Lillian should have gone home hours ago.
But here she was at 11:47 PM, still hunched over her laptop in the empty conference room, trying to make sense of another "impossible" assignment Adrian had dumped on her desk that afternoon. This time it was a merger between two pharmaceutical companies that made absolutely no financial sense—until you looked at the patent portfolios and realized someone was playing a very long game.
Her eyes burned from staring at spreadsheets, and her stomach had given up growling around hour three of her impromptu fast. The cleaning crew had been and gone. Even Marcus had left around nine, shaking his head and muttering something about "inhuman work schedules."
She saved her work and finally admitted defeat. The rest would have to wait until tomorrow.
The building felt different at night. Shadows stretched longer across the polished floors, and her footsteps echoed louder in the empty corridors. The forty floors of glass and steel that buzzed with energy during the day now felt like a tomb.
The elevator ride down seemed to take forever.
Outside, Manhattan was still awake, but barely. A few taxis cruised by with their roof lights on, and the occasional drunk wandered past looking for their next destination. Street lamps cast yellow pools of light every few yards, leaving dark gaps in between that made Lillian walk a little faster.
She'd taken this route home dozens of times during her job search, back when she was apartment hunting in neighborhoods she could actually afford. The twenty-minute walk to the subway would save her eight dollars in cab fare—money she definitely didn't have to waste.
But tonight felt different. Maybe it was the late hour, or maybe it was the fact that her life had turned completely upside down in the past two days. Either way, she found herself glancing over her shoulder more than usual.
The first sign of trouble was the footsteps.
They'd been behind her for three blocks now, matching her pace. When she slowed down, they slowed down. When she sped up, so did they.
Lillian's heart started beating faster. She pulled out her phone and pretended to check messages while using the camera to look behind her. Two men in dark hoodies, keeping about half a block back.
Maybe she was being paranoid. Maybe they were just walking in the same direction.
But when she turned the corner onto a quieter side street, they turned too.
"Shit," she whispered.
The smart thing would be to turn around and head back to the main avenue. Or duck into one of the 24-hour delis that dotted the neighborhood. But she was already halfway to the subway, and her exhausted brain wasn't making the best decisions.
She picked up the pace.
They picked up the pace too.
The side street was darker, lined with old brownstones and parked cars. Fewer streetlights. Fewer people. Fewer options.
"Hey, lady."
The voice came from behind her, closer than before. Lillian's blood turned to ice.
"Lady, hold up a second."
She broke into a run.
"Shit, she's running. Go, go!"
Heavy footsteps pounded behind her. Lillian sprinted toward the next intersection, her work shoes slipping on the wet pavement. Her laptop bag banged against her hip with every step.
Almost there. Almost there.
A hand grabbed her shoulder and spun her around. She stumbled, nearly falling, and came face to face with two men who looked like they'd stepped out of a crime show. One was tall and thin with greasy hair, the other shorter but built like a linebacker.
"Easy, easy," the tall one said, holding up his hands like he was trying to calm a spooked horse. "We just want to talk."
"About what?" Lillian clutched her laptop bag to her chest.
"About what you got in that bag," the shorter one said. "And that fancy watch you're wearing."
Lillian looked down at her wrist. The watch had been a graduation gift from her parents. It wasn't expensive, but it was the nicest thing she owned.
"I don't have any money," she said.
"Sure you don't." The tall one smiled, showing teeth that probably hadn't seen a dentist in years. "Working late at that fancy building, dressed all nice. You got money."
"Look, just take the watch, okay? But I need my laptop for work."
"You need your laptop?" The short one laughed. "Lady, you're in no position to be making demands."
He stepped closer, and Lillian caught the smell of stale cigarettes and something worse. Her fight-or-flight response was screaming at her to run, but there was nowhere to go. They'd cornered her between a parked car and a fire hydrant.
"Please," she said. "Just take what you want and leave me alone."
"Oh, we're gonna take what we want," the tall one said. "Question is how much trouble you're gonna give us."
He reached for her bag.
That's when the shadows moved.
One second the street was empty except for the three of them. The next, a dark figure stepped out from between two parked cars like he'd materialized out of thin air.
"Gentlemen," a familiar voice said. "I think you're in the wrong neighborhood."
Adrian Valderon stood ten feet away, looking completely calm despite the fact that he was facing down two muggers at midnight. He wasn't even breathing hard.
"Who the hell are you?" the short one demanded.
"Someone who doesn't like bullies."
The tall one laughed. "Walk away, rich boy. This doesn't concern you."
