Where would she go?
The answer is immediate and obvious; she would go home.
I grab my keys, my movements sharp, efficient. The pain is just information now, a signal from a damaged machine. I ignoreit. I take the elevator down to the garage, the descent a mirror of her own escape. The Challenger starts with an angry roar, the sound a perfect match for the fury churning in my gut.
I tear through the city streets, the laws of traffic a suggestion I have no time for. The drive is short. I pull up across from her apartment building, its shabby brick facade a stark contrast to my own sterile world. I kill the engine and just watch for a moment. This is her territory. Her past.
I get out and cross the street. The front door is unlocked. I take the stairs two at a time, my long legs eating up the distance. I arrive at her floor, the air smelling of old carpet and fried onions. Apartment 3B.
The lock is cheap. A credit card and ten seconds of pressure is all it takes. The door clicks open.
I step inside, and for the first time, I am invadingherworld. Not the cage I built for her, but the nest she made for herself. It’s small, cluttered, and so profoundly, achinglyher. A half-dead plant sits by the window. Books are stacked on every surface. A yellow mug with a chipped rim sits on the counter. I pick it up, my thumb tracing the edge. It feels more real, more intimate than anything in my loft. This was her life. The life I took from her.
I am not here for sentiment, I am here for intelligence.
I move through the small apartment with methodical precision. I am not looking for her; I know she is not here. I am looking for what she took. In the bedroom, I see the closet door is slightly ajar. A shoebox sits on the floor beneath the shelf, its lid askew. It’s empty. She took her emergency money.
She’s not just running. She’s planning, she’s equipping herself.
The realization doesn't bring fear. It brings a strange, sharp clarity. I underestimated her. I saw her as a broken thing I needed to protect, a symbol of my grief for Leo. I was wrong. She is not a symbol. She is a fire, and I was the one who lit the match.
I pull out my phone, my bruised fingers protesting as I dial. It rings twice.
“Yeah?” The voice is rough. It’s my lead foreman, a man who knows how to get things done without asking questions.
“I need eyes,” I say, my voice low and cold. “I’m sending you a photo. A woman. Her name is Aria. I want every crew, every site, from the docks to the high-rises. I want every man looking. There’s a ten-thousand-dollar bonus for the first credible sighting. Another twenty for whoever finds her.”
There’s a pause. “She dangerous?”
I look around the small, dusty apartment, at the ghost of the life she lived.
“Yes,” I say, the word tasting like truth and irony. “To me.”
I hang up. I walk out of her apartment, leaving the door unlocked behind me. Let her think she has a sanctuary. Let her think she has a head start.
This is my city. My crews are its eyes and ears. She can run, but every street corner, every alley, every rooftop belongs to me.
I will turn over every stone in this city. She is mine, and I am going to collect.
Thirty Five
Aria
Isitonthecold,splintered floor of my studio for what feels like an eternity. Time has become a fluid, unreliable thing, measured only by the slow creep of hunger and the intensity of the silence. My world has shrunk to this ten-by-ten room, and my only connection to the outside is the small, black burner phone that I stare at for hours, willing it to ring.
I can’t stay here forever. This room is a hiding place, not a fortress. I need information; I need to know what he’s doing,how he’s looking for me. I need to turn his own obsession into a weapon I can use against him.
There is only one person who might help me. One person who is not Cassian.
Milo.
The memory is sharp, a single point of light in the suffocating darkness of my captivity. It was the second day. Cassian was at the door, snarling into his phone, furious about some missing component for a new lock. Milo arrived less than fifteen minutes later, breathless, holding a small case. Cassian snatched it from him, his back turned. In that brief moment, Milo’s eyes met mine. He saw me. He saw the bruises. And in his eyes, I saw it all: shock, pity, and a profound, overriding fear. It was a silent, desperate warning.
He is afraid of Cassian, and that makes him a potential ally.
My hands are shaking as I power on the burner phone. The screen glows to life, a beacon in the oppressive dark. I don’t have Milo’s direct number, but I remember the name of Cassian’s company. Kostas Development. A quick search on the phone’s primitive browser brings up a main office number.
My finger hovers over the call button. This is it. This is the first shot fired in my war. I press the button.
