LOGINSebastian’s POV“Down.”The word leaves my mouth the second the lights die. Glass rattles somewhere in the front hall. A frame falls. Eleanor lets out one sharp breath, not quite a scream. Then everything goes black and quiet in the wrong way. Not power-cut quiet, but occupied quiet.I pull my phone out and switch on the flashlight. White light cuts a narrow line through the dark.Aurora is already moving. Of course she is. She reaches Nadia first and pulls her away from the window. Good. Megan is pressed against the wall near the mantel. Arthur is still in his chair, one hand on his cane, looking annoyed more than frightened. Also good. Eleanor is halfway to her desk.“Stay away from the windows,” I say. Another crash, closer this time, in the front hall. Someone is inside.Aurora looks at me. No panic. Just one sharp nod. “I’ll check the hall,” I say. “No,” she says immediately. “We do it together.” Not the time to argue. I nod once. We move.Nadia says, “I’m not staying here.” “Yes
Aurora’s POV“What does that mean?”I hear the question come out of my mouth, but I already know why no one answers right away. Because the room knows exactly what it means.The key was left to me; the code phrase was left to Nadia. My mother split the truth the same way she split us: neat, cruel, and practical. Still choosing strategy over softness even from the grave.Clara looks at me. Then Nadia. “It means Elena did not trust either of you alone.” That lands harder than it should. Because some part of me still wants my mother to have loved us in a way that looked simple; she didn’t.She loved us like a woman under siege. Like someone who knew what men with money and family names do when they feel their inheritance slipping.Sebastian says, “What exactly is the code phrase?”Clara shakes her head. “Marian never told me.”Nadia’s fingers tighten around the locket. “My grandmother knew.” “Yes.” “And she told no one.” “Also yes.” Good. Another dead woman with a secret and a timetable.
Sebastian’s POV“Don’t open that door.” I say it before the third knock lands; no one argues. Good.Aurora is already holding the affidavit tighter. Nadia still has the locket in one hand and the note in the other. Arthur hasn’t moved from the chair. Megan is nearest the window, trying to see the street without being seen from it.Eleanor Vale stands by the hall table with her chin lifted, the way old women do when they’ve already lived through enough to stop performing fear for anyone else. The knock comes again.Then a woman’s voice. “Eleanor, if you hand the wrong paper to the wrong people, Marian dies for the second time.”That gets a reaction, not from Eleanor, but from Nadia. I see it in the way her whole body goes still. Junebug was one thing. That name, that memory-this is another. “Do you know the voice?” I ask without looking away from the door.“No,” Nadia says. “But she knows too much.” Fair. Too much is becoming a pattern.Aurora steps toward the door. I catch her elbow.
Nadia’s POV“What did you give her?”I hear my own voice before I feel it. Eleanor Vale does not look away. “Not what she came for,” she says. That is not enough. I step closer. “Then what did you give her?”The old woman folds her hands once on top of the desk, like she is deciding how much of me she can stand to look at before the truth does the rest.“A decoy packet,” she says. “Blank legal pages in an old envelope. Enough weight to feel important. Nothing inside that could hurt you.” The air in the room changes. Aurora lets out one breath. Sebastian does not move at all. Good. Let him stay still. One of us should. “How did you know it wasn’t me?” I ask.Eleanor studies my face. “Because I asked her what Marian used to call you when you were sick.” I stop, not because I don’t remember, because I do. So clearly it hurts."Junebug," I say.Eleanor nods. “She said Nadia.” That lands somewhere ugly and soft at the same time. My grandmother knew someone might come using my name. She lef
Sebastian’s POV“Take the river road," Megan says it from the back seat so fast it sounds like the thought was waiting on her tongue. “If Vincent thinks we’re going to Vale, he’ll send people to the main route first.” I don’t waste time asking how she knows that. I take the next left hard enough to throw all of us slightly sideways. Good. Let the car complain. We don’t have time to drive politely.Aurora has Adrian’s will open in her lap again. Nadia is reading the hidden note for what must be the tenth time, like the words might shift if she stares long enough. Find Eleanor Vale before nine. Nine is getting too close.Arthur sits in the back beside Nadia, one hand on his cane, breathing steadily but slower than before. He’s older now than he was an hour ago. Or maybe he just looks that way because no one in the car is pretending around him anymore. “Address,” I say.Arthur answers immediately. “Bellcombe Row. End house. Blue door. She’s lived there twenty years.” “Why there?” Aurora
Nadia’s POV“They’re here.”Megan says it from the window, and the room snaps back into motion.One second ago I was staring at the will in Arthur’s hands, trying to understand how a dead man could leave me everything and still never come for me. Next, Sebastian is already moving toward the door, Aurora is shoving the wooden box back into my arms, and Arthur is folding the paper with hands that look older than they did a minute ago. “How many?” Sebastian asks.“Two cars,” Megan says. “Maybe four men. One woman.” She glances back at us. “Victoria.” Of course. I take the will from Arthur before anyone can tell me not to. It is mine too.Not just Aurora’s. Not just Sebastian’s problem. Not just another piece of a story men keep reading over our heads, mine. “Back stairs,” Megan says. “If we leave now, we beat them to the hall.”Aurora turns to Arthur. “Can you move fast enough?”He gives her a look that almost feels offended. “Try me.” Good, because I am tired of fragile old men tonight.
Aurora's POV"Pull over." Lucas glances at Sebastian first.Sebastian looks at me."Aurora." "Pull over."The car slows. I do not wait for it to stop completely. I open the door the second the tires hit the curb and step out into the cold night air like the car itself was suffocating me.It was.Na
Aurora's POV"We need to leave."Nadia does not move. She is still on the floor. Still staring at the hospital tag like it might change if she looks at it long enough. It will not."Nadia." Nothing.I crouch down in front of her and take her hands.They are cold. "I know this is too much," I say. "
Aurora's POV"Find me for what?"Nadia's voice is too loud for the small room. I do not have an answer. The locket is still in my hand. The photograph. The word. My mother's handwriting on something that has been hanging around Nadia's neck for fifteen years, safe, one word, one child, not Nadia, b
Aurora's POV"You can't just show up at her door."Sebastian says it like he already knows I am not going to listen. He is right. "Watch me."Lucas is already driving toward Nadia's apartment. I gave him the address before Sebastian could argue. Now we are three blocks away, and I can feel the tens







