Chapter 53 Lark
Lark
Location: Same
Time: Minutes Later
He’s holding himself together.
Barely.
Most people wouldn’t see it.
They’d see control.
Authority.
Strength.
But I see the fracture lines.
In the tension in his shoulders.
In the way his jaw keeps tightening like he’s trying to lock something down that won’t stay contained.
“They’re using you,” he says.
“I know.”
“They’re turning you into the trigger.”
“I know.”
“And you’re still going to pull it.”
“Yes.”
The word hangs there.
Heavy.
Unapologetic.
His voice breaks.
Just slightly.
Just enough to matter.
“You’re not expendable.”
My throat tightens.
Neither is he.
That’s the problem.
That’s always been the problem.
“I can build a deadman cascade,” I say. “If anything happens to me—if I’m taken, silenced, discredited—everything goes public anyway. Everywhere. Simultaneously.”
His eyes lock onto mine.
Sharp.
Searching.
“You planned for dying.”
“No,” I correct quietly. “I planned for not being able to stop them quietly.”
There’s a difference.
A huge one.
He knows it.
That’s why it scares him.
Silence stretches.
The kind that changes things.
Then—
“If you do this without me,” he says, voice low and lethal, “I will burn every person involved to the ground.”
I don’t flinch.
Because I believe him.
Completely.
“I know.”
“That’s not a threat.”
“I know.”
It’s a promise.
And for a second—
just a second—
I let myself imagine what that looks like.
Aaron unleashed.
Not controlled.
Not contained.
What he would become if I disappear.
It’s not justice.
It’s annihilation.
The system pings again.
Louder now.
Insistent.
Hungry.
He steps closer.
Close enough that I can feel the heat of him.
“Then don’t make me choose that version of myself,” he says.
That—
That’s the one thing I don’t have an answer for.
Behind him, Ronan appears in the doorway.
Fast.
Focused.
Already moving.
“It’s happening,” he says.
Aaron turns. “Where?”
Ronan’s eyes flick to me.
Grim.
Certain.
“They’ve started the countdown.”
My stomach drops.
Because now—
It’s no longer theoretical.
It’s live.