CHAPTER 2
ALESSIA P.O.V.
The low hum of the penthouse’s climate control was the only moving thing in the room.
I stared at the eight-by-ten glossy photograph sitting dead center on the white marble table.
It was me. Me in my Quantico blues, looking young and violently naive.
The name printed underneath in bold black ink—Special Agent Alessia Heller—felt like a death certificate.
I dug my fingernails so hard into the palms of my hands that the sharp, biting pain was the only thing keeping my lungs functioning.
The psychological safety net I’d spent three years weaving as Alessia the harmless logistics clerk had just been ripped out from under me.
"That’s a lot of ink for a lie, isn’t it?" he said, his voice flat.
I didn't answer. I couldn't.
"Don’t look so surprised," Leon continued, unbuttoning his shirt cuffs with agonizing, predatory slowness. "You knew this day was coming."
He rolled his sleeves up. Forearms corded with muscle. A faint, jagged scar near his wrist. He wasn't rushing. He was prepping for work, and I was the project. He unclasped his heavy platinum watch and set it on the marble table. The metallic clack sounded like a gunshot.
"Is that the face you made when you swore the oath, Agent?" he asked.
I shifted my weight, dropping my center of gravity into a baseline fight-or-flight stance. Unarmed. Backup miles away. He was balanced, perfectly ready, and terrifyingly calm.
"I expected you to be faster on the draw," he said casually. "You look small in this light, Alessia. The Bureau really didn't teach you how to handle a burn notice, did they?"
I ignored him, my tactical brain finally rebooting, cataloging the perimeter.
I looked at the floor-to-ceiling glass wrapping the penthouse.
Custom-tinted. Thick enough to stop a .50 caliber round.
No latches. No vents. The acoustic panels on the walls suddenly looked like the padding of a psych ward cell.
I traced a grey vein in the edge of the marble table with my index finger, my eyes darting across the sterile leather couches, looking for a loose object, a heavy edge, anything I could drive into a man’s skull.
I missed the biometric locks on the inside doors when I studied the blueprints three years ago.
Deadass the dumbest oversight of my career.
"The glass is reinforced, in case you were thinking of a dramatic exit," Leon said, tracking my eyes. "No one hears anything in here. Not even screams."
I stepped back, feeling the vibration of the high-voltage security systems through the soles of my shoes.
"Look at the view," he added. "It’s the last time you’ll see the city from this side."
I reached up, pretending to push my dark auburn hair out of my face, and tapped the skin behind my right ear. The sub-dermal conductive earpiece activated. I coughed slightly to mask the movement of my jaw, letting the vibration carry my voice into the bone-conduction mic.
"Broken Arrow. Level Ten. Do you copy?" I whispered, my teeth biting down on my lip. Static roared in my ear. A massive spike of heat rushed up my spine. "Trenton, pick up the goddamn phone."
Nothing. Not a click. Not an open channel. Dead air.
"Shit... please, someone be there," I muttered under my breath. The realization that my handler wasn't on the other end was a physical weight crushing my ribs.
Leon walked toward the bar, completely unbothered, pouring himself a neat peated Scotch. He didn't take his ice-blue eyes off me. He swirled the ice in his glass, the clinking sound filling the empty space between us.
"You’re wasting your breath, Agent," he said, gesturing vaguely toward the ceiling. "Faraday was a genius. You’re just a girl with a radio that doesn't work. Nothing leaves this room. Not even a radio wave."
Motherfucker. He installed a military-grade Faraday mesh during the renovation. Not for privacy. For me. He let me transmit into a goddamn vacuum for months.
I looked back down at the file on the table.
It wasn't a copy. I reached out, my finger trembling as I flipped the cover page.
The crisp sound of the high-bond paper felt abnormally loud.
There were my own fingerprints on the background check form.
And right at the top, signed in blue ink, was the signature of Trenton Cross.
My handler. The man who pushed me into this deep-cover assignment.
"Trenton? No... he wouldn't," I breathed out, the words tasting like copper. Rage, pure and feral, obliterated my panic. "How much did you pay him, Leon? Motherfucker... he sold me out."
Every check-in. Every dead-drop. Trenton was probably reading my reports to Leon over a steak dinner. I was a dead woman walking.
I reset my posture, dropping into a half-crouch, weight on the balls of my feet. I slowly tucked my hair behind my ears, clearing my peripheral vision. The tension in my calves coiled tight. The heavy crystal decanter was two feet to my left.
