I flipped off the monitors. The image of the burning warehouse still seared into my retinas. Rhea thought she was calling in a favor. Zeno thought he was guarding a ward. They were both wrong. Daphne wasn't a debt to be paid. She was a queen in the making, and I was the only one dark enough to wear her crown.
“Let them come for her,” I whispered, the darkness of the office swallowing the words like a vow. “Let them try to collect a debt already paid in my blood. They’ll find out I don’t justprotect what’s mine. I annihilate anything that dares even to look at her. In this city, I am the judge, the jury, and the man holding the match. And Rhea is about to find out just how fast she burns.”
Ten
ADANGEROUS DECISION
DAPHNE
The door to my suite slammed shut with a heavy, echoing thud, and I automatically looked down at the thick manila envelope Thal had just handed me. A wave of questions flickered through my mind: Now what?
Dread settled in my gut like a stone, growing heavier with each passing second, a stark reminder of the heavy decision looming ahead. With every moment that ticked by, that burden seemed to grow larger.
I reached for an open bottle of wine, poured myself a glass, and spread the contents of the envelope across the surface of my coffee table.
For the next half hour, I meticulously sifted through every piece of intelligence he had sent, along with his terse note asking me to review everything and share my thoughts.
By then, I was sure he had already made up his mind.
As I went through the papers, a disturbing detail caught my eye, one of Zeno’s properties had been attacked, and he hadn'teven mentioned it. That seemed odd. Zeno was the kind of person to call me, venting over the smallest issue.
Yet here I was, hearing about it from Thal first, and a shiver ran down my spine as I wondered why I had been kept in the dark.
As I delved deeper, it became clear that the attack was probably planned by someone inside Zeno’s network. There were no signs of intruders entering or leaving. The only footprints were from a few workers on site. I had been there just last week, dropping off some paperwork for Zeno.
Yet, nothing appeared unusual.
I looked at the inventory list Thal had highlighted, and the air in my lungs turned to ice. It wasn't business assets. It was my father’s ghost. Boxes of personal journals, the watch he wore the day he died, the deed to the estate Zeno told me had been seized by the state.
Zeno had done more than rescue me. He collected the wreckage of my life and put it in a vault I didn't even know existed.
Now, Rhea was burning my history to the ground to remind me that I was the only piece of the debt still standing. It wasn't an attack on a warehouse. It was a cold, calculated signal that the collectors were coming for the last item on the list: me.
It didn't feel like a random business hit anymore. It felt like Rhea was incinerating my past, clearing the slate for my future as her payment. This wasn't an attack on an operation. It was a message to the girl inside the gilded cage.
Thal’s sources indicated that a member of Rhea’s group had infiltrated the location as an employee. This seemed to be just the first strike in a series of attacks planned by the syndicate.
I found myself pondering what might happen next, filled with a mix of curiosity and unease. It was obvious they wouldn’t stop their attacks until they reached their hidden objective.Rhea’s unwavering resolve was well known. She would go to any lengths to get what she desired, regardless of the cost.
Her pursuit not only endangered Zeno’s empire but also threatened Thal’s and Aidon’s worlds. However, if Thal’s suspicion was correct—that one of her own men had infiltrated us—then we still might have a chance to intervene.
A wave of guilt washed over me as I struggled with this new information. Now that I knew what I was supposed to do? Should I put it back in its envelope and send it straight to Zeno? I couldn’t shake the feeling. Why had I not heard from him anymore?
If he didn’t tell me what was going on, why should I tell him what I’d learned? Besides, there was no way to explain how I gained this knowledge, or why Thal was sharing it with me in the first place.
I picked up my phone and, instead of calling Zeno, I sent Thal a message to express gratitude for sharing the information. I still didn’t know what to do with it, but I was glad to have it.
I stayed seated for another hour, eyes drifting over the same pages, letting fragments of information swirl and settle in my mind. As I poured the remaining wine down my throat, it offered a fleeting distraction from the rising tide of anxiety, but it failed to quell it.
It didn’t work.
Zeno’s warnings and Thal’s encouragement resonated deeply in my mind—voices in a fragile tug-of-war. One warned me to be cautious, aiming to hold me back, while the other encouraged me toward freedom.
I wondered why I felt so conflicted, why this struggle was so painful. Perhaps, if they weren't rivals and could resolve their differences, they might even join forces.
Was it possible for me to have both of them without the heavy burden of loyalty weighing me down?
A desperate longing pushed me to cast everything aside.
