The rain hadn't stopped; it had simply softened, turning the world outside the window into shifting gray glass.
Sofia sat on the edge of the bed, tea untouched, trying to decide if she felt safe or trapped.
The room was sparse—white walls, one armchair, a desk with no drawers. Every object looked deliberately chosen, like someone had edited the space until nothing unnecessary remained.
Her laptop and phone were gone. Panic flared for a second, but then she saw them on the desk, screens dark, charging. Nothing appeared broken or searched.
The door opened again, quietly this time. Adrian stepped inside carrying a paper bag. "Breakfast," he said, setting it down. "And before you ask, no one's coming after you today."
She eyed him. "Where's he?"
"Working."
"That's what you call whatever he does?"
Adrian smiled faintly. "He doesn't sit still, if that's what you mean."
Sofia unwrapped the food without appetite. "Why bring me here instead of letting me go home?"
"Because they would've followed you. Albrecht doesn't like unfinished work."
She looked up sharply. "He tried to kill me."
Adrian's expression didn't change. "He tried to find you. Killing you would've been a bonus."
A silence settled between them until she said, "You sound disturbingly calm about that."
"I work for someone who survives by keeping calm," Adrian said simply. Then, after a pause: "He asked me to tell you you're free to leave after noon, if you still want to."
Sofia frowned. "And if I do?"
"Then we drive you to the edge of the city, and you forget this place exists. But if you stay, you'll see the side of Verrencia you've only written about."
She studied him for a moment. "Which side is that?"
"The part that decides who gets to write history."
---
Meanwhile, three floors below, Ramond stood in the safe house's garage beside an open car hood, phone pressed to his ear.
"I told you to keep the docks clear," he said, voice cold but quiet. "If Albrecht can plant men on my pier, someone in customs is selling information."
The voice on the other end mumbled excuses.
Ramond ended the call mid-sentence, dropped the phone onto the workbench, and wiped his hands on a cloth. The gesture looked almost human—almost weary—but when Adrian appeared at the stairwell he straightened instantly.
"She's awake?"
"Eating. Suspicious as ever."
"Good," Ramond said. "Fear keeps her alert."
"And guilt?" Adrian asked.
Ramond gave a short, humorless laugh. "That keeps everyone else obedient."
He closed the hood, the sound echoing like a gavel. "By tonight, I want a name for the leak. And make sure she doesn't try to run before I can explain why she shouldn't."
Sofia waited until the sound of footsteps faded down the hallway before she stood. Curiosity had always been her compass; it still pulled even when she knew better.
The safe house stretched farther than she expected—a corridor of gray doors, the air faintly scented with cedar and disinfectant. One door opened onto a living room lined with maps of Verrencia. Red pins dotted the city like constellations. Another wall carried a shelf of books: finance, politics, and a few older volumes whose spines were worn almost smooth.
She traced one finger along the map nearest her. The harbor was marked three times—different colored pins linked by thin threads of string. She followed the lines until they reached the inland district where her father's headquarters stood. Her chest tightened. He had mapped her world onto his.
A voice behind her: "Find something interesting?"
She turned quickly. Ramond stood in the doorway, jacket gone, sleeves rolled up, the fatigue of a sleepless night visible around his eyes.
"I was looking for coffee," she lied.
He smiled faintly. "There's a machine in the kitchen. That wall won't pour you any."
She gestured toward the map. "You have my father's office pinned."
"I have every office pinned. Your father's is just more relevant today."
"Because of me."
"Because of what he signed," Ramond said evenly. "You only brought the signature into daylight."
He stepped closer, studying her the way one studies a rare artifact—careful, curious, detached. "Do you understand why that matters?"
"You're asking if I know what I've stepped into."
"Do you?"
"I'm beginning to," she admitted.
"Then stay until you're sure," he said, turning toward the coffee machine. The scent of roasted beans filled the room as he continued, almost absently: "When truth surfaces in Verrencia, someone drowns. I'd rather it not be you."
Sofia watched him pour two cups, place one on the table before her. "You keep saying you're protecting me," she said. "But it feels more like you're collecting me."
He met her eyes. "Protection and possession are cousins. People just prefer the polite word."
The honesty in his tone unsettled her more than any threat could have. She wrapped her hands around the warm cup, unsure whether to drink or throw it at him.
After a moment she asked quietly, "What happens when you run out of polite words?"
"Then," he said, turning toward the window, "you'll finally see what kind of man you're writing about."
Outside, thunder rolled again, echoing through the steel bones of the city. Inside, neither of them moved. The silence between them was heavy enough to have shape.
---
Later that afternoon the storm eased, leaving only a soft hiss of water draining through the gutters. Restlessness pushed Sofia out of the living room and down another hall she hadn't explored. The corridor ended in a door left slightly open.
Voices drifted through.
"…she'll need to know eventually," a man was saying—older, the accent from Verrencia's southern coast.
"She'll know when I decide," came Ramond's reply, low and precise.
Sofia pushed the door wider. Inside was a small command room—screens showing live feeds of the city, streets she recognized and others she didn't. At one of the monitors sat a gray-haired man in a tailored vest.
He looked up first. "Ah, the journalist." His smile was almost warm. "You walk quieter than most of his men."
Ramond turned, surprise flickering across his expression before it was gone. "Sofia, this is Leon Marchand. Retired intelligence. Occasionally useful."
"Occasionally honest," Leon corrected. He extended a hand. "You're making quite the stir for someone with a pen."
Sofia shook his hand warily. "You've been watching me?"
Leon gestured toward the screens. "We watch everyone. It's the only way Verrencia stays standing."
