A flicker crosses the younger man’s face at my words. Good. It shows they understand the theater.
I want to see her face when the hope finally drains from it. I want to be the last thing she sees in this world. Dorian thinks he can build a new life with her, that he can find happiness in the ruins of my own plans. What a fool.
“Is that clear?”
The older man gives a single, sharp nod. “Crystal.”
“Good.” I turn toward the window, my reflection a pale, composed ghost against the glittering city. “You have your instructions. I expect a full report on her movements by morning. Now, get out.”
The men leave. I tap the screen for tide charts and cliff access points, running the variables, I will use until the plan fits like a glove.
The California dusk has painted the horizon in molten fire. Appropriate. A burning sky for what’s coming.
Shadows, sorrow, and sudden ends.
* * *
Dorian
The sun is high—midday—but my office feels like midnight. I haven’t slept. Not a minute. Every time I close my eyes, I see Della’s face, the fragile hope in her eyes swallowed by the shadows I let chase her.
A day and a sleepless night passed since Della’s message, and the silence is a slow, grinding torture. The half-empty bottle of scotch on my desk is a testament to a night spent wrestling with ghosts and the raw, gnawing fear that I’ve already failed her again.
The door opens, and David strides in. He looks exhausted, his jaw tight, but his eyes are sharp with grim purpose. He’s not here to talk; he’s here with a verdict. He places a tablet on my desk without a word.
“You have to see this,” he says. No preamble.
I gesture him closer. “What is it?”
“Leah,” he says, his eyes locking on mine. “When I came in for our meeting yesterday, I saw her with Julian.”
A muscle jumps in my jaw. “Julian?” The eager, devoted assistant I hired a year ago.
“Something was off,” David continues, his voice low and urgent. “She had him cornered, gripping his arm in the kitchenette. The look in his eyes… It ate at me all night.”
A bitter taste fills my mouth. “Show me.”
“I pulled the feeds this morning. Whole sections were wiped clean. He even tried to wipe the server, the coward.” David says, pulling a chair closer. “But erasing isn’t the same as destroying. Took me hours, but I to recovered them.”
He taps the screen.
The image is from the small conference room. Last week. The angle is from a hidden corner camera. It shows Leah, and it shows Julian. But they aren’t talking. My blood runs cold as I watch my own assistant, the boy I trusted with every detail of my life, worshiping at the feet of the woman who tried to destroy it. The betrayal is a physical blow, but it’s not what makes my heart stop.
“There’s another one,” David says, his voice tight. He swipes to the next file.
It’s the kitchenette. Yesterday morning. The quality is grainy, the sound nonexistent, but the image is brutally clear. I watch Leah’s predatory rage, Julian’s terror. I see him fumble for his phone and show her the screen. My blood turns to ice as I realize exactly what he is showing her.
“He gave her Della’s location,” I state, the words a dead weight in the room.
David’s face is grim. He pulls up another screen—a flight manifest.
“It’s worse, Dorian. Leah booked a one-way ticket to San Diego yesterday afternoon, right after she left here. She’s already there.”
The room stills. Leah is hunting Della. And I led her right to the door.
For a single, silent moment, the world stops. The rage, the guilt, the terror—it all collapses inward into a single point of cold, diamond-hard focus. The time for patience is a luxury I no longer have.
I turn, leaving David at the screen, and stride back to my desk. My hands are steady as I pull out my phone, dialing a number I haven’t used in years. The storm in my chest is no longer chaotic; it is a cold, controlled singularity of purpose.
