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I open my eyes.
Nero watches me, concern cutting through the hunger on his face.
“Lara,” he says. “Are you okay? Your eyes went red.”
I push him away.
“I know where Julian is.”
“What?” His whole body tightens. “How? Where?”
“I need to go.”
“You’re not going anywhere. Not after this.”
Only then do I remember there are still two bodies on the floor.
“Sava will take me.”
I run out of the bathroom and down the corridor. When I reach the stairs, Sava appears with a gun in his hand, looking like someone’s old uncle in a plaid shirt who wandered into the wrong place.
He lifts his phone with my text glowing.
“Back door.”
“You didn’t come,” he says.
“Next time, come quicker, would you? Now let’s go.”
Nero catches up and grabs my hand before I reach the exit.
“I’ll follow you.”
There is no time for arguing. I climb into the BMW and tell Sava to head toward Westwood Bridge, across the center. The city blurs past the windows, lights smearing into neon lines while adrenaline and drugs burn through my blood. When we reach the river, I see it immediately.
A new skyscraper, still under construction near the bridge. Exactly like in the vision. Raw concrete. Dark windows. Countless floors staring over Midnight City.
“This is it,” I say.
Nero parks his bike behind us and pulls off his helmet.
“Are you sure?” he asks.
“Yes.”
He looks up at the building, and something shifts in his face.
“You know this is our estate.”
I turn to him. “What?”
“Yes,” he says. “We are building it.”
I look at Sava, waiting for some signal, some warning, some reason not to walk into the unfinished tower where Julian may be chained and dying.
Sava gives me nothing.
Fine.