Chapter 25 Roman Chooses Her Over Power #2
He turned his head slightly, speaking to Ava without taking his eyes off the threat. “You’re not a charge.”
Ava’s breath shuddered once, the kind she tried to hide. “Good. Because I’m not one.”
The woman’s smile vanished. “You think you’re clever.”
Roman watched her hands. No weapon drawn. But her posture was relaxed in the way of someone who trusted their exit strategy. The hum in the walls deepened - subtle, like a countdown starting.
Roman said, “Where is the device that holds the clean evidence?”
Ava’s eyes sharpened at the phrase - device. She already knew. She’d been tracking it too, even if she hadn’t had the keycard yet.
The woman’s gaze flicked toward the cracked monitors behind Roman’s line of sight. “You want to force leadership’s attention? Then do it while your time is still yours.”
Roman didn’t ask what she meant. He felt it. The air had changed again. The room wasn’t just listening. It was deciding when to stop.
Ava stepped forward half a pace, and Roman felt the sharp instinct to grab her. He didn’t. He let her choose.
“I want the truth on the record,” Ava said, voice steady. “Not a rumor. Not a purge. Not a shadow account that predates your command.”
The woman’s eyes widened a fraction. Caught. Not by the words - by the precision. Ava was naming targets.
Roman heard himself speak before he could stop it. “Ava.”
She didn’t look away. “This is bigger than us.”
Roman’s throat tightened. “It’s always been bigger than us.”
Ava’s expression shifted, something raw slipping through the attorney mask. “Then stop treating me like I’ll break when you pull the curtain.”
Roman stared at her, realizing the bruise wasn’t the only damage. Someone had tried to take her voice. To make her complicit in silence.
A vulnerable truth rose in him like bile: he’d been terrified of failing her, terrified that the moment he let leadership see him as compromised, they’d cut her loose like a liability.
He’d turned that fear into control.
He swallowed it down and replaced it with something sharper and more honest. “I was afraid,” Roman said.
Ava blinked, caught off guard. The woman’s amusement curdled into attention.
Roman didn’t look at the woman. He looked at Ava. “Afraid that if I gave you the evidence and told you the truth, you’d still choose the court instead of your safety. Afraid that if leadership saw my compromised clearance, they’d decide you were disposable.”
Ava’s breath slowed. Her eyes softened, just slightly. She’d been ready for war; she hadn’t expected confession.
The soft moment shattered when the intercom hissed to life again. Not the traitor’s warped voice this time - another sound, a man’s breath, tight and controlled, as if he was speaking through a mouthguard.
“Roman.” The voice from behind the locked door returned, closer now, threaded with satisfaction. “You made it public.”
Roman didn’t move. “You’re going to release her.”
Ava tensed at the word her - like she’d been waiting for someone to finally acknowledge her as a person worth saving.
The voice chuckled. “You think this is about saving? It’s about leverage.”
Then the woman in front of them spoke again, quicker now, her mask of calm cracking. “We don’t have to kill her. We just have to make sure you can’t use what you found.”
Roman’s eyes snapped to Ava’s face. “Ava - ”
Ava’s jaw tightened. “Don’t.”
The hum in the walls spiked into a sharp, rising note.
Lights flickered. The cracked monitors in the command office behind them flared white, then went black, then flared again - like a heartbeat being forced into panic.
Ava grabbed Roman’s wrist, her grip hard enough to hurt. “The channel you planned - release it now. Before they cut the feed.”
Roman stared at her, understanding blooming late: they weren’t just trying to ambush him. They were trying to erase the evidence’s path before leadership could see it.
He’d been chasing survival; she was forcing accountability.
Roman drew his phone and keyed the secured channel he’d been afraid to use - an override route he only trusted for things he couldn’t later pretend were accidents.
He sent a burst: the folder’s catalog metadata, the compromised chain-of-custody warnings, and the note referencing Enzo handoff.
Partial, but enough to anchor the truth even if they corrupted the full file.
Ava watched his face as he transmitted, as if she could see the cost in every second he hesitated.
The intercom snapped with a new sound - someone inhaling, then speaking with a colder urgency.
“You released it.”
Roman’s voice stayed level. “I did.”
Ava exhaled, once, like she’d been holding herself together with her teeth. “Roman - ”
The woman’s laugh turned sharp. “Now you’ll see what public stands buys you.”
Roman spun toward the woman, gun rising - - and the intercom voice cut through everything, a final threat aimed so precisely at Ava that Roman’s blood went cold.
“If she survives the week, Roman, it won’t be because you protected her. It’ll be because I let her.” A pause, then the voice lowered further, intimate in its cruelty. “And I don’t let things live twice.”
Ava jerked as if the words had physically struck her. Her eyes widened, not with fear alone - with recognition, like the threat carried details only the target would understand.
Roman lunged toward her, yanking her behind him with a force that made her stumble against his chest. “What did you mean?”
Ava’s lips parted. For a second, she looked like she might tell him everything right there. Then her gaze flicked to the floor where the dark marbling spread in a thin, deliberate line toward her feet.
Roman’s brain caught up too late.
The warehouse went quiet in a way that didn’t belong to machines.
And behind the locked door, the intercom clicked - then a second sound bled in, tinny and close, like a latch releasing.
Roman felt the air change again, hot and chemical, and Ava’s breath hitched as she realized it too.
The evidence wasn’t the only thing being released.