Lark
"I need a minute,” she said. No one stopped her as she slipped away from the operations floor.
She found an empty office overlooking the warehouse through a wall of glass and quietly shut the door behind her, and for the first time all night, she was alone.
The silence didn't last, though. A soft knock sounded against the glass, but she didn't have to turn around.
He smiled faintly. "I do now."
"You've come a long way,” she teased.
"I’m trying,” he said. She opened the door, and he stepped inside before closing it behind him. Neither of them spoke, and the room suddenly felt much smaller than it actually was.
"You shouldn't be alone,” he said.
"I needed to think,” she breathed.
"About?"
She looked out across the warehouse. "When I was little—” Her voice barely rose above a whisper. "My father used to tell me stories." Dante stayed quiet. "He'd sit on the edge of my bed and tell me that everyone wanted something from us." She laughed bitterly. "He said trust was weakness."
Dante folded his arms over his massive chest. "I've heard that speech."
"He said love makes people vulnerable,” she said, looking down at her hands. "I believed him."
His chest tightened. "I know."
"No." She slowly shook her head. "I really believed him." She looked back toward the operations floor where agents hurried between workstations. "Now I look out there—” She swallowed, “and I see complete strangers risking their lives."
"For you,” Dante added.
She nodded. "I don't understand it."
Dante took a slow breath. "They're not risking themselves because you're Rafael Santos's daughter." She looked at him. "They're risking themselves because you're Lark." The simple statement unraveled something inside her because no one had ever separated the two before.
"I don't even know who I am anymore,” she admitted. The confession hung in the air.
Dante stepped closer. "I do."
She looked up at him. "You do?"
"I know that you’re the woman who sneaks books into the kitchen because the staff works sixteen-hour shifts and never gets a break,” he said.
Her eyes widened. "You knew about that?"
"I knew everything that you did, Lark.” He smiled softly. "I know you secretly feed the stray cat that lives outside the east wall."
She blinked. "You saw that?"
"I saw you every morning." He continued. "I know you hate lilies."
She laughed through her surprise. "How do you know that?"
"You told one of the gardeners they smelled like funerals."
"I did,” she remembered.
"You asked the chef to make birthday cakes for the children of the housekeepers.” He continued.
She stared at him. "I never told anyone that."
"You didn't have to,” he said. His voice grew quieter. "I paid attention."
Tears burned behind her eyes. All these years, she'd believed no one saw her—not really. Her father saw an asset, the guards saw an assignment, and the servants saw someone they were afraid to speak to. But Dante—he'd seen her.
"I don't know what to say,” she admitted.
"You don't have to say anything,” Dante said.
She closed the distance between them, not because she needed protection, but because she wanted to be near him.
There was a difference now. She wrapped her arms around his neck, and someone knocked at the door.
It opened before either could answer, and Rocco stepped inside.
He stopped immediately, and for one awkward second, no one moved.
Then Rocco smiled. "I was beginning to think I'd have to search the whole building to find you."
Lark laughed quietly. "I just needed some air."
He looked around the enclosed office. "Worst place to find it." That made her laugh again, and the sound surprised all three of them. It almost felt normal. That was something she hadn't experienced in years.
Rocco leaned against the doorframe. "You okay?"
She considered lying. "No."
His expression didn't change. "Good."
She frowned. "Good?"
"I don't trust people who claim they're fine after surviving what you survived."
She appreciated the honesty. "I'm scared."
"We know,” Rocco said.
"I'm angry." Dante nodded.
“I get it,” Rocco said.
"I don't know what tomorrow looks like,” Lark admitted.
Rocco smiled. "Neither do we." For some reason, hearing him say that helped. She wasn’t sure why Rocco brought her so much comfort after they had only just met, but he did.
Avery's voice echoed through the intercom.
"Everyone to the briefing room." The moment disappeared as reality crashed back in.
The three of them walked toward the operations center together, and Lark found herself naturally falling between Dante and Rocco.
