Liam Ashford's bedroom window opened without resistance—Morgan had disabled the alarm system twelve minutes earlier, timed the security patrol's rotation, mapped every exit. The operation should have proceeded like the others. Silent extraction. Minimal contact. Clean.
Morgan moved through the dark room toward the bed where Liam slept. Reached for the chloroform-soaked cloth, the method that had worked four times before.
Liam's eyes snapped open.
Then Liam's fist connected with Morgan's jaw.
Morgan staggered backward, vision sparking. Liam rolled off the bed, stance low and balanced—trained, Morgan realized too late. The boy pivoted, drove a palm strike toward Morgan's solar plexus. Morgan blocked, but barely. Grabbed for Liam's arm. Liam twisted free, used the momentum to sweep Morgan's legs.
Morgan hit the floor. Liam bolted for the door.
No. Morgan lunged, caught Liam's ankle. Liam crashed down, screaming now—high and piercing, the sound that would bring parents running, neighbors calling police, everything collapsing.
Morgan clamped a hand over Liam's mouth. Liam bit down. Hard. Morgan's other hand found the chloroform cloth on the floor, pressed it against Liam's face despite Liam's thrashing. Counted seconds. Ten. Fifteen. Liam's struggles weakened. Twenty. The boy went limp.
Morgan's hand throbbed where Liam's teeth had broken skin. Blood seeped between Morgan's fingers. The bedroom door flew open.
Victoria Ashford stood silhouetted in the hallway light. Her eyes locked on Morgan's face. One second. Two. Long enough to see. Long enough to remember.
Then Morgan moved—kicked the window screen out, hauled Liam through the opening. Dropped into the landscaping below, Liam's unconscious weight crushing Morgan's shoulder. Ran through the garden where every shadow could hide security cameras, where every step left evidence.
The van sat three blocks away. Morgan's lungs burned. Liam's head lolled against Morgan's chest. This wasn't rescue. This was assault. Kidnapping. The words the law would use, the reality Morgan could no longer deny.
Morgan dumped Liam in the back of the van, secured the restraints with shaking hands. Started the engine. Drove toward the safe house while checking mirrors for police lights that would inevitably come.
Victoria Ashford had seen Morgan's face.
Everything had just changed.
The safe house apartment smelled like mildew and old cigarettes. Morgan had prepared it days ago—mattress on the floor, bottled water, the folder containing Marcus Chen's case files that would explain everything to Liam.
Except Liam wasn't listening.
"My dad is going to kill you." Liam sat against the wall, wrists zip-tied, face pale but eyes burning with rage. "He has connections. You have no idea what you've done."
Morgan opened the folder, spread the documents across the floor between them. "Your biological father is Marcus Chen. He's in prison for embezzlement charges that were fabricated. The Ashfords—"
"The Ashfords are my parents."
"They stole you. When your mother died, when Marcus was imprisoned on false charges they engineered—"
"I don't care." Liam's voice cracked. "I don't remember any Marcus. I don't want to remember. You kidnapped me from my real family."
Morgan's hands stilled on the papers. "Your real family is—"
"The people who raised me. The people who were there when I learned to ride a bike, who helped with homework, who—" Liam's composure shattered. Tears streaked his face. "You're a monster. That's what you are. A monster who hurts kids."
The words hit like Liam's earlier punch. Harder. Because they contained truth Morgan couldn't categorize away.
"I'm trying to help you," Morgan said, but the words felt hollow even as Morgan spoke them.
"By drugging me? By tying me up? By ripping me away from everyone I love?" Liam pulled against the restraints. "That's not help. That's not rescue. That's just you being a criminal."
Morgan gathered the documents, returned them to the folder. Liam wouldn't look at them. Wouldn't accept the narrative Morgan had constructed. The binary categories—stolen child, rightful parent, justice delivered—meant nothing to a boy who remembered only the Ashford family's love.
Sophie had questioned. Liam rejected entirely.
The mission was supposed to reunite families. Return children to biological parents. Correct the injustice of wealth stealing from poverty.
But Liam didn't want reunion. Didn't recognize Marcus Chen as family. Viewed Morgan not as savior but as exactly what Morgan was: someone who'd drugged and kidnapped a child from the only parents that child had ever known.
