All Chapters of Contract of Hearts : Chapter 11 - Chapter 20

Leo’s redemption arc began with a lie.A simple one, as far as deceptions went. He called his contact in Castellano’s network—a jittery middleman named De Luca who handled communications precisely because he was too insignificant to be worth killing—and told him that Kieran Locke was moving the evidence. Not the flash drive or the notebook, but copies. Dozens of them. Encrypted files stored on dead drops across the city, each one set to release its contents to a different media outlet if not manually reset every forty-eight hours.“He’s paranoid,” Leo said, his voice flat and convincing over the secure line. Mira listened through the speaker, sitting beside Kieran in the study, her hand gripping his knee so hard her knuckles were white. “The only way to stop the leak is to get the master list of drop locations from him directly. And he doesn’t trust anyone with that. Not even me anymore.”De Luca’s reply was static-scrambled but audible. “Castellano won’t like this.”“Castellano doesn

The helicopter blades faded into the distance, leaving behind a silence that felt heavier than the gunfire had been.Mira stood in the center of the penthouse living room, still wearing the same clothes from the rescue—torn, dirty, smelling of fear and sweat and the metallic tang of blood that wasn't hers. Kieran's security team moved around her like ghosts, checking windows, resetting alarms, speaking in low murmurs she couldn't quite hear.She should shower. Should eat. Should sleep for about a thousand years.Instead, she walked to the window and pressed her forehead against the cold glass, staring out at the city lights.Castellano was out there.Alive. Free. Already planning his next move."Mira."Kieran's voice was soft, but she heard the tension beneath it. She didn't turn around."He's going to come back," she said. "You know that, right? This isn't over. It's not even close to over."Footsteps approached. Then Kieran was behind her, his hands settling on her shoulders, his wa

The hospital became a second home.Mira spent every daylight hour at her mother’s bedside, watching over her as she drifted in and out of sedated sleep. The doctors spoke in hushed, clinical tones about recovery timelines and psychological trauma and the long road ahead. Mira nodded along, signed forms, answered questions, and felt nothing.Not nothing, exactly. Something colder. Something that lived beneath her skin like ice water in her veins.She hadn’t cried since that first day. Hadn’t screamed or raged or broken down. She sat in the hard plastic chair beside her mother’s bed and held her hand and waited for the numbness to crack.It didn’t.Kieran came every evening. He sat in the corner of the room, silent and watchful, his gray eyes tracking every nurse who entered, every doctor who paused too long at the chart. He didn’t hover. Didn’t push. Just existed in her orbit, a dark star whose gravity held her together.“You need to eat,” he said on the third night, appearing at her s

The federal detention center smelled like bleach and despair.Mira had dressed carefully that morning—not in armor, but in something that felt like it. Black pants, a cream silk blouse, the sapphire ring glowing on her finger. Kieran had wanted her to wear a wire. She'd refused. Castellano would know. He always knew.Instead, she carried herself like a woman who had nothing to lose.Kieran walked beside her, his hand pressed against the small of her back, a silent promise. His gray eyes were flat, cold, the mask so firmly in place that even she couldn't read him. He'd argued with her for an hour that morning—begged her to stay behind, offered to send Simone, offered to go alone.She'd refused every option."My mother," she'd said, "is dying because of choices she made to protect me. I owe her this."Kieran had kissed her then—hard and desperate, the kind of kiss that tasted like goodbye. "If he touches you—""He won't. You'll be right there.""I can't protect you from his words."Mira

The Adirondacks in winter were a cathedral of silence.Mira watched the trees blur past the window of the SUV, their branches heavy with snow, their trunks dark against the white. Kieran drove—too fast, his knuckles white on the steering wheel, his gray eyes fixed on the road ahead. Leo sat in the back, his broad shoulders tense, his hand resting on the weapon holstered beneath his jacket.They'd brought a team. Three other vehicles, carrying federal agents and Kieran's private security. The cabin was supposed to be empty—Castellano had been in custody for weeks, his network in ruins—but no one was taking chances.Not after the last trap.Not after Castellano had revealed himself as Mira's biological father."The turn is half a mile ahead," Leo said, consulting a tablet. "Looks like the road hasn't been plowed. We may have to walk the last stretch."Kieran's jaw tightened. "Then we walk."Mira stared out the window, her hand resting on her stomach. The baby was barely a heartbeat, bar