The laughter and music of the masquerade faded behind her like the echo of a dream.
Isabella walked alone down the marble corridor, her heels tapping like a countdown to something she couldn't name.
In her fist, the keycard burned like a secret.
Nicolai's words replayed in her head.
Poor Evelyn. So clever… yet so predictable.
Her throat tightened. Every instinct screamed this was wrong, that she should turn back, but she didn't. She couldn't.
Because if there was even a chance Evelyn was alive—
If there was even a fragment of the truth left to hold—
She slid the keycard into the reader.
A soft click.
The door opened.
The room was a cathedral of silence.
White walls. Black floors. A single table under a hanging light.
And on that table… a small, glass box.
Inside it was something that made her breath stutter.
A mask.
Broken.
Stained with blood.
Her knees went weak. The lace edges were familiar—Evelyn's favorite mask, the one she wore on their last night together.
Her hand shook as she reached for the box—
A screen lit up on the wall.
Her sister's face.
Evelyn.
Alive.
But her eyes… her eyes were dead.
"Isabella." Her voice was a whisper, fractured, like it was dragged across glass.
"You shouldn't have come."
Isabella stumbled closer, her heart a wild drum.
"Evelyn—where are you? I'll—"
The image glitched.
Blood. Screams. A man's laugh like breaking teeth.
Then Nicolai's voice filled the room.
"Do you like my little theater?"
Isabella spun. The door slammed shut behind her.
He was there. Leaning against the frame, mask off, eyes dark as midnight sin.
"I told you," he murmured, stepping forward, "the truth would unmask us all."
Across the ballroom, Alexander realized too late that Isabella was gone.
And then—
Gunfire split the air.
Screams shattered the music as masked men drew weapons.
The masquerade dissolved into chaos.
Alexander's gun was in his hand before the first body hit the floor.
But his blood turned to ice when he saw who led the attack.
Not strangers.
Not outsiders.
His own men.
Back in the locked room, Nicolai reached out, lifting Isabella's chin with a single gloved finger.
"Do you know what she traded for you?" he whispered.
Her pulse stopped.
"What… what did you do to her?"
He smiled. Slow. Cruel.
"Nothing you won't beg me to do to you."
The lights cut out.