Morgan stood, moved to the window. Couldn't look at Liam's tear-streaked face, couldn't confront the gap between Morgan's ideology and the twelve-year-old boy whose suffering Morgan had directly caused.
Outside, the city continued its ordinary existence. People going to work. Children going to school. Families loving each other without categories defining which love counted as authentic.
Morgan's phone buzzed. Turned it over. Stared at the screen.
NEWS ALERT: Senator's Friend's Son Kidnapped—FBI Investigating
Morgan's stomach dropped. Clicked the notification. Read the article that detailed Liam's disappearance, the Ashford family's prominence, Senator Harrison Whitmore's statement condemning the "heinous act" and demanding federal resources.
And below the text: a police sketch.
Morgan's face. Not perfect—the nose slightly wrong, the jawline softer than reality. But close. Close enough that anyone who knew Morgan would recognize the resemblance.
Based on witness description, the caption read. Victoria Ashford had provided details. Had spent however many seconds looking at Morgan's face in Liam's bedroom, enough seconds to remember, to describe, to give authorities the first real lead they'd ever had.
Morgan refreshed the page. The sketch appeared on three more news sites. Five. Eight. Going viral across every platform.
Special task force formed, one headline announced. Detective Ruth Banner assigned to lead investigation.
FBI involved despite family's initial reluctance, another stated. Federal resources mobilized.
Morgan's anonymity—the protection that had allowed four successful operations, the shield that had kept Morgan invisible—had evaporated. Now every person watching news coverage, every police officer checking bulletins, every FBI agent in the task force had Morgan's face.
Not the real face, but close enough. Too close.
The phone rang. Father Domingo's number.
Morgan answered. "I can't talk right now—"
"The community is scared." Father Domingo's voice shook. "People are asking questions. Four families here, Morgan. Four biological parents who got their children back. They're wondering if there's a connection. If the police will trace it back here."
Morgan pressed forehead against the window glass. Cold. Solid. Real.
"They're looking for patterns," Father Domingo continued. "The news is talking about other missing children from wealthy families. They're saying it might be connected. If they find this place, if they start asking questions about who's living here and how their children came back—"
"I know."
"Then what do we do? These families trusted you. Trusted that you were helping them get their children back from people who'd stolen them. But if this explodes, if investigators start connecting cases—" Father Domingo's breath caught. "What if they trace this back to us? What happens to these families?"
Morgan turned from the window. Liam sat against the wall, watching Morgan with hatred that felt deserved.
"I don't know," Morgan said.
"You don't know?" Father Domingo's voice climbed. "Morgan, there are children here. Parents who've just gotten their kids back. If authorities find out, those children get taken away again. The parents face charges. Everything you've done—"
"Gets undone. I know."
Silence stretched across the line. Finally: "So what now?"
Morgan looked at Liam. At the police sketch on the phone screen. At the safe house that no longer felt safe.
Two options. Both impossible.
Abandon everything. Return Liam to the Ashfords. Stop the operations. Protect the families already reunited by disappearing before authorities could trace connections. Let the mission die, let Morgan's identity as the debt collector evaporate, accept that the system had won.
Or escalate. Find a way to complete Liam's case despite the FBI, despite the task force, despite Morgan's face on every news channel. Continue the mission because stopping meant surrendering to the injustice Morgan had dedicated everything to fighting.
But escalation meant more risk. More danger. More potential for the entire network to collapse and drag down every family Morgan had tried to help.
"Father Domingo," Morgan said quietly. "Tell them to be ready. To have plans if investigators come asking questions."
"Ready for what?"
"For everything to fall apart."
Morgan disconnected. Set the phone down. Stared at Liam, who stared back with a child's absolute moral certainty about who was victim and who was villain.
The mission was supposed to be simple. Stolen children returned to biological parents. Justice delivered where the law refused. Categories that made sense of a complex world.
But Liam's tears were real. Victoria Ashford's witness testimony was real. The families at Father Domingo's halfway house facing exposure were real.
And Morgan's face, broadcast across every news channel, recognizable to anyone who might know Morgan or have seen Morgan during surveillance—that was real too.
The ground had already fractured. The question wasn't whether everything would collapse.
The question was how many people would be buried in the rubble when it did.