But curiosity had always been my weakness. Gabriel had recognized that on the very first day, when I'd sat across from Mr. Winters in that coffee shop and signed a contract I hadn't read, convinced I was too smart to be trapped.Curiosity killed the rabbit,he'd said once, during one of our sessions, his voice warm with amusement.But it also made her interesting.
I opened the box.
Inside, nestled in a bed of pale pink tissue paper, was a music box. Small enough to fit in my palm, made of polished wood the color of honey, with a tiny brass crank on one side. It was exquisite. Antique, maybe, or a very good reproduction. The kind of thing Gabriel would have displayed in his study, alongside his leather-bound journals and his collection of psychological texts.
My hand trembled as I turned the crank. The first notes floated into the quiet apartment, and my blood went cold.
Brahms. The lullaby. Not the version most people knew—this was the arrangement Gabriel had played during our conditioning sessions, a particular interpretationwith a slightly off-key note in the third measure. He'd said the imperfection helped anchor the memory. Made the association stronger.
"Whenever you hear this melody, your body will remember what it's learned. Your muscles will relax. Your mind will open. You'll be ready to receive instruction."
The music box slipped from my fingers and clattered onto the floor, still playing its terrible song. I stood frozen, watching it spin, my body responding exactly as it had been trained—shoulders dropping, jaw going slack, a fog settling over my thoughts like morning mist.
"Nathan!" The name came out strangled. "Nathan, come here!"
The shower cut off. Footsteps, wet and hurried. Then Nathan was there, towel around his waist, water still beading on his chest. He took in the scene in a single glance—me, pale and shaking; the music box on the floor; the lullaby still playing its broken melody.
"Where did this come from?" He didn't touch it. His voice had gone sharp, the way it did before a mission.
"Outside the door. No return address."
He bent down, picked up the box with careful hands, and examined it. His jaw tightened. I watched him catalog the details—the craftsmanship, the mechanism, the lack of identifying marks—and knew he was reaching the same conclusion I had.
"Gabriel," he said, and the name hit the air like a curse.
"You don't know that—"
"Who else would send you a music box that plays your conditioning trigger?" He turned it over in his hands, and I saw his knuckles whiten. "He's trying to reach you. Trying to activate old programming."
"Maybe it's just—"
"It's not." He strode to the kitchen, and before I could stop him, he brought the music box down against the edge of the counter. The wood splintered with a sound like breaking bone. The mechanism gave one last wheeze of melody before going silent.
"Nathan!" I grabbed his arm, too late. "Why did you—"
"Because it's poison." He turned to face me, and I saw something in his expression I'd never seen before—a fury so deep it bordered on violence. "He's trying to get inside your head. Trying to undo everything we've built. I won't let him."
"You could have kept it for evidence. We could have traced—"
"Traced what? There's no return address. No fingerprints except ours now." He dropped the shattered remains into the trash. "It was a threat, Bunny. Nothing more. He wants you to know he's still out there."
The lullaby had stopped, but I could still hear it. Echoing in my ears, in my bones, in the parts of my brain that Gabriel had shaped like clay. The fog was lifting, slowly, but my body still felt strange—distant, like I was watching myself from very far away.
"I need to sit down," I said.
Nathan guided me to the couch, his anger shifting to concern with the fluidity of long practice. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have broken it in front of you. I just—the thought of him reaching out, after everything..."
"I know." I pressed my palms against my thighs, trying to ground myself. "I just need a minute."
He sat beside me, not touching but present, and I focused on breathing. In through the nose, hold for four, out through the mouth. The technique he'd taught me. The technique that worked, most of the time.
But the lullaby was still there, buried beneath the silence.Whenever you hear this melody, your body will remember.
"You're safe," Nathan said. "He can't touch you. I won't let him."
"What if he's close? What if he knows where we live?"
"He doesn't. I've been careful. We've been careful." His hand found mine, squeezing gently. "He's just trying to scare you. Don't let him win."
