Morning belonged to me.
That alone felt like a small victory.
The safe house was hushed in the way places get when everyone who mattered preferred the dark. No footsteps. No voices. No subtle hum of Sylus's attention sharpening somewhere behind me. Just sunlight spilling across stone and glass, and the low, steady breath of systems idling instead of watching.
I worked on the balcony at first.
The air was cool enough to keep me alert, the city still stretching itself awake below. My laptop rested on the table, coffee within reach, TraceNet unfolded across the screen in layers that only made sense once you stopped trying to force them.
I didn't chase Viktor.
I listened.
I let TraceNet drift through feeds and systems the way a tide moves through ruins—touching everything, claiming nothing.
Absences were clearer now.
Gaps where traffic should have flowed. Redundant paths that suddenly weren't. Cameras that blinked, just once, at the same hour every day. Patterns not meant to be patterns—habits disguised as noise.
I marked them without comment.
Amber, not red.
Not yet.
A breeze lifted the edge of my hoodie. Sunlight warmed my hands as I worked, and for the first time since arriving in this world, I realized my shoulders weren't locked around my ears.
Sylus wouldn't be awake for hours.
That was canon.
Night was his element—shadowed corridors, artificial light, the kind of darkness that sharpened instead of softened.
The twins followed his rhythm.
Which meant I was alone.
And I liked it more than I expected.
Around midmorning, I checked in on Elara.
Me: You up?
Elara: Barely 😭 but yes. Are you okay??
A soft exhale left me.
Still herself. Still immediate. Still worried in all the ways that didn't hurt.
Me: I'm okay. Promise. Just wanted to check in.
Elara: kk have a good day.
Me: you too.
I locked the phone and set it aside.
By noon, the sun had shifted enough that the balcony lost its edge. I closed the laptop, stretched carefully, and went inside to make lunch.
The mansion stayed still.
After eating, I migrated again.
The couch caught my eye—deep, wide, close enough to the windows that the light didn't glare off the screen. I settled there with the laptop balanced on my knees, one leg tucked beneath me, posture shifting every few minutes as ideas moved faster than my body could stay still.
This was how I worked best.
Not locked in one place.
Not contained.
I followed threads now instead of nodes. Watched how certain systems reacted when others went silent. Let TraceNet suggest correlations I wouldn't have trusted without sleep, sunlight, and the absence of immediate threat.
One cluster resolved itself slowly.
Not a location.
A schedule.
Viktor seemed to favor movement just before dusk—adjustments made too early to be coincidence, too late to be efficiency.
I tagged the cluster and leaned back, staring at the ceiling.
As the day slipped toward evening, the house stirred.
First the subtle signs—doors opening softly, floorboards acknowledging weight again. Then voices. Low. Familiar.
The twins emerged like nocturnal creatures blinking into a world they tolerated rather than loved.
Luke padded into the kitchen first. "I'm starving," he announced to no one in particular.
Kieran followed, calmer as always, already checking the fridge.
I joined them with my mug, leaning against the counter. Their rhythm was easy—no forced conversation, no explanations needed. We ate in a companionable quiet.
Then Luke brightened.
"Oh—almost forgot," he said, tapping at his tablet. "We found something."
Kieran glanced at him. "You mean you pulled it."
"Found sounds better," Luke said, already grinning. "Anyway. We were worried when Boss came back alone."
"So we checked," Kieran finished, setting his plate aside.
The screen lit up.
Security footage.
The poker room.
My stomach tightened—I hated watching myself.
The angle was wide. Clean. Me at the table. Kovi. Halden. Sylus beside me, unreadable as ever.
Luke leaned his elbows on the counter like this was entertainment. "Alright," he said lightly. "Let's see what almost got you killed."
The footage jumped.
The bodyguard moved.
I moved.
I watched myself kick the chair backward—harder than I remembered. The legs slammed into his shins and his balance folded immediately.
I winced.
"Too much commitment," I muttered. "If he'd cleared the chair faster—"
"You'd be eating felt," Luke cut in, tone breezy. "Yeah. But he didn't."
"That's not a defense," I said.
"It is if you're still standing," Luke replied.
The footage rolled.
My hand caught his wrist mid-reach. The gun came into frame—too close.
"That," I said flatly, "was the risk."
Luke's grin faded just a notch. "Yeah. That window's ugly."
"He almost had the weapon," I said. "I let him think he did."
Kieran paused the video precisely as the joint lock set.
"You isolated the arm before he could fire," he said. Not impressed. Just exact.
"Barely," I replied. "If his grip had been stronger, I'd have had to break it instead of threaten it."
Luke tilted his head. "You chose quiet."
"I chose control," I said. "Breaking it would've escalated faster."
The footage continued—me on top of him now, knee braced beside his ribs, weight crushing the breath out of him as his free hand scrabbled uselessly.
Luke made a low sound. "Oh, that's mean."
"It's positional," I said. "Panic makes people sloppy."
Kieran nodded once. "You denied escalation."
"Exactly."
The final moments played—the strike, the second, the disarm. The magazine scattering across the carpet.
Luke exhaled, impressed despite himself. "You didn't just end him. You shut the room up."
I folded my arms. "Too late."
Both of them looked at me.
"If he'd had backup," I said quietly, "I stayed grounded too long."
The brothers exchanged a glance.
"We should train sometime," Luke said, already smiling. "New variables keep things fun."
"New blood keeps you honest," Kieran added calmly.
I hesitated—then smiled, small.
"Once I'm cleared."
Luke grinned wider. "Holding you to that."
Kieran reached for the controls.
"There's more," he said.
And pressed play.
The reveal of ink.
The shift in posture.
The cigarette.
The way the room subtly recalibrated around me.
Luke let out a slow, appreciative whistle. "Okay. Yeah. That was a choice."
