جميع فصول : الفصل -الفصل 100

LENAWe spent three days confirming everything we suspected while keeping a close eye on the fourth property, cross-referencing everything while studying the quiet, wooded estate from all angles, until the connections to Elias Marlow felt as inevitable as anything this investigation had uncovered so far.We still had to ask ourselves the more tangible question that we hadn't wanted to confront, not even as we came to terms with the evidence. The one that had stayed the quiet, simmering concern at the back of our discussions."We can't just walk up and knock," Noah said, only half-jokingly as he stood where the group had gathered once more into our library. "Either way, whatever we do next has to actually work.""Agreed," Aiden said. "Which means we really need to consider what working means in this instance. Exposure? Justice via the council? Something else more direct?""Exposure requires proof the council can't ignore," Astra said. "Everything we have is compelling to us. Whether it

LENAWe met Thorne at the same ranger station, the cold and silence having grown familiar around us by now, and Aiden was prudent and only shared fragments of information we had collected, rather than the whole we had offered Okafor."We have a name," Aiden said, "of someone associated with what happened twentytwo years prior, and we wanted to know if it would ring any bells with you."Thorne's expression was carefully controlled, and he watched Aiden warily."Elias Marlow," Aiden said, watching him intently.For just a moment, some deep emotion flickered behind Thorne's gaze, too fast to be anything but certain that you had seen it correctly"That name means something to you."Thorne was quiet for a long moment, and some calculation played out behind his keen, careful eyes. "It might. I knew a man once for brief amount of time before everything unraveled, but he kept his personal details close and went always by E. Marlow, for all intents and purposes. The look in his eyes is familia

LENAOkafor didn't show up for our weekly check-in on Wednesday, and by Thursday morning, it had gone a day too long."She's always shown up," Aiden said, pacing the library corner in a manner I had never seen before. "Always. Never missed one, not in weeks of this. Something's wrong."Cole's hand found mine, both of us feeling the particular kind of dread knowing that yet another person we cared about has been silenced like Sarah Marsh, Rhys, her own husband."What do we do?" Damien asked."Carefully, " Astra said. "Panicking gets us nowhere."Noah was already doing research and managed to find the particular piece of information that sent us into tense silence."Her car," he muttered, finding the link between our last disappearance and Sarah's. "Was found abandoned two counties away yesterday morning. It doesn't show up anywhere in the system as belonging to anyone, but I did a location cross-reference based on her common travel routes, and it doesn't match any she would have reason

LENAThe hour dragged slower than any I'd ever experienced, the hall vibrating with anxious, uncertain energy. Watching to see if Vane would finally honor the promise Aiden had extracted from him.Cole never stopped holding my hand, and I was grateful for the grounding sensation and the effort it took to keep my fingers entwined with his own. The pressure of his grip reminded me that I had nothing to fear when it came to the most terrifying part of that evening, facing a hall of strangers.When Okafor finally emerged, flanked on either side by two council guards through the side door, the hall fell completely silent. Watching her like hawks as she made her way, slowly, purposefully, until she arrived at the raised table.She appeared different than the last time I'd seen her, sunken around the eyes, a bruise forming along one cheekbone that hadn't been there the last time I'd seen her, that careful composure of hers unraveled into something dangerously close to fragile. But here she w

LENADamien's call pulled me from half-sleep, the sound of his voice rough with exhaustion making me sit up before he even said anything."Someone broke into my father's home," he said. "He's safe, he wasn't there when they did it. He already moved to the safe house Aiden set up, but they were going through everything. All of it. His office, his papers. It's obvious they were after whatever he could have possibly hidden away as leverage."Cole was already on his feet beside me, his phone in hand, alerting the others, and within twenty minutes we were all crowding the usual floor of the usual library, where we had unofficially been working out of this entire time."It's not a coincidence," was Aiden's immediate response after Damien finished telling us exactly what had happened. "Vane knows about the reconvened session, knows it's happening, and he's trying to cover his tracks, remove any other evidence that might show up before we meet again.""Did they find anything?" Astra asked."N