Ramond's tone sharpened. "Enough introductions. Leon, the leak from customs—?"
"Contained," Leon said. "For now. But your problem's moving closer. Albrecht's men know about the girl."
"Of course they do."
Sofia folded her arms. "You could try not talking about me like I'm a file on one of those screens."
Ramond regarded her for a moment. "Then stop standing where the bullets land."
Leon gave a soft chuckle. "She's got spirit. Reminds me of someone."
Ramond ignored him. "You wanted to see what this world looks like," he said to Sofia. "Here it is—wires, trades, half the city owing favors they can't repay. And somewhere inside that tangle is your father's signature."
She glanced at the map overlay glowing on the central screen. Lines of code linked bank accounts to shipping manifests, political donations, charity funds. "You built this."
"I inherited it," he said. "Then I made it efficient."
Leon leaned back, studying the two of them. "Efficiency, obsession—same coin, different sides."
Ramond's expression didn't change. "You have work to do, old man."
Leon stood, still smiling, and left the room, the door closing softly behind him.
For a long moment, only the soft hum of electronics filled the air. Sofia finally said, "So this is what power looks like."
"No," Ramond said. "This is what survival looks like. Power is the illusion we sell to make it bearable."
She looked at him then—really looked—and realized he believed every word. Whatever mask he wore in public, it wasn't for vanity; it was armor.
---The room felt larger once Leon's footsteps faded. The monitors threw pale light across Ramond's face, cutting sharp angles into the calm.
Sofia turned toward the nearest screen. "Can you trace where the money went?"
"I already did." He keyed a few commands; the display changed to show a network of transfers branching through offshore accounts. "Half the fortune under your father's name came through shell companies tied to Albrecht. The other half disappears into development projects that don't exist."
Her throat tightened. "You could destroy him with this."
He looked at her. "You think that's what I want?"
"I think you don't do anything without purpose."
That drew the faintest curve of his mouth. "Correct. But I prefer leverage to ashes."
The admission stung. "So I'm leverage too?"
"You're context," he said, not unkindly. "You make his empire human. That makes it weak."
She turned away, pressing a hand to her temple. "You talk about people like chess pieces."
"Because they move like them," he said quietly. "Every one thinks they have free will until someone knocks over their king."
Lightning flared outside, a brief white pulse against the rain-smeared glass. For a second she saw his reflection beside hers—two silhouettes framed in blue light, neither looking entirely real.
She whispered, "Why hide your face, then? If you hold all the pieces?"
He hesitated. When he spoke, his voice was softer, the edge dulled by memory. "Because faces make men mortal. Mortality invites betrayal."
"That's not an answer," she said.
"It's the only one you'll get."
He stepped past her to shut down the screens. The hum died, leaving the faint patter of rain and her heartbeat filling the silence.
Sofia caught herself watching the way he moved—precise, contained, as if every gesture was measured against some unseen scale. For the first time, she wondered whether he ever allowed himself to stop calculating.
He turned back, sensing her gaze. "Curiosity again," he said. "It's going to get you hurt."
"It's what makes me good at my job."
"It's what gets people buried in Verrencia."
She wanted to retort, but something in his tone—a flicker of genuine concern—stopped her. Instead she asked, "If you didn't hide behind the mask, what would you be?"
Ramond looked at her for a long moment, then said, "Free."
The word landed between them like a secret neither of them had the right to claim.
---
Sofia didn't sleep.
When the rain stopped, the silence inside the safe house grew even louder—every tick of the wall clock, every shift of the floorboards under the wind. She drifted to the desk, unable to resist the single file left half-open among the neat stacks of paper.
Her name sat on the cover in clean black type: SOFIA MORETTI – INTERCEPT.
She hesitated only a second before opening it. Inside were copies of emails she'd sent to her editor, private notes from her draft folder, photos of her meeting at the harbor café three nights ago. The precision of it made her stomach twist.
"How long have you been watching me?" she asked.
Ramond's reflection appeared in the dark glass behind her. She hadn't even heard him enter.
"Since you published the first article on Verrencia's port contracts," he said. "You were getting too close to names that mattered."
"My father's included."
He didn't deny it. "I prefer to know who's walking blind into a storm."
"You call that protection?" she said, anger sharpening her words. "You call it concern when you track someone's life like a dossier?"
Ramond came closer, stopping just behind her. "I call it preparation. Concern is what I felt when you ignored the warning and went to the docks."
She turned, meeting his eyes. "You think watching me gives you the right to decide where I go?"
"I think saving your life buys me the right to ask questions," he said quietly.
The air between them felt charged, not with threat this time but with something heavier—a recognition neither wanted to name.
Sofia closed the file. "What do you want from me, really?"
Ramond looked past her, out the window toward the city lights. "Understanding. You think my world runs on cruelty; it doesn't. It runs on cost. Everyone pays for what they take. Even me."
She studied him for a long moment. "And what did you take?"
He exhaled, almost a laugh, almost a confession. "Everything worth losing."
Before she could speak, his phone buzzed. He glanced at the screen, expression hardening. "Albrecht moved early. The council meets at dawn." He slipped the phone into his pocket. "You'll stay here until I return. Adrian will guard the door."
"And if I refuse?"
Ramond's gaze softened, but his words were iron. "Then don't make me prove why people obey me."
He turned and left, the door closing quietly behind him.
Sofia stood motionless, the file still in her hands, feeling the echo of his absence like pressure in her chest. Outside, the city lights shimmered across the wet streets, and she realized Verrencia had stopped feeling like home.