2025-02-18 19:20:16I don’t have time to bleed.
The train rumbles beneath me, the cold metal pressing into my back as I stare up at the dark sky. My shoulder is a mess, my ribs feel like they’ve been crushed, and my head won’t stop pounding from the fight at the station. But pain doesn’t matter. The Oath is still after me. I need to keep moving. I climb down the side of the train, slipping through the door into an empty car. The overhead lights flicker, casting shadows on the torn seats and graffiti-covered walls. No passengers. Good. I need a moment to think. I drop onto a seat, pressing my fingers against the wound on my shoulder. Not deep, but still bleeding. I rip a strip from my ruined shirt and wrap it tight. It’s not perfect, but it’ll do for now. My mind shifts back to the USB drive. The corrupted files. The message. You made the right choice, Nathan. But they will never let you walk away. What choice? What did I do? I don’t remember. But someone does. And if The Oath wants me alive, it means I’m still useful to them. I need answers before they find me. I pull out my phone. A burner. Untraceable, but even those can be tracked if I’m not careful. No calls. No texts. I need someone I can trust. One name comes to mind. Riley Kade. If anyone can crack the drive, it’s her. Last I heard, she was working security for an underground syndicate. If she’s still in the game, she can get past any encryption. She can tell me what The Oath is trying to hide. The train slows. I get off at a small station on the edge of the city, keeping my head down. Cameras are everywhere, and I don’t know how many of them belong to The Oath. I disappear into the streets, moving fast, hands in my pockets, shoulders hunched. My body is exhausted, but rest isn’t an option. Finding Riley isn’t easy. She doesn’t just hide—she erases herself. But I know who to ask. After a few dead ends—and some “persuasion”—I get an address. An old warehouse near the docks. I approach carefully, scanning every shadow, checking every rooftop. If Riley is still Riley, she’s watching me right now. The door is locked. Not a normal lock. No keypad. No keyhole. A biometric scanner. Military-grade. I smirk. Classic Riley. I knock once. Nothing. I knock again, this time in a pattern only she would recognize. Silence. Then, a voice crackles from a speaker above the door. “Nathan Vale. I was wondering when you’d come crawling back.” Her tone is sharp, amused. “Open the door, Riley.” She doesn’t. “You’re bleeding on my doorstep. That’s rude.” “I’ll buy you a new doorstep.” A pause. Then—a click. The door unlocks. I step inside. The place is filled with screens, wires, and enough tech to break into the Pentagon. Riley sits in a chair, feet propped on a desk, flipping a knife between her fingers. Her dark eyes scan me, taking in the torn clothes, the bandaged shoulder, the exhaustion I can’t hide. “You look like hell,” she says. “Feel worse.” She nods to the chair across from her. “Sit. Talk.” I drop into the chair, exhaling slowly. “I need you to decrypt something.” I pull out the USB and place it on the table. Riley doesn’t touch it. She just looks at me. “Where did you get this?” “From me.” She raises an eyebrow. “I had it hidden. Didn’t even know I had it until today. The Oath wiped my memory, but this survived.” Her smirk fades. She picks up the drive, turning it over in her fingers. “If The Oath wanted this erased, then whatever’s on here is dangerous.” “Exactly.” She slides it into one of her computers. Her fingers fly across the keyboard. Lines of code fill the screen, scrolling too fast for me to follow. She frowns. “This encryption isn’t standard.” Her voice is quieter now. “It’s layered. Someone really wanted to keep this buried.” A progress bar appears. Thirty percent. Forty. Then—the screen flickers. Riley curses. “Shit. It’s fighting back.” The system starts shutting down. Files scramble. The drive is erasing itself. No. Not now. Riley’s hands blur over the keyboard. Bypassing firewalls. Isolating corrupted data. Trying to save what she can. Then— A single line of text flashes before the drive self-destructs. A name. Elias Graves. My pulse pounds in my ears. Riley turns to me, her face grim. “Who the hell is Elias Graves?” The question burns in my mind. I don’t know. But something deep inside me does. And it terrifies me.
