Chapter 1 #2
Then I exhale and lean back.
“Drop me off at Anna’s.”
Ash’s eyes narrow. “Why?”
“She’s been waiting on me. I promised I’d stop by tonight.” I pause. “And I want to check on her.”
Kellan flicks a glance toward the GPS, already adjusting the route. “You think it’s smart, getting close to her right now?”
“I think it’s human,” I reply. “She’s the only person who ever cared without asking for something back.”
Which is a lie.
Because she did ask for something?—
She asked for my trust.
And she got it.
God help me, she got it.
“I’ll call you in the morning,” I add.
Ash’s voice is rough. “You sure she’s safe?”
“She’s harmless,” I whisper, mostly to myself.
The car slows in front of a quiet apartment tucked between a flower shop and an old bookstore. The porch light is on, casting a soft golden glow across the chipped steps and ivy-covered brick.
Warm. Familiar. Deceiving.
Kellan puts the car in park, and I reach for the door handle.
“Isabella,” Ash says behind me, voice low now. Like a warning wrapped in worry. “Don’t forget why we started this.”
I glance back.
“I haven’t,” I say. “But if I’m going to finish it… I need to do it my way.”
Then I step out into the night and shut the door behind me. The car doesn’t drive away immediately. They wait—like they always do—until I reach the door and unlock it.
Only then do I hear the engine pull off.
I stand there for a moment, hand resting on the handle, heart a storm in my chest.
Because even now… I feel it.
That pull.
That lingering heat of Rafael’s gaze from a rooftop away, still burned into my skin like a brand I never asked for.
And tomorrow…
Tomorrow, I’ll walk into his world like I belong in it.
The porch creaks beneath my boots as I climb the steps, the worn wood groaning like it remembers every secret whispered in this house.
I glance up at the faded number above the door. 206. The paint’s chipped, the metal rusted along the edges. It’s the kind of place you’d walk past without a second thought. Just another building in a row of buildings.
But for me, it’s been a kind of refuge. A shelter.
Anna’s home doesn’t just smell like cinnamon and old books—it feels like safety. Which is ironic, considering what I do. What I’ve done . But in here, I can breathe. Or at least I used to.
Tonight, the air feels… heavier.
I unlock the door with the key she gave me last year. “For whenever you need it, my little storm,” she’d said.
The nickname used to make me smile. Now, I don’t know what to feel.
I step inside and shut the door softly behind me.
It’s warm. Cozy. The yellow glow of a table lamp spills across the living room, brushing against floral curtains, lace doilies, and the same porcelain tea set that’s been sitting untouched on the corner shelf since I met her.
The scent of chamomile and lemon balm lingers in the air. A record hums in the background—some old classical piano piece I can’t name. It’s soft. Soothing. Like always.
But my fingers curl tighter around my jacket.
Something’s different.
“Anna?” I call gently.
Her voice comes from the kitchen. “In here, sweetheart.”
I slip out of my boots and walk through the narrow hallway, my eyes tracing the photographs on the wall like they always do. None of them are real. Not really. Just strangers in frames, bought from thrift stores, arranged to mimic a life that never existed.
It used to break my heart—that she had no real family photos.
Now it unsettles me.
Anna stands at the stove, wearing one of her floral aprons, silver hair pulled into a low bun. There’s a steaming cup already on the table—mine, chamomile with too much honey, just the way I like it.
She turns when she hears me, smiling with that softness that used to feel like home.
But tonight… it scratches something raw in me.
“There you are,” she says, wiping her hands on a dish towel. “You missed dinner.”
“I wasn’t hungry.” I slide into the chair, my jacket still wrapped around me. “Had a long night.”
Her eyes flick to mine. They’re the same pale blue they’ve always been—watery, kind, deceptively innocent. “Work?”
Something about the way she says it makes me pause. She never asks what my work is. She just accepts that I disappear sometimes with blood in my teeth and ghosts in my eyes.
“Something like that,” I say.
She nods and pours herself tea. The china clinks gently as she lowers the kettle.
“You look tired,” she says.
“I am tired.”
“Tired of the chase?”
I look up sharply. Her gaze holds mine, steady. Calm.
My throat tightens. “I didn’t do it.”
She doesn’t ask what I mean. Doesn’t need to.
“I had him in my sights,” I whisper. “Everything we worked for. Everything I’ve become. And I still couldn’t do it.”
Her expression doesn’t change. She just sips her tea.
“Doubt is a funny thing,” she says. “It only grows when you water it.”
I study her. “You think I’m going soft?”
“I think,” she says gently, “that you’ve always carried too much heart for someone raised in the dark.”