Not because they guided her there, but because it felt safe.
The realization startled her. She'd known Rocco less than a day, and yet something about him settled the constant anxiety buzzing beneath her skin.
He projected confidence without arrogance and strength without intimidation.
Dante noticed her glance toward Rocco, and instead of looking jealous, he looked relieved.
That also surprised her. Most of the men she'd grown up around viewed every relationship as a competition, but these two didn't. At least, not yet.
The briefing room filled quickly. A large satellite image covered one wall, and Avery stood beside it with a laser pointer. "Keller's people have completely surrounded this block." Red dots appeared across the map. "There are twenty-seven confirmed hostiles."
Someone whistled. "We have twelve operators." Those weren’t great odds.
Avery continued. "We've also intercepted communications." She clicked to the next screen, and a photograph appeared. Lark's stomach dropped. It was a photo of her. It wasn’t a recent picture, though. It was taken several years earlier.
"What is that?" Rocco's expression hardened.
"A contract,” Avery said.
"Keller has circulated her photograph to multiple private military groups." Another screen appeared, and then another. Each contained Lark's picture at different ages with different hairstyles and different clothing. Someone had been watching her for years. A chill crept down her spine.
"He's been planning this,” she whispered.
Rocco nodded. "For a long time."
"Why?" Lark asked.
Silence settled over the room before Avery opened one final file. "This." A document appeared on the screen, and at the top was one name.
Isabella Santos.
Lark stopped breathing. "My mother."
Avery looked at her. "We finally found her file.
" Lark's pulse thundered in her ears. "She changes everything.
" The room fell silent as every pair of eyes turned toward the screen because whatever Isabella Santos had discovered before she disappeared was important enough that someone had spent twenty-five years killing to keep it buried.
The room disappeared, and Lark couldn't hear Avery anymore.
She couldn't hear the agents whispering around the conference table.
She couldn't even hear her own breathing.
The only thing she saw was the name at the top of the screen.
Isabella Santos—her mother. For twenty-six years, she'd believed two things: the first was that her mother had died, and the second was that Rafael Santos never lied to family. Now she knew neither had been true.
"Lark." Rocco's voice sounded far away.
She blinked. "What?"
"You look like you're about to pass out."
She shook her head. "I'm fine." The words tasted hollow.
Dante quietly stepped beside her. "No, you're not." She appreciated that neither man pretended otherwise.
Avery clicked to the next page. "This file was recovered from one of Keller's encrypted servers." A photograph appeared of a younger woman smiling at the camera. She had dark hair, warm green eyes, and a soft smile that somehow felt familiar.
Lark's breath caught. "That's—” She couldn't finish. She didn’t have pictures of her mother anymore.
Not one, because her father had destroyed every photograph in the mansion.
Every painting, every memory was gone, yet somehow, looking at the woman on the screen was like looking into the future.
They had the same eyes, the same smile, and the same stubborn chin.
Tears blurred her vision. "I look like her."
Dante answered quietly. "Yes, you do, honey.”
Avery enlarged the image. "Isabella Santos was an accountant before she married Rafael."
Lark frowned because she didn’t know that. "An accountant?"
Rocco nodded. "Financial crimes." Avery clicked again, and spreadsheets filled the screen with wire transfers, offshore accounts, and shipping manifests.
"What am I looking at?" Lark asked.
Rocco folded his arms over his chest. "Proof."
"Proof of what?" Lark asked.
"That your father wasn't the one in charge,” Avery said.
Lark looked back at the monitor. "I don't understand."
Avery pointed to several highlighted transactions. "Your mother discovered someone was buying children."
The room fell silent, and Lark felt sick. "What?"
"Not kidnapping." Rocco's voice was tight with anger. "Buying."
She stared at him. "No."
Rocco nodded. "Families who owed money sold their children to get out of debt. They were runaways, missing foster children, and even refugees. Keller had built an empire on people that no one came looking for.”
Lark covered her mouth. "My God.”