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CHAPTER 220
The Last ThoughtI stare at my reflection, my breath uneven, my eyes hollow. The glass is cracked—thin fractures running like veins across the surface, distorting my face. Fitting.The overhead light flickers, casting brief shadows across the room. It’s cold. Not the kind of cold that bites at your skin, but the kind that settles in your bones, that tells you something is coming. The kind that makes you wonder if it’s always been there, waiting.I press my palms against the sink, fingers curling against the porcelain. The weight in my chest isn’t fear. It isn’t regret. It’s something worse. A question with no answer.Behind me, the door creaks open. A slow, deliberate sound. My hand moves instinctively to my gun, but I already know who it is."That the last time you’re gonna check yourself out, Nathan?" a voice teases, rough with amusement.I smirk, though it feels foreign on my face. "Figured I should see what’s left of me before I walk out that door."Jackson leans against the doorf
CHAPTER 219
The End of the LineThe city is quiet. Too quiet.Not the kind of quiet that comes with peace, but the kind that signals something is about to break. It settles over the skyline, heavy, waiting. The streets are empty, but the ghosts of what I’ve built, of what I’ve destroyed, linger in the alleyways and shadowed corners.I stand at the edge of it all, watching from the rooftop of an old high-rise, the cold wind whipping against my face. Below me, the pieces are moving, each player stepping into position, some thinking they’re the ones holding the strings. They aren’t.They never were.Jackson shifts beside me, his hands buried deep in his pockets. He’s restless. Always is before things go south.“You sure about this?” he asks.I don’t answer right away. Because there’s no easy answer. No right one, either.He sighs, shaking his head. “You always do this. Get in too deep and think you can control every variable. But this—” he gestures to the streets below, to the quiet before the storm
CHAPTER 218
The Final MoveThe city is waiting.It doesn't know it yet, but the tides are shifting. Power doesn’t disappear; it transforms and morphs into something new, something unrecognizable until it’s already taken hold. I’ve seen it happen too many times to count. This time, I’m the one pulling the strings.This time, it ends on my terms.I stand in the shadows of an empty warehouse, the scent of oil and dust thick in the air. The city hums outside, its lights flickering through the gaps in the rusted metal walls. Jackson stands beside me, his body tense, arms crossed. He’s waiting for me to explain, to tell him what comes next.I let the silence stretch before I finally speak.“We’re not burning it down.”Jackson’s head snaps toward me, eyes narrowing. “What?”I meet his stare, my voice steady. “We’re not wiping the board clean. We’re flipping it.”For the first time in a long time, Jackson looks unsure. He shifts his weight, jaw tightening as he processes my words. “You said yourself—this
CHAPTER 217
The Final CrossroadsThe city hums beneath me, restless and alive. From this rooftop, I see everything—the neon glow stretching into the horizon, the winding streets below, the fractured heartbeat of a place that never stops moving. A world of light and shadow, built on secrets, power, and debts that can never truly be repaid.The air is thick with the scent of rain and asphalt, the faintest trace of gasoline lingering in the wind. It’s the smell of something on the verge of combustion, of a city always teetering on the edge of chaos. I tighten my grip on the cigarette between my fingers, watching the ember glow in the dark, a tiny heartbeat against the cold night. I don’t smoke. Not really. I just like the way it feels—holding something that’s burning, something that’s alive for just a little while before it fades into nothing.I should walk away.I should let it all burn.But I don’t.Because no matter how much I tell myself that I don’t care anymore, that none of it matters, the tr
CHAPTER 216
The Last Time He Sees RileyThe air is colder than I expected. Maybe that’s fitting. Maybe that’s how it’s supposed to be.She’s already there when I arrive, standing near the edge of the pier, arms folded tight against the wind. The city sprawls behind her, all light and noise, but out here, it’s just the quiet lapping of the water and the space between us.Riley doesn’t turn when I approach.“I wasn’t sure you’d come,” she says, her voice carrying over the water, calm but unreadable.I stop a few feet away. Close enough to feel the weight of her presence. Far enough to know I shouldn’t get any closer.“Neither was I,” I admit.She exhales a slow, steady breath. “You look the same.”“So do you.”A lie.There’s something different in her now. Something more guarded, more distant. Like she’s finally built the walls she should’ve had when we were younger.Like she’s learned.She turns, finally meeting my gaze, and for a moment, it’s just us. No past, no future. Just this one sliver of t
CHAPTER 215
The Fall of KingsThe thing about power is that it never learns.It moves through different hands, dresses itself in new suits, and speaks in fresh voices. But underneath, it’s always the same: greed, arrogance, and the inevitable mistake of thinking you can control what was never meant to be tamed.Ronan believed he could do it differently.I watch from the shadows as he proves himself wrong.---The city is quieter these days. Not because the storm has passed, but because it’s waiting to break.I see it in the way people move, the way deals are whispered instead of spoken. Ronan’s reign is still fresh, but already, the cracks are showing.And he doesn’t even realize it.Or maybe he does. Maybe he’s just too proud to admit it.I’m standing outside a high-rise downtown, watching from across the street. Up there, behind floor-to-ceiling windows, Ronan is playing king. A meeting’s in progress—his men, his allies, his problems.He thinks he has time. He thinks he’s in control.He doesn’t
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