I look away.
The tea burns my throat when I take a sip. Too sweet. Always too sweet.
“Do you think I’m wrong?” I ask. “For needing more than just someone else’s word before I end a life?”
She sets her cup down and reaches across the table, brushing her fingers lightly over mine.
“I think,” she says softly, “that whatever choice you make, it will be the right one. Because you’ve always trusted your soul, even when it was bleeding.”
It should comfort me.
But something about the way she says it… feels rehearsed.
Like she already knows what I’ll choose.
She walks me to the guest room later, the one with the soft blue walls and the cracked window that whistles when the wind hits right.
“You’ll sleep better tonight,” she says as she pulls the covers back for me.
“I doubt it.”
She smiles again. Brushes a hand over my hair.
And for a moment…
I let her.
Because it’s easier to believe in softness than to question it.
The hum of the ceiling fan is soft, steady, my mind focused on it when Anna walked away, closing the doors behind her with a soft tud. It used to lull me to sleep. Now it just matches the rhythm of my thoughts—never still, never quiet.
But tonight… the noise in my chest feels softer somehow. Muted.
Maybe it’s the tea.
Maybe it’s her.
I glance across the small room. The shadows fall gently across the bookshelf, the lace curtain drifting slightly in the breeze. This place has always made space for my exhaustion. Anna never pries. She never judges. She just waits—with warmth and honey and quiet.
She’s the only person who never asked me to be more than what I was in that moment.
And tonight, I needed that.
Not Kellan’s logic. Not Ash’s fire. Just Anna’s soft steadiness.
I turn my head to the side, pressing my cheek into the pillow. My body’s heavy with tension I didn’t realize I was carrying.
The weight of the rifle.
The weight of my choice.
I can still see Rafael’s face. Not the version I painted in my head all these years—the villain, the butcher, the boy who grew into a monster—but the man who looked almost… bored.
Calm.
Untouchable.
Until something shifted in his eyes.
And I couldn’t do it.
I close my eyes and try to pull that guilt tighter around me, wrap it like armor, but it slips through my fingers every time. And somewhere underneath it all, something else coils inside me.
Curiosity.
Doubt.
Need.
I exhale slowly, about to let myself drift, when the vibration of my phone against the nightstand jolts through the room like a crack of thunder.
I reach for it blindly, flipping it open.
Kellan.
My voice is groggy. “Yeah?”
The background noise hits first—the low hum of an engine, a soft beep of a turn signal.
“You sound like you just got punched by sleep,” Kellan says, voice low and dry.
“Didn’t even get to the first round,” I mumble, rubbing my eyes. “Why are you calling?”
“Because your life’s about to change, sweetheart.”
I sit up. “What?”
“I got you in.” There’s pride in his voice. “Interview’s today. In an hour.”
I blink. “Wait—today?”
“Mmhm.”
“Kellan, it’s—” I glance at the clock. “It’s not even six.”
“Exactly. No time for nerves.”
I swing my legs over the edge of the bed, already reaching for my hoodie. “What did you give them?”
“Custom ID, forged background, verified references, and a charming lie about how you used to serve Russian oligarchs in a private estate off the coast of Nice.” A pause. “You’re officially Natasha Orlova.”
I snort. “How original.”
“You’ll blend in better with a name like that. Keep the Russian tie close. The Bratva will think twice before touching someone they think might be connected.”
“Which casino is it?”
“Rafael’s hotel— Obshor . Private casino floor. High rollers only. They’re onboarding two new cocktail servers for the VIP lounge. I got you the last spot.”
I run a hand through my hair. “And how do I get in?”
“Shower. Get dressed. I’m outside.”
I freeze. “What?”
“Yeah,” he says, smug. “I figured you’d forget to set an alarm.”
“You’re insane.”
“Would you love me any other way?”
I hear a low voice in the background, muffled.
“Ash says you better not wear heels that’ll get you killed.”
I grin faintly. “Tell him I’m not the one who trips over his own shadow.”
“I heard that,” Ash growls from somewhere behind him.
I shake my head and move to the window. Sure enough, Kellan’s car is parked out front, the headlights cutting softly through the early morning haze.
“Kellan.”
“Yeah?”
“Thanks.”
He’s quiet for a beat. “We’ve got your back. You go in, we stay close. Ash is working a cover position as internal security. I’m in the surveillance room. You won’t be alone.”
That shouldn’t comfort me.
But it does.
I hang up and toss the phone on the bed.
Then I move to the mirror and start peeling off who I am—layer by layer. Until all that’s left is Natasha Orlova .
Just another beautiful lie.
I move through the apartment quietly, careful not to wake her.