Chapter 8 Eight

• Sera didn’t stop running until the alley turned to silence.
• Lucien’s grip stayed tight on her wrist. Not possessive. Not even protective. Just desperate. Like if he let go, the truth might swallow them both.
• They ducked into a nondescript black sedan idling on the far curb.
• No driver.
• Of course.
• “Whose car is this?” Sera asked, breathless.
• Lucien slid into the driver’s seat. “Mine. It doesn’t exist.”
• “Like Elise?”
• Lucien flinched. Just slightly.
• Sera climbed in beside him, shaking. Blood still sang in her ears from the flashbang, and Elise’s voice still echoed like a crack in her skull.
• “If you see me again, walk away.”
• She didn’t. She couldn’t.
• Not when her sister had looked at her like a stranger.
• Not when Lucien had stolen her out of that room like she was his to take.
• “You had no right to pull me out,” she said as the car peeled into traffic.
• Lucien’s eyes stayed locked on the road. “And she had no right to use you as bait.”
• “I was willing bait.”
• “You were misinformed bait.”
• “That’s not your choice to make!”
• He slammed the brakes at a red light hard enough to make her jolt forward.
• His voice was gravel. “You think this is about choice?”
• Silence stretched. Thick. Heavy.
• Sera turned to him. “Then what is it about?”
• Lucien didn’t answer.
• He just hit a button on the console.
• A hidden screen slid out from the glove compartment.
• A face appeared.
• Her face.
• But younger.
• Different haircut. Different name under the photo.
• S. MARIN / CLASSIFIED: GHOST FILE 7
• Sera stared. “What is this?”
• Lucien’s knuckles whitened on the wheel. “A file Elise built. On you.”
• Her voice cracked. “I don’t understand.”
• “She registered you under a dead program. Government black ops. Ghost IDs. Untraceable citizens. Shadow files. They don’t exist unless someone pulls the plug on their code.”
• Sera’s stomach turned. “She made me a ghost?”
• “She made you a fail-safe.”
• The light turned green, but Lucien didn’t move.
• “She knew she couldn’t win. So she embedded everything, everything she uncovered, everything she was into someone who had nothing left to lose. Someone no one was watching. Someone the system ignored.”
• Sera’s throat closed. “Me.”
• “She didn’t protect you,” Lucien said, voice hollow. “She turned you into her dead man’s switch.”
• Sera stared out the window, heart fracturing.
• Elise hadn’t just left her behind.
• She’d used her. Programmed her. Made her a weapon without her knowledge.
• “You knew,” she whispered. “Didn’t you?”
• “I suspected.”
• “And you didn’t tell me?”
• Lucien turned to her, something wild in his eyes. “Because the moment you know what you are, they start hunting you differently.”
• What you are.
• Not who.
• The car finally moved.
• But the silence was worse now.
• It wasn’t anger. It was heartbreak, curled in on itself.
• “I don’t know who to believe anymore,” she said.
• Lucien didn’t answer right away.
• “...I don’t want you to believe me,” he said. “I want you to see me. Because if you do and you still stay then maybe I’m not beyond saving.”
• The city bled past them in gold and ice and shadow.
• Then, the car jerked to a stop again.
• Sera’s head snapped up. “What ?”
• Lucien was staring ahead.
• Someone stood in the middle of the street.
• Not masked. Not armed.
• Just… waiting.
• Female. Mid-forties. Immaculate suit. Cold smile.
• Lucien swore under his breath.
• “Who is she?”
• He didn’t answer.
• The woman stepped forward.
• And Sera heard a click behind her.
• A second woman had appeared. At her door. Gun drawn.
• “Out of the car,” the new voice said. “Both of you.”
• Lucien didn’t move. “You don’t want to do this.”
• “We’re not here to kill you,” the suited woman said calmly. “Just extract the asset.”
• Sera’s pulse spiked.
• Asset.
• They were here for her.
• “On whose orders?” Lucien asked.
• The woman smiled.
• “Elise.”
• Sera’s fingers inched toward the door handle.
• Lucien didn’t blink.