"Actually," Adrian said, taking a step forward, "it does."
"Yeah? You and what army?"
"Just me."
The short one pulled something from his jacket. In the dim streetlight, Lillian caught the glint of metal.
"Knife!" she shouted.
Adrian moved.
Lillian had seen people move fast before. Athletes on TV, dancers on stage, her cousin Jake who'd done martial arts in college. But she'd never seen anything like this.
Adrian didn't run. He flowed. Like water, like wind, like something that wasn't entirely human.
One moment he was ten feet away. The next, he was behind the man with the knife, who was now face-down on the pavement with his arm twisted at an angle that made Lillian wince.
The tall one swung a punch that should have connected with Adrian's jaw. Instead, it hit empty air. Adrian was suddenly beside him, moving with the kind of speed that shouldn't have been possible.
A hand to the chest sent the tall one flying backward into a parked car with a metallic thud that echoed down the street.
The whole thing took maybe five seconds.
Both men were on the ground, groaning. The knife had somehow ended up in a storm drain twenty feet away.
Adrian straightened his tie and turned to Lillian.
"Are you hurt?"
She stared at him. "How did you... what did you..."
"Are you hurt?" he repeated.
"No, I'm... I'm fine." She was definitely not fine. Her hands were shaking, and her heart was beating so fast she thought it might explode. "How did you do that?"
"Do what?"
"Move like that. They didn't even see you coming."
Adrian glanced at the two men, who were starting to get back to their feet. The tall one was holding his ribs, and the short one's arm hung at his side at an odd angle.
"You should call the police," Adrian said.
"Shouldn't we—"
"No." His voice was sharp. "Call the police. File a report. Go home."
He started to walk away.
"Wait." Lillian grabbed his arm. "What are you doing here?"
Adrian went very still. Under her hand, his arm felt like granite. Too warm, too solid, too strong.
"I was in the neighborhood," he said.
"At midnight? On a Tuesday?"
"I don't sleep much."
He tried to pull away, but she held on. "That's not an answer."
"It's the only answer you're getting."
"Like hell it is." Adrenaline was making her brave. Or stupid. "You moved like... like you weren't human. And your eyes..."
"My eyes what?"
She looked up at him, trying to see his face in the streetlight. For just a moment, when he'd been fighting, she could have sworn his eyes had changed color. From midnight blue to something else. Something that glowed.
"They changed," she whispered. "They went gold."
Adrian's entire body went rigid. When he looked at her, his expression was completely blank.
"You're imagining things. You're in shock."
"I'm not—"
"You are." He pulled free of her grip. "Go home, Lillian. Forget this happened."
"How can I forget? You just saved my life!"
"I helped you out of a bad situation. That's all."
But it wasn't all, and they both knew it. Normal people didn't move like that. Normal people didn't have eyes that changed color in the middle of a fight.
"What are you?" she asked.
For a long moment, Adrian just looked at her. In the yellow glow of the streetlight, his face was all shadows and sharp angles. When he spoke, his voice was so quiet she almost missed it.
"I'm someone you should stay away from."
"Why?"
"Because I'm dangerous."
"You don't seem dangerous to me."
He laughed, but there was no humor in it. "That's because you don't know me."
"Then tell me. Help me understand."
"No."
He turned and started walking away again. This time, when she called after him, he didn't stop.
Lillian stood there on the empty street, watching him disappear into the shadows between the streetlights. The two muggers had limped away while she'd been talking to Adrian, probably more afraid of him than they were of the police.
She pulled out her phone to call 911, but stopped when she realized she didn't know what to tell them. That she'd been mugged but her boss had shown up and fought off her attackers with superhuman speed and possibly glowing eyes?
They'd think she was crazy.
Maybe she was crazy.
But as she finally made it to the subway station and descended into the fluorescent-lit underground, she couldn't shake the image of Adrian's face in that moment when she'd asked what he was.
He'd looked afraid.
Not of the muggers. Not of being caught doing something impossible.
He'd looked afraid of her.
Or maybe afraid of what she might think of him.
Which raised the question: what exactly was Adrian Valderon hiding? And why did she get the feeling that whatever it was, it was connected to the strange things that had been happening to her?
The train pulled into the station with a screech of metal on metal, and Lillian climbed aboard. She found a seat by the window and watched the dark tunnel walls flash by.
Tomorrow, she decided, she was going to get some answers.
Even if she had to follow Adrian Valderon around Manhattan to get them.
End of Chapter 3