I didn't sleep.
How could I? Every time I closed my eyes, I saw those floating body parts, the file with my picture, Dante's golden eyes promising both protection and threat. The silk sheets felt like a trap, the beautiful bedroom like a luxurious cage.
Around three in the morning, I gave up pretending and got out of bed. If I was trapped here, I was at least going to find a way out.
I pulled on jeans and a sweater from the closet - someone had filled it with clothes in exactly my size, which should have been comforting but just felt creepy instead. Then I crept to the bedroom door and listened.
Silence.
The hallway was dark, but soft lighting along the baseboards kept me from breaking my neck as I made my way back downstairs. The front door was my first stop, but when I turned the handle, nothing happened. It didn't even budge.
"Electronic locks," I muttered, looking for a keypad or scanner. But there was nothing - just smooth wood and brass hardware that looked completely normal.
I tried the windows next. The ones in the living room were floor-to-ceiling affairs that should have opened onto the gardens I'd seen from the car. But when I pulled on the handles, they might as well have been painted on.
Kitchen. Same story. Every door, every window - all sealed tight.
By the time I'd tried every possible exit on the ground floor, panic was starting to set in. This wasn't just locked doors and windows. This was something else entirely.
I was standing in the foyer, trying not to hyperventilate, when I noticed the shimmer.
It was barely visible - like heat waves rising off summer pavement, but indoors. The distortion was strongest near the doors and windows, creating a faint ripple effect in the air.
"What the hell?" I reached out to touch it, and my hand hit something solid about six inches before it should have reached the door.
The barrier was invisible but completely impenetrable. And it covered every exit I could find.
"Energy field," a voice said behind me. "Military grade. Nothing gets in or out without the right frequency."
I spun around to find Dante watching me from the staircase. He'd changed out of his wedding clothes into dark jeans and a black t-shirt that showed off exactly how not-human his build was. His eyes were still that unnatural gold color.
"You trapped me here," I said.
"I protected you here." He came down the stairs with that predatory grace I was starting to recognize. "There's a difference."
"No, there isn't. A cage is a cage."
"Even if it's the only thing keeping you alive?"
I gestured at the shimmer around the door. "This isn't protection. This is imprisonment."
"Sometimes they're the same thing." He was close enough now that I could feel the heat radiating off his skin. "Did you really think you could just walk away from this?"
"I had to try."
"Why?"
The question caught me off guard. "Because... because I'm not some lab rat you can experiment on. I'm not your breeding stock. I'm a person with rights and choices and—"
"And you're dead if you step foot outside this house." His voice was flat, matter-of-fact. "Your choices are stay here and live, or leave and die within the hour."
"You don't know that."
"Don't I?" He pulled out his phone and tapped the screen a few times. "Come on. Let me show you exactly how much choice you really have."
He led me back down to the secret laboratory. The lights came on automatically as we descended, illuminating the same horror show of equipment and specimens I'd discovered earlier. But this time, Dante went straight to the main computer terminal.
"What you saw last night was just the tip of the iceberg," he said, typing in a series of commands. "You want to know why you can't leave? Why your whole life has been a lie? Why you're so important to these people that they'll kill anyone who gets in their way?"
The main screen flickered to life, displaying what looked like a government seal. Then the image changed to a conference room full of people in military uniforms and expensive suits.
"This was recorded six months ago," Dante said. "Pentagon sub-basement. Classification level: Beyond Black."
The video started playing, and I heard a voice I recognized immediately.
"Project Genesis has exceeded all expectations," Vivian was saying. She was sitting at the head of the conference table, looking every inch the high-powered executive. "Subject 47-A shows remarkable genetic stability and optimal breeding compatibility."
Subject 47-A. That was me. I was Subject 47-A.
"The Xerion genetic material has integrated flawlessly," Vivian continued. "Our projections show that her offspring will possess enhanced physical capabilities, extended lifespan, and unprecedented regenerative abilities."
"And the control mechanisms?" This from a man in an Air Force uniform.
"Fully operational. The subject has no awareness of her true nature or purpose. She believes herself to be an ordinary college student from a middle-class family."
"What about emotional attachments? Resistance to the breeding program?"
Vivian smiled, and it was nothing like the warm maternal expression I remembered from my childhood. "That's what the contract marriage is for. We'll pair her with one of our enhanced assets, someone who can ensure compliance while providing optimal genetic material for the next generation."
"Asset designation?"
"Werewolf-7. Also known as Dante Salvatore."
I felt like I'd been punched in the stomach. On screen, someone was handing Vivian a folder.
"Salvatore's conditioning is complete," she said, opening the file. "He'll fulfill his breeding assignment and neutralize the subject if she becomes non-compliant."
The blood was roaring in my ears, but I forced myself to keep watching. There was more - so much more. Video after video of meetings, planning sessions, progress reports. All about me. All about turning me into some kind of breeding machine for super soldiers.
"That's enough," I whispered, but Dante kept the video running.
"No," he said. "You need to see all of it."
The next clip showed a younger version of Vivian standing in what looked like a hospital room. A woman was lying in the bed, pale and exhausted, holding a newborn baby.
My mother. Holding me.
"The birth was successful," Vivian was saying to someone off-camera. "Both the Xerion modifications and the human genetics are stable. The child shows no obvious abnormalities."
"And the mother?"
"Will be terminated as planned. We can't risk her talking about the program."