"You think I’m just going to sit here?" I snarled. "I’ve killed men twice your size with less than a decanter. Don't come any closer."
I lunged. I put every ounce of fast-twitch muscle I had into closing the distance to the table. I was fast. I was top of my class at Quantico fast.
Leon was already there.
He didn't even throw a punch. He stepped directly into my space, his hip checking mine, a massive wall of dark wool and kinetic force.
The fabric of his sleeve brushed roughly against my arm as he casually flicked his wrist, sweeping the decanter right off the table.
It hit the plush Persian rug with a heavy, muted thump.
He neutralized my assault with the effort of a man swatting a fly.
"Too slow, Alessia," he murmured, his body heat radiating right into my chest. "I know the FBI’s CQC manual by heart. Page thirty-four, isn’t it? Try again. It’s more fun when you fight."
I scrambled backward, my breathing hitching shallowly in my chest. He loomed over me, using his 6'3" frame to blot out the light and block the main thoroughfare of the room. I almost tripped, my heel sinking into the thick pile of the rug as I gave up ground. He was herding me.
"Where are you going?" he asked, the scent of cedar and expensive tobacco rolling off his breath. "The door is that way. But you already know it’s useless."
I backed up another step. He matched it.
"Fuck, you’re shaking," he observed. "Is it fear or adrenaline?"
"Fuck you," I spat, moving in a tight semi-circle toward the kitchen, trying to find an angle.
Every time I pivoted, Leon shifted his weight perfectly, correcting his stance to cut off my escape. He was steering me away from the center of the room. He adjusted his cufflinks as he walked, his eyes never breaking from mine.
"You have nowhere to run, Alessia," he said, the rhythmic sound of his heavy shoes scuffing the marble echoing in my skull. "Look at you. Trapped in a cage you helped me build. Stop. You’re making yourself dizzy."
I saw a gap. A three-foot margin between the sofa and his left flank. I didn't think, I just exploded into a sprint. My sneakers squealed on the marble. My shoulder brushed a heavy ceramic vase on a pedestal, sending it wobbling violently on its base as I flew past.
"Move!" I shouted at nothing. "I’m not staying here! Goddammit!"
My lungs burned as I closed the distance to the heavy steel doors of the front foyer. The glowing blue light of the override panel mocked me. I slammed both hands against the cold steel, mashing my palm flat against the biometric scanner.
A cold, synthetic voice chimed overhead: Biometric authorization required. User: Heller, Alessia—Status: Access Denied.
The screen pulsed a violent, bloody red. I punched the steel door, the impact vibrating painfully all the way up my ulna. I grabbed the edge of the keypad panel, trying to pry the plastic casing off with my bare hands. One of my fingernails snapped backward with a sharp, sickening sting.
"Open the fucking door!" I screamed at the camera lens in the corner. "Let me out! Leon, open this goddamn door right now!"
"Are you quite finished, Alessia?"
I slid an inch down the door, my chest heaving, and looked over my shoulder.
Leon had stopped about ten feet away. He had his hands in his pockets.
He tilted his head to the side, examining me like I was a feral dog that had just tired itself out biting the fence.
The flickering red light of the panel washed over my damp skin.
"Christ, you’re a mess," he said dryly. "All that training for nothing. Did you really think I’d leave the override code under the mat?"
I pushed off the door, refusing to stay lower than him. My legs were shaking, but I locked my knees and stood tall. The grit of the floor scraped under my shoes. Time to bluff.
"My team is already on their way," I lied, projecting every ounce of federal authority I had left. I wiped a smudge of dirt off my chin with the back of my hand. "You’re signing your own death warrant, Falk. I’m still an agent of the United States government."
Leon closed the distance until he was just out of reach. His expression didn't change, but his eyes narrowed. He reached into his suit jacket, pulled out my official gold FBI shield, and tossed it. The heavy metal badge clinked sharply against the marble and skidded to a stop at my feet.
"The Bureau doesn't want you back, Alessia. They want you dead," he said softly. "You’re a 'rogue agent' now. A thief. A traitor. Trenton scrubbed your file. You stole syndicate funds and went dark. No one is coming for you. Except maybe a clean-up crew with a bullet."
The air completely left the room. My entire life. My service. The things I did in the dark for that agency. Erased. I was a criminal on paper. I took a step back, and then another, until my shoulder blades hit the freezing, reinforced glass of the exterior window.