• “Don’t,” he said quietly. “If they get you out of this car, you disappear.”
• The woman with the gun didn’t flinch. “You’re outnumbered, Calder. Step out. Or we open fire.”
• Sera’s heart pounded. Not with fear. With fury.
• “You work for Elise?” she asked.
• The woman outside the driver’s side smiled with something like admiration. “We work with Elise. She’s a partner now. What she knows makes her invaluable. What you know… makes you dangerous.”
• “I don’t know anything,” Sera hissed.
• “You will,” the woman replied. “And we’re not interested in letting that happen.”
• Lucien’s voice dropped to something colder than death. “Touch her and I burn your entire network to ash.”
• The agent behind Sera cocked her weapon. “Try it.”
• And in that split second.
• Lucien moved.
• He slammed his hand against the center console triggering a built-in EMP.
• A pulse of blue light burst through the car, frying the nearby electronics.
• Sera screamed as sparks exploded from the gun beside her.
• The agent staggered back.
• Lucien shoved the door open, yanked Sera across the seat and out the passenger side just as the second agent fired.
• The bullet grazed his shoulder he didn’t stop moving.
• They ducked behind a delivery truck.
• Breathless. Alive.
• For now.
• Sera pressed a hand to Lucien’s bleeding arm. “That was insane.”
• “I told you,” he gritted, “I don’t play fair.”
• Behind them, the agents were regrouping.
• Lucien grabbed Sera’s face, urgent. “We have two minutes before they reroute comms and bring backup.”
• “Where are we going?”
• He pulled out a key metal, old, and scratched.
• Not digital.
• He pressed it into her palm.
• “There’s a safehouse under the old post office at Canal Street. Basement level. Locker 17. You’ll need the key. Go there. Alone.”
• Sera froze. “What about you?”
• Lucien looked at her really looked.
• “This is where they split us.”
• “No,” she whispered.
• “Yes.”
• “They’ll kill you.”
• He smiled faintly. “They’ll try.”
• She gripped his hand harder. “You can’t just send me into the dark like this. I don’t even know who I am anymore.”
• “Yes, you do,” he said. “You’re not a file. You’re not a ghost. You’re the one who keeps surviving.”
• Her eyes burned.
• “Tell me you’re coming back.”
• Lucien leaned in. Pressed his forehead to hers.
• “I don’t deserve you.”
• “That’s not an answer.”
• But he was already moving.
• Already pushing her toward the edge of the alley.
• “I’ll find you,” he said.
• Then turned and walked into the oncoming agents weapon holstered, hands raised.
• Sera watched him disappear behind a wall of black suits and emotionless orders.
• She didn’t wait to see what happened next.
• She ran.
• Canal Street. One Hour Later.
• The post office was condemned.
• Sera slipped through a side entrance, down a rusted stairwell, every nerve on fire.
• Locker 17 was hidden behind a false wall in the basement.
• She used the key.
• Inside:
• A burner phone.
• A handwritten note.
• A flash drive.
• The note was addressed to her.
• “If you’ve made it here, they haven’t broken him. Yet.”
• No signature.
• Just three words beneath the line:
• “Trust the cracks.”
• Sera stared at the note.
• Then the phone buzzed.
• Unknown number.
• She answered.
• No voice.
• Just breathing.
• Then, “Elise,” she said.
• But the voice that answered wasn’t hers.
• It was male.
• Choked.
• “Don’t go back to Lucien.”
• Her breath caught. “Aiden?”
• “Listen to me,” he rasped. “He’s not who you think. He’s not even who he thinks.”
• “What are you talking about?”
• “They didn’t break him. Because he was never on our side.”
• Silence.
• Then the call cut.
• Sera stared at the dead line.
• Behind her, somewhere in the shadows, she heard a door creak.
• She turned.
• No one there.
• But on the floor… something slid out from under the locker.
• A photo.
• She picked it up.
• A surveillance shot.
• Her and Lucien.
• Kissing.
• A red circle drawn around her spine.
• And one word beneath it:
• “TRADE COMPLETE.”