I watched my mother kiss my forehead, completely unaware that the woman she trusted was planning to kill her. Three days later, according to the file, she died of "complications from childbirth."
Murder. They murdered my mother.
"Turn it off," I said, but my voice came out as barely a whisper.
Dante didn't turn it off. Instead, he switched to another file - this one showing surveillance footage. Me at age five, starting kindergarten. Me at ten, riding my bike in the driveway. Me at fifteen, getting my first job.
Every major moment of my life had been recorded, analyzed, reported on. Vivian appeared in dozens of clips, always playing the loving adoptive mother while describing my "development" like I was a science experiment.
"Emotional stability remains high," she was saying in one report. "Subject shows no signs of awareness regarding her true nature. Recommend proceeding to Phase Two on schedule."
"What's Phase Two?" I managed to ask.
"Marriage and reproduction," Dante said quietly. "They were planning to start breeding you as soon as you turned eighteen."
The room was spinning. I gripped the edge of the desk to keep from falling over. "All of it. My entire life. It was all fake."
"Yes."
"Vivian isn't really my adoptive mother."
"She's a government scientist. Has been since before you were born."
"And you? Are you really Asset Werewolf-7?"
He was quiet for a long moment. "It's complicated."
"Uncomplicate it."
"I was. Five years ago, I was exactly what they made me to be. Enhanced genetics, psychological conditioning, absolute loyalty to the mission." His golden eyes met mine. "But something went wrong."
"What?"
"I started remembering things. Human things. Emotions that weren't supposed to exist anymore." He gestured at the screens around us. "They think their conditioning is perfect, but it's not. And when I started to break free..."
"You decided to help me instead of following orders?"
"I decided you deserved better than being a test tube for their master race fantasies."
I stared at him, this man - this creature - who had married me under false pretenses but was apparently the only person in my entire life who wasn't lying to me about everything.
"So what now?" I asked. "We're both trapped here. They know where we are. Eventually they'll come for us."
"Eventually." He started typing commands into the computer again. "But first, we need to figure out what you're really capable of."
"What do you mean?"
"The genetic modifications they gave your mother weren't just for breeding compatibility. They were supposed to give you abilities. Powers that would make you useful as more than just a baby factory."
"What kind of powers?"
"That's what we're going to find out." He pulled up another screen, this one showing what looked like DNA sequences. "According to their research, you should be able to manipulate biological systems at the genetic level. Rewrite DNA, alter cellular function, maybe even resurrect dead tissue."
"That's impossible."
"Is it? Look around you, Aria. Everything you thought was impossible turned out to be true."
Before I could argue, alarms started blaring throughout the laboratory. Red lights flashed, and every computer screen switched to the same message: SECURITY BREACH - CONTAINMENT COMPROMISED.
"What's happening?" I shouted over the noise.
Dante's face had gone white. "Someone's trying to break through the energy field."
"The government?"
"Worse. The Xerions."
"The aliens?"
"They want you back. And they don't take no for an answer."
The main screen switched to external cameras, showing the grounds around the mansion. Dark figures were moving through the gardens - dozens of them, all carrying weapons that definitely weren't human-made.
"We need to get out of here," Dante said, grabbing my arm.
"How? You said the energy field—"
"The field's been compromised. That's how they got in." He was pulling me toward a different door, one I hadn't noticed before. "But it also means we can get out."
"Where are we going?"
"Anywhere but here."
We ran through corridors I hadn't seen before, past rooms full of equipment and storage areas packed with supplies. The alarms were getting louder, and I could hear sounds of fighting from somewhere above us.
"This way," Dante said, yanking open a door that led to what looked like a garage. Three motorcycles sat ready, helmets hanging from the handlebars.
"I don't know how to ride—"
"You're riding with me." He threw me a helmet and straddled the largest bike. "Hold on and don't let go no matter what happens."
I climbed on behind him just as explosions started going off upstairs. The garage door was already opening, revealing a ramp that led up to the gardens.
"Ready?" he asked.
"No."
"Good enough."
He gunned the engine, and we shot up the ramp like a rocket. The night air hit my face as we burst out of the underground garage, and I could see the battle raging around the mansion.
The attackers weren't human. They were tall, pale, with elongated limbs and faces that were almost right but not quite. Their weapons fired beams of light that cut through trees like they were made of paper.
But as we raced across the lawn, something strange happened. The energy field that had trapped me in the house was flickering, weakening. And every time one of the light beams came close to me, it bent away, like there was an invisible shield around us.
"Dante!" I shouted over the engine noise. "Something's happening!"
"I know!" he called back. "Don't fight it! Let it happen!"
We hit the main road doing at least eighty miles an hour, the mansion burning behind us. But I could feel something building inside me - a pressure, a heat, like electricity running through my veins.
And then it exploded outward.
Every streetlight we passed flickered and died. Car alarms started going off in random sequence. The motorcycle's engine surged, giving us even more speed. And behind us, I heard a sound like thunder as the energy field around the mansion collapsed completely.
"What did I do?" I gasped.
"You broke free," Dante said. "You're finally awake."
As we disappeared into the Miami night, I could feel something fundamental changing inside me. The girl who had walked down that aisle twelve hours ago was gone forever.
I didn't know who I was becoming, but I knew one thing for certain: I was never going to be anyone's victim again.
End of Chapter 3