Chapter 2
CHAPTER TWO
LEA
“...She’s close. Find her!”
Nico’s command cuts through the clearing, just feet from where I hide. I press myself deeper into the hollow beneath a large, rotting log—not the one he’s examining so intently. My heart hammers as I watch his powerful silhouette move through the trees.
My flight from the mansion was blind terror, the forest a blur of lashing branches and suffocating darkness as sobs tore from my throat. My mother, the spy. Nico, the manipulator. I wasn’t just running from them; I was running from the ruins of my life.
Huddled behind the massive trunk of a fallen oak, I forced my mind to work.
I can’t outrun him, not with his resources, his men.
But I don’t have to outrun him. I just have to out-think him.
Nico isn’t hunting me ; he’s hunting the version of me he has constructed in his mind. And that is his weakness.
So I gave him the scene he expected. A trail that screamed of a woman too broken to think.
I used his perception of my weakness as my greatest weapon, tailoring a narrative for an audience of one.
I remember my hands, numb and clumsy, tearing another strip from the hem of Nico’s ruined shirt.
I remember finding the sharpest edge of a quartz rock and, without hesitation, dragging it across my palm.
The pain was clean and searing as I squeezed my fist, letting my own blood fall beside the fabricated footprints.
With agonizing care, I laid the rest of the trap before doubling back to this hollow.
A desperate gambit. And impossibly, it’s working.
Nico crouches, studying the decoy. Even in my terror, I notice the barely perceptible wince as he favors his injured side—wounds I tended to less than twenty-four hours ago, believing him worthy of my care. Before I knew it was all a lie.
Blake is with him, their flashlight beams converging on the evidence I planted. They think they’ve found me. They’re wrong. A surge of fierce, cold triumph moves through me. I have outsmarted Nicolás Varela.
As they continue their examination, I begin my retreat, inching backward through the wet leaves.
A twig snaps beneath my knee. I freeze, but thunder rumbles, masking the sound.
Neither man turns. I ease into the deeper shadows, finally rising into a half-crouch.
Pain lances through my bare feet, but I swallow the cry.
Physical pain is nothing compared to the betrayals I’m running from.
My mother’s face flashes in my mind—the photograph in that North Korean uniform, her handwriting on that damning note: Asset now in place.
I was her asset. Her pawn. Just as I was Nico’s.
The thought propels me deeper into the woods, away from the search party, away from the man who held me while I slept, who made me feel things I’d never felt before—all while knowing my entire life was a lie.
I pick a direction away from the lights, away from the voices, and move as quickly as my battered body allows, following no path but instinct and the desperate need to put distance between myself and everything I thought I knew.
Hours bleed together. The initial triumph curdles into the grim reality of survival. Hunger is a hollow ache, thirst a fire in my throat. Every step on my bruised and bleeding feet is a fresh agony. I am completely lost.
The thought of my career, my scholarships, every byline—was any of it real? Or was it all part of my mother’s grand design? And Nico… God, the vulnerability in his eyes when fever took him. Was that calculated, too? It must have been. The man I thought I was falling for doesn’t exist.
A wave of dizziness forces me to grab a tree for support. The light is fading. Soon it will be full dark. No shelter, no food, no water. Real fear grips me now—not the panicked fear of capture, but the cold, rational fear of dying out here alone.
I push away from the tree, forcing myself onward.
To stand still is to surrender, and I cannot surrender.
Not to this forest, not to him. But each step is harder than the last, black spots dancing at the edges of my vision.
A root catches my foot, sending me sprawling.
I land hard, the air forced from my lungs.
I lie there, face pressed against the wet grass, my body trembling. Get up, Lea. But my limbs refuse.
No. The voice in my head is sharp. Get up or fucking die here.
With monumental effort, I push myself to my feet. I stagger forward, driven by a primitive instinct to keep moving. Night has fully claimed the forest. Branches slash at my face. An owl’s hoot becomes Nico calling my name.
“Not real,” I mutter, the words slurring. “None of it is real.”
I stumble again, sliding down a tree trunk to the ground.
My legs will not carry me any farther. I draw my knees to my chest, my teeth chattering from a cold that has settled in my bones.
My father. The questions swirl in my fading consciousness.
Did he know? My eyelids grow heavy. Just a brief rest…
As consciousness slips away, a new sensation registers. Faint but distinctive. Wood smoke.
My eyes snap open. Hope, fierce and desperate, floods my system. I force myself to stand, my legs shaking violently. Through the dense trees, a faint glow. Light. A cabin? It doesn’t matter. It’s my only chance.
I take a stumbling step toward it, then another. The journey is a blur of pain and will, the promise of that warm glow pulling me forward like a lifeline. Suddenly, the trees thin. It’s a small cabin in a tiny clearing, windows glowing, a thin column of smoke rising from a stone chimney. Salvation.
I stumble across the clearing, my vision narrowing to a tunnel focused on the rough-hewn door. I reach the small porch, my legs finally giving out as I collapse against the door frame. With a trembling hand, I rap weakly on the wood. I try again, louder.
“Help,” I call, my voice hoarse. “Please… help me.”
From inside, footsteps. Solid. Measured. The latch clicks. The door swings inward.
Warm light spills out, blinding me. I blink, my vision clearing to focus on the figure silhouetted in the doorway. Broad shoulders, tall frame, a perfectly composed stance.
Recognition comes instantly. Standing there is Nicolás Varela.
His expression is calm as he surveys my bedraggled state. No surprise, no concern, no relief. Nothing but the controlled mask he wears in his most dangerous negotiations.
“Hello, Lea,” he says. “I’ve been expecting you.”
Darkness rushes in from all sides as I realize I never escaped at all.