CHAPTER 142Beep. Beep. Beep.Isabella's eyes opened slowly, dragged from deep sleep by the insistent notification sound coming from her phone on the nightstand.She blinked against the darkness.The cabin was completely quiet except for the sound of steady breathing beside her.She checked the time.1:34 AM.Outside, the world was completely dark, no moonlight penetrating the heavy cloud cover, no sounds except the distant whisper of wind through the trees surrounding the cabin.Isabella lay still for a moment, orienting herself.The cabin. The safe house. The bombing at the hotel. The car chase. The blown tire.And then...l...Her face flushed with heat despite the cool air, and she carefully turned her head to look beside her.Adrian was sleeping soundly, his white hair spread across the pillow, his expression completely relaxed in a way she rarely saw when he was awake.The constant tension he carried, the vigilance, the guardedness, had dissolved in sleep, leaving behind somethin

CHAPTER 144Adrian wrote the note quickly.Short. Careful. Leaving nothing that could be misinterpreted."Had to leave. Something urgent at the estate. I'll explain everything soon. Stay here until you hear from me. Don't open the door for anyone. Adrian."He folded it and placed it on the nightstand beside Isabella's phone, where she would see it immediately when she woke.He stood there for a moment, looking at her sleeping form one final time.Something about leaving her here felt wrong. Exposed. Dangerous.But taking her to the estate,.where Jean Baptiste was waiting with information about her, about her, felt worse.He needed to hear what her father had to say before he decided anything else.Adrian pulled the bedroom door closed behind him, grabbed his jacket from the sofa, and walked out of the cabin into the cold afternoon air.The drive back to the estate was tense and quiet, just Adrian and his thoughts and the damaged SUV limping along the rural roads toward Ottawa.His min

CHAPTER 146Adrian's SUV moved fast through the Ottawa streets, eating up the distance between the estate and the cabin with an urgency that had Miguel gripping the dashboard and Kael sitting with preternatural stillness in the back seat.Rafael had insisted on coming.Adrian hadn't argued.He was too focused on the phone in his hand, trying Isabella's number again as he drove.Ring.Ring.Ring.Voicemail."Still nothing," Adrian said, his jaw tight."She could just be sleeping," Miguel offered, though his tone suggested he didn't entirely believe that."She's not sleeping," Adrian said. "It's past two in the afternoon. And even if she were, the phone would wake her."He took a corner faster than was strictly safe, the SUV's tires complaining briefly before finding grip again."Adrian," Rafael said from the passenger seat. "What Jean Baptiste told you. About Lucian Ashford.""What about it?""You believe him?"Adrian was quiet for a moment. "I believe he was telling the truth as he un

CHAPTER 148Adrian knocked on the door of the east guest suite exactly one hour after he'd promised."Come in," Isabella called.He pushed the door open.The room was warm and softly lit, the curtains drawn against the early evening darkness outside. A tray with the remnants of a meal sat on the small table near the window, which told him she'd eaten something at least.Isabella was sitting on the small sofa in the corner of the sitting room, her legs tucked beneath her, wearing clothes that someone on the staff had clearly provided. Simple things. Dark jeans and a soft gray sweater that was slightly too large for her frame.She looked younger in them.More vulnerable.Her hair was damp at the ends, which meant she'd showered, and her face was clean of the careful makeup she usually wore. Without it, every emotion she was feeling was more visible. More immediate.She looked at him when he came in and didn't look away."You came," she said."I said I would," Adrian replied, closing the

CHAPTER 150The planning session ran for two hours.Isabella talked and the others listened, and what emerged from that conversation was a picture of Lucian Ashford's operation that was simultaneously more detailed and more alarming than anything they'd previously had access to.She described the estate's layout with the methodical precision of someone who had learned to observe carefully and retain what she saw. The main building's structure. The positioning of the guards she'd noticed during her visit. The vehicles parked in the side courtyard. The housekeeper who moved through the building with the practiced invisibility of someone who had worked there for years and knew every room.She described the way Lucian carried himself in his own space. The particular authority of someone who had never needed to raise his voice because everyone around him already understood the consequences of not listening.She described the study. The desk. The laptop. The photographs spread across the su