Paperwork

Chapter 71Morning light felt like an intrusion. I stood at the kitchen window, coffee gone cold in my mug, watching the tree line where the camera had caught nothing and everything. The house smelled of fresh toast and tension. Lila moved quietly behind me, setting plates down with deliberate care. Riven sat at the table, eyes shadowed, typing on his laptop with mechanical precision.None of us had slept more than an hour.“The new cameras are online,” Riven said without looking up. “Triple redundancy. Motion alerts straight to all our phones. If anyone breathes near the property, we’ll know.”Lila slid into the chair across from him. “Good. But what about the thing Marcus actually wants?” She glanced at me, then at Riven. “The key asset. We’re not pretending anymore, right?”I set my mug down. “We’re not.”Riven closed the laptop. For a long moment the only sound was the refrigerator humming. Then he spoke, voice low.“Twelve years ago I was broke, running, and desperate enough to m

Summons

Chapter 72The coordinates glowed on my phone screen like a challenge. A remote park clearing about forty minutes outside the city. Neutral ground, as Marcus called it. I memorized the location, then deleted the message. Twenty-eight hours. The number felt smaller every time I thought it.Lila caught me in the hallway. “What aren’t you telling us?”I hesitated only a second. No secrets. Not anymore. I showed her the screen. She read the text once, twice, then handed the phone back with steady hands that didn’t match the fear in her eyes.“You’re not going alone.”“I might have to.”Riven appeared behind her, drawn by our voices. He took the phone, read it, and went very still. “This is a trap. He wants you isolated. Wants me to wonder if you’ll come back.”“He wants all of us off balance,” I said. “But if I don’t show, he’ll make good on the threat. We’ve seen how close he can get.”We returned to the war room. The whiteboard now held the new coordinates circled in red. Kane’s name un

The witness

Chapter 73The prison visiting room smelled of bleach and old regret. I sat across from Kane at the scratched metal table, the plexiglass barrier between us feeling thinner than it should. Riven and Lila waited outside — a compromise. Kane had insisted on speaking to me alone. “Some ghosts only talk to the man who buried them,” he’d said through the intermediary.He looked older. Harder. Fifteen years had carved deep lines into his face, but his eyes still held that calculating glint I remembered from the empire days.“Voss,” he greeted, voice rough from disuse. “Didn’t think I’d see you on this side of the glass.”“I didn’t think I’d come back,” I said. “But Marcus changed the math.”Kane leaned forward, chains clinking softly. “Marcus always changes the math. You here about the paper?”I nodded once. No point dancing around it. “You witnessed it. The agreement. Tell me what it really says.”He studied me for a long moment, like he was weighing old loyalties against old grudges. “It

Safe House

Chapter 74The first safe house was a derelict warehouse on the industrial edge of the city, the kind of place that had once hummed with empire business and now only echoed with broken glass and rain. We arrived just after dusk, the 48-hour clock down to eighteen hours. Riven drove. Lila sat in the back with a tablet, monitoring the new security feeds back home. I rode shotgun, gun in the glove compartment and tension coiled tight in my shoulders.“This was one of his bolt holes,” Riven said, killing the engine a block away. “Marcus liked keeping physical backups. Paper doesn’t hack as easily as servers.”We moved like ghosts — dark clothes, silenced steps, years of old instincts returning whether we wanted them or not. The side door hung crooked on rusted hinges. Inside, the air smelled of mold and motor oil. Flashlights cut narrow beams through the dust.Lila stayed close to me. “If the original is here, it’ll be in a hidden compartment or false wall. Marcus was paranoid about that

The Park

Chapter 75Twelve hours became eight. Then six. The house felt like a pressure cooker with the lid bolted down. We sat around the kitchen table with the printed copies of the original agreement spread out like battle maps. Every page felt heavier than the last.“You’re not going alone,” Lila said for the fifth time. Her voice was steel, but her eyes were raw. “He wants you isolated so he can pick us off one by one.”Riven stood by the window, checking the feeds again. “She’s right. This isn’t negotiation. It’s a trap designed years ago. If you walk in there without backup, you’re handing him exactly what he wants.”I rubbed my temples. The scar on my side ached with every heartbeat. “If I don’t go alone, he starts shooting. You saw the scope on Lila. He’s not bluffing.”The live feed from earlier still burned behind my eyes — that red dot dancing across our front window. Marcus had made his terms crystal clear. Come alone or assets depreciate permanently.We had rehearsed every angle.

Erupted

Chapter 76The world exploded in dirt and noise.I hit the ground hard, the impact jarring every bone as the second shot chewed into the pavilion wall inches from my head. Dirt sprayed across my face. My heart hammered against my ribs. Riven’s voice exploded in my earpiece, sharp with urgency.“Two shooters! Ridge north and east! Move, Damien—now!”Adrenaline flooded my system. I scrambled low on elbows and knees, clutching the folder of documents like a lifeline. Another crack split the dawn air. Bark and splinters rained down. I pushed up and broke into a sprint toward the tree line, zigzagging the way Riven had drilled into me years ago during those long nights when survival meant staying unpredictable.“On your six!” Riven barked. His rifle cracked twice from the ridge. One distant shadow jerked and dropped.I reached the trees and slammed my back against a thick trunk, chest heaving, trying to steady my breathing. The wire against my skin was still live, but static flickered at t