Elena's breath fogged against the chilled glass of the black SUV's window. The city blurred outside, but her thoughts raced sharper than ever.
Nicholas sat beside her in silence—too still, too composed. His phone buzzed once. He ignored it.
After everything—Lucas's arrest, Ava's disappearance, and the sudden leak of classified Vale Technologies footage—Elena couldn't shake the feeling they were being watched. Or worse—followed.
"You should've let me go alone," she said, voice low.
"I couldn't." Nicholas didn't look at her. "You're not safe."
She turned to him. "Since when do you care?"
A muscle in his jaw ticked. "Since I realized you were never the pawn in this."
His words hung there like smoke—confusing, heavy, impossible to grasp. Before she could ask what he meant, the SUV jerked to a halt.
"Why are we stopping?" Elena whispered, instinctively reaching for the door.
Nicholas's hand shot out. "Don't."
A knock on the window startled them both.
It wasn't the driver.
The man who stood there was lean, dressed in a maintenance uniform, but Elena caught it instantly—the slight bulge beneath his vest. Armed. Trained. Watching.
Nicholas lowered the window half an inch. "You're early."
The man didn't blink. "The asset has been compromised. Contingency Bravo in effect. She comes with us."
Elena's heart plummeted.
"I'm not an asset," she said, voice cold. "I'm a person."
The man's eyes flicked to her for the first time. "Not tonight."
Nicholas reached into his coat and pulled something small and black from his pocket—a thumb drive.
He handed it out the window.
The man took it without looking, then spoke into a radio clipped to his shoulder. "Package received. Executing fallback route."
A second later, he vanished into the shadows.
Nicholas rolled the window back up and exhaled slowly.
"What was on that drive?" Elena asked.
"Proof. Or a death sentence. Depending on who finds it first."
They drove for another twenty minutes before arriving at a penthouse she didn't recognize—sleek, empty, too clean.
Inside, the air felt colder than it should.
"Whose place is this?" Elena asked.
"Mine," Nicholas said flatly. "One I never told the board about."
He moved to a wall-mounted control panel and tapped in a code. The floor beneath them vibrated slightly—an elevator? No, a vault.
A hidden door slid open, revealing a private lab.
Rows of servers. A glass wall lined with photos. Elena stepped closer.
Every photo was of a missing person. Women. All tied to Vale Technologies internships or acquisitions.
And in the center, a photo of Kate.
Pinned with a red string to Nicholas's.
Elena turned to him, heart pounding. "Why is your photo connected to hers?"
He didn't answer. Instead, he tapped a screen. Video footage flickered to life. Grainy. A lab hallway.
Kate. Arguing with someone. The audio crackled, then cleared just long enough for one line to cut through:
> "You said you'd protect me from him, not hand me over!"
Elena staggered back. "Who was she talking to?"
Nicholas didn't look away from the screen. "My brother."
Silence crashed over them.
"You never told me you had a brother."
"Because I thought he was dead."
Elena stared at the footage again. "You're telling me your brother... was the one pulling the strings?"
"He faked his death eight years ago. Vanished after a scandal. I didn't think he'd dare return. But he didn't just come back—he took over from the shadows."
"Then who have we been chasing this entire time?"
Nicholas met her eyes. "The wrong Vale."
Just as the truth began to settle, a deafening bang shattered the calm.
The glass wall exploded inward—smoke and sparks filling the room. Nicholas lunged for Elena, pulling her down as red laser sights danced through the haze.
"Get up!" he shouted, dragging her toward the back exit.
A voice crackled through the building's speaker system—distorted but clear.
> "You got too close, brother."
The doors slammed shut behind them.
"Is that him?" Elena gasped.
Nicholas didn't answer. He was already bleeding from a shallow cut above his brow, but his grip on her wrist never loosened.
"He has access to your entire network," she said. "Every safehouse, every system—"
"No," he growled. "There's one thing he doesn't know."
They burst through a fire escape door and spilled onto the rooftop, the city roaring below them. A helicopter circled above, spotlight scanning.
Nicholas pressed a button on his watch. A code flashed on the rooftop tile beside him.
Then the tile opened.
Below it—an underground elevator. Hidden in plain sight.
"Where does it lead?" she asked.
"To the one place he can't follow."
"And where's that?"
He stepped into the elevator and pulled her in with him.
"My past."
As the doors closed around them and the rooftop vanished above, Elena realized something chilling:
This wasn't just a race to find the truth anymore.
It was a war between brothers.
And she was the only one who might not make it out alive.