Kieran didn't speak, but his head tilted—a tell I'd learned to recognize as interest.
"That part," Luke added, amused, "changed the vibe completely."
"It was an order," I said.
They both looked at me.
"Boss said to seize the moment," I continued. "There was a shift. I felt it. So I took them by surprise."
Luke smirked. "By setting the table on fire."
"I hope it wasn't too much," I added, quieter than I meant to.
Luke opened his mouth—probably to say something unhelpful—
—and I felt it.
The weight.
The air changing.
I turned.
Sylus stood just inside the kitchen threshold, black silk pajamas, hair sleep-tousled, presence filling the space without effort. He hadn't announced himself. Hadn't interrupted.
He'd been there long enough to see the screen.
I stilled.
"Morning, Boss," I said, tipping my head once.
Then I picked up my mug and left the kitchen without another word.
Grabbed my laptop from the couch.
And didn't slow until I was back in my room.
The door slid shut behind me with a soft seal, and only then did I let out the breath I'd been holding—sharp, irritated, more like a hiss than a sigh.
Idiot.
I set the mug down, crossed the room, and dropped onto the edge of the bed harder than necessary. The laptop followed, landing beside me with a dull thump. For a moment, I just sat there, elbows on my knees, staring at the floor like it had personally offended me.
Why did I leave?
The question needled at me, immediate and unwelcome.
He hadn't said anything.
He hadn't moved.
He hadn't stopped me.
So why did my chest feel tight, like I'd narrowly avoided something sharp?
I scrubbed a hand down my face, fingers catching briefly in damp hair. The reaction didn't make sense. That was the problem. I replayed the moment in my head with clinical precision—him standing in the doorway, the screen still lit, the twins mid-banter, my own voice coming out steadier than I felt.
Morning, Boss.
Polite. Controlled. Correct.
And then I'd left.
Too fast. Too clean.
Like I was retreating.
The annoyance sharpened.
This was ridiculous. He wasn't real—not really. Sylus was a character I knew inside and out. I knew his tells, his patterns, the way his presence was designed to dominate a room. I knew what his silence meant in a narrative sense. Approval withheld. Judgment deferred. Power conserved.
I'd navigated that dynamic a hundred times on a screen.
But this wasn't a screen.
The thought landed heavier than expected.
This wasn't a cutscene or a branching dialogue tree where the worst outcome was a reload. This was my body on the line. My breath. My bones. My continued existence contingent on choices I couldn't undo with a menu.
The poker game had felt like play.
Dangerous play, sure—but still a game. Cards. Posturing. Calculated risks. Even the fight had snapped into something familiar: movement, angles, cause and effect. Action without reflection.
The kitchen wasn't like that.
The kitchen was… aftermath.
People replaying my decisions. Analyzing them. Admiring them. Questioning them.
Seeing me.
And then Sylus had seen me too—not in the way he did at the table, not as an asset or a variable, but as someone mid-sentence, mid-doubt, openly wondering whether she'd gone too far.
Guard down.
I pressed my palms into my thighs, grounding myself in the pressure.
That was the part that bothered me.
Not that he'd watched. He always watched.
It was that I'd cared.
Cared enough to hope—quietly, stupidly—that he hadn't hated it. That my interpretation of his order hadn't crossed some invisible line. That I hadn't misplayed a role I was only just beginning to understand.
Why?
I didn't have feelings for him. That was absurd. He wasn't him. He was a composite of lore, design, voice acting, player projection. A narrative construct I'd dissected from every angle.
So why did my instincts tell me to protect myself the moment he entered the room?
The answer came uncomfortably fast.
Because he wasn't contained anymore.
On a screen, Sylus existed at a safe distance. I could admire the control, the danger, the mythic gravity without consequence. Here, that gravity had weight. It bent the room. It bent me, just enough that I noticed.
And that scared me more than Viktor ever had.
Viktor was obvious. Loud in his cruelty. Predictable in his hunger. A threat I could map, track, dismantle piece by piece.
Sylus was quieter.
He didn't demand anything.
He didn't reassure.
He didn't correct me.
He just… allowed.
Allowed me to act.
Allowed me to interpret.
Allowed me to leave.
That kind of freedom came with teeth.
I leaned back against the headboard and stared at the ceiling, jaw tight.
Get a grip.
This wasn't about attraction. It wasn't about trust. It was about proximity and power and the uncomfortable fact that my survival was now entangled with people who weren't characters anymore—they were stakeholders.
They weren't pieces on a board.
They were the board.
And I was standing on it, barefoot, trying to remember when the game had stopped feeling like a game at all.
I reached for the laptop, flipping it open with more force than necessary. The screen lit up, familiar and obedient, and relief washed through me at the sight of TraceNet waiting exactly where I'd left it.
Good.
Data didn't look back.
Patterns didn't care.
Systems didn't watch me hesitate.
I could handle this.
I flexed my fingers and leaned forward, letting the glow of the screen pull me back into something I understood.
Whatever that moment in the kitchen had been—whatever nerve it had touched—I didn't have time for it.
Not now.
I had a man to find.
And a reality to survive.
I stayed there until the glow of the screen stopped feeling like a shield and started feeling like work again.
That was my cue.
I saved my progress, tagged the dusk cluster for later, and closed the laptop. The screen went dark, leaving the room dim and ordinary again. Evening had crept up while I wasn't looking.
Midnight was coming.
I stood and crossed to the closet. My things were few. I zipped the bag and set it by the door, then sat on the edge of the bed for a moment longer than necessary.
I checked the time.
Still hours to kill.
I lay back, hands folded over my stomach, eyes on the ceiling, letting the quiet settle back in around me.
Time to go back home.
Or whatever still thought it could pass for one.