Avery changed slides again. "This is where your mother became dangerous.
" A handwritten note filled the screen. The ink had faded with age, but Lark immediately recognized the handwriting.
She'd seen birthday cards written by Rafael's lawyers and old labels tucked inside forgotten books.
It wasn't her father's handwriting. It was feminine.
Lark stepped closer. "Can I—” Avery nodded, and Lark read slowly. "If anything happens to me, Rafael knows where I hid the ledger. He won't destroy it because he doesn't know how valuable it is. One day, someone honest will find it."
Lark's heart hammered. "The ledger?"
Rocco looked at Avery. "We've spent the past five years trying to find it."
Lark looked between them. "My father has it?"
"We think so,” Rocco said.
"But he doesn't know?" Lark asked.
"No,” Avery said.
She frowned. "Then why keep me alive?"
"Because you were leverage,” Dante said.
She looked at him. "If your mother never came back—" His voice softened.
"You would become the only connection to whatever she left behind.
" Pieces clicked together. Her father had never protected her.
He'd protected what she represented—insurance.
She was a bargaining chip, and that made her feel sick all over again.
The room emptied slowly as agents returned to preparing the defenses. Within minutes, only four people remained—Lark, Dante, Rocco, and Avery.
Avery quietly closed the laptop. "I'll give you three a minute." She slipped out, shutting the door behind her, and silence settled over the room.
Lark walked toward the warehouse windows overlooking the city. "So—" She wrapped her arms around herself. "My mother died trying to stop Keller."
"No,” Rocco answered immediately. "We don't know that."
"The file doesn't say she died,” Dante said.
"It doesn't say she lived either,” Lark countered.
"No." He walked closer. "But bodies leave evidence, and there wasn't one."
Hope flickered inside her. "You think she's alive?"
"I think we don't have enough facts,” Rocco said.
Dante nodded. "And until we do, we don't assume the worst." Lark wanted to believe them. God, she wanted to. But twenty-four years was a long time. Could someone survive that long? Would her mother still be—she stopped herself because hope was dangerous. Hope hurt when it didn’t work out to be true.
That was one lesson that her father had taught her.
"You know what scares me?" Lark asked. Neither man answered. "I'm starting to hope."
Dante smiled gently. "That's not something to fear."
"It is." She laughed quietly. "Every time I've hoped for something—” Her voice cracked. "It was taken away." Neither man rushed to fill the silence. They simply waited.
She whispered, "What if she's really gone?"
Dante stepped beside her. “Then, we mourn her."
Rocco joined her other side. "And we finish what she started.
" Lark looked between them. They were two completely different men.
One who had spent years trapped inside her father's world, and the other who had spent years trying to destroy it.
Both were standing beside her, not telling her what to do, and not demanding anything from her.
They were simply standing there. She realized something then.
For the first time in her life, she wasn't carrying the weight alone.
A sharp knock interrupted the quiet moment, and an operator entered. "We've got something."
Rocco immediately turned. "What?"
"The surveillance team intercepted a transmission." He looked directly at Lark.
"It's from Rafael Santos." Every muscle in her body locked.
"My father?" Lark asked.
The operator nodded. "He isn't with Keller."
Rocco frowned. "What?"
"They're hunting each other,” the man said. Silence fell over the room as the operator continued. "Santos just put a fifty-million-dollar bounty on Adrian Keller."
Lark stared. "He did what?"
The operator handed Rocco a tablet. "He also left a message." Rocco read it once and then looked at Lark. His expression had gone unreadable.
"What is it?" she asked. He hesitated, but finally he handed her the screen. The message contained only one sentence.
Tell my daughter the ledger isn't where Keller thinks it is.
Beneath the message was a set of GPS coordinates.
Lark's pulse thundered in her ears. Her father had just contacted STARR—not to surrender or to negotiate, but to warn her.
Everything she'd believed about Rafael Santos, and everything she'd learned about her mother, had just become even more complicated.