15. Roman #3
My gaze snaps toward Atlas. Every mission we’ve planned has started there. Every time we thought we were being careful and private, we’ve been sitting down there talking, drinking, laughing like no one could ever hear us.
But what if someone did?
“We need to check if it’s bugged,” Atlas says, and I nod immediately.
“Okay, let’s circle out here. Check every room, take anything electronic and meet back at the underground.”
Felix’s order breaks the tension in the room and we move, falling back into the familiar rhythm of a search.
Doors open, drawers are checked, cupboards are pulled apart as we spread through the house in different directions.
Footsteps echo across the marble halls and up the staircases as the quiet order of the place begins to unravel under our hands.
Every room we enter looks the same. Tidy, controlled and stripped of anything that might tell us where Ackworth has gone.
Laptops, old phones, anything electronic gets collected and passed along as we move; the growing pile of evidence proves just how quickly a house can turn from a home into a crime scene.
Somewhere along the way I lose track of the others.
I push open another door expecting a guest room or an office but instead I walk straight into a scent that stops me cold.
I just stand there in the doorway as the smell wraps around me like a memory I wasn’t prepared to face. It’s faint now, but it’s unmistakable.
My Tinkerbell.
My chest tightens as my eyes slowly adjust to the space around me.
It’s her bedroom, clearly from years ago.
The furniture is expensive; everything arranged with the kind of careful order Ackworth seems to prefer.
The colours are neutral and elegant in a way that feels more curated than lived in.
It’s not the room of the woman I know. It’s the room of the girl her father wanted her to be.
My gaze lands on the bed and I feel something soften in my chest.
A teddy bear sits propped neatly against the pillows.
The sight of it catches me off guard and a small smile tugs at the corner of my mouth as I cross the room and pick it up.
The fabric is worn thin in places, the fur flattened from years of being held, and my thumb traces slowly over the frayed stitching along one ear.
An image of a younger, smaller Fae curled around this thing whilst she slept hits me.
I can picture her clinging to it the same way she clings to me, refusing to let go of something that makes her feel safe.
As I stand there holding it, a strange calm moves through me as I imagine Fae years from now, softer somehow, sitting on the edge of a bed with one of our kids tucked against her side as she hands them something just like this.
I can already see the way she’d smile at them, giving them the kind of safety she had to fight to find, and despite the situation, I smile at the realisation of how good of a mum she is going to be.
I tuck the bear under my arm, deciding that it’s coming with me before I start moving through the room, opening drawers and checking shelves.
The space tells me far more about the girl she used to be than the woman I know now.
Everything is controlled but there are small rebellions scattered between the neat lines.
A jewellery box is tucked half open on the dresser.
Photographs pinned quietly to the mirror.
I see Fae standing between Felix and their mother, all three of them laughing at something outside the frame.
Little pieces of her. Proof that the girl who grew up here was never quite as obedient as her father believed.
As I make my way downstairs, I see Felix lingering in the doorway of the lounge. He isn’t moving, he is just standing there with his hands braced against the frame as his eyes drift slowly across the room like he’s seeing it properly for the first time.
By the time we step back outside, the night has settled across the estate and the last trace of daylight is gone. The gravel shifts under our boots as we make our way down the drive in silence. Felix slows halfway to the cars and then turns, his gaze lifting back toward the manor looming above us.
“He’s not running,” he says with a quiet certainty that makes me stop beside him. “Father would never run.” His jaw tightens slightly as he studies the windows. “He’s hiding, and someone is helping.”
I pull my phone from my pocket and give his shoulder a brief pat as I pass him on the way toward his car. “When we find him… we’ll find Fisher and the girls with him too.”
Felix sighs, still staring ahead like he’s trying to see through the walls and into whatever secrets the house is holding onto. The wind shifts through the trees, rustling the hedges that line the driveway. I glance back once more before climbing into the car.
The longer I stare at it, the heavier the feeling of dread settles into my chest.
There are too many moving pieces.
And fewer people I can trust with every step we take.