Page 106 of Fractured Allegiance
And it’s not because I was surprised.
It’s because I wasn’t.
She steps past me, heading back toward the couch. Her pace is steady. Not fast. Not slow. Just enough to show she’s not walking away from me. She’s walking toward whatever she needs to feel grounded again.
She sits on the edge, legs crossed, hands loose in her lap. I follow.
I don’t sit.
I stay standing across from her, half-shadowed by the fractured light filtering through the blinds. This is what it’s like to be both seen and invisible.
She finally speaks again.
“You think someone’s been watching longer than the last forty-eight hours.”
“Yes.”
“You think they’ve been inside this building before.”
I nod. “Not today. But recently. Maybe.”
"You think I'm being hunted."
"No." My voice is level. "I think someone wants to own you."
That pulls something taut in her. Not panic. Not even fear. Just contempt.
Her hands tense. Barely.
I watch them instead of her face.
"Drazen already thinks he owns me," she says, voice flat. "If someone else is circling, they're not trying to save me—they're trying to take his inventory."
"So what do you do?"
"Figure out who sent it. What they want. Whether they're more dangerous than Drazen." She pauses. "Then I decide who gets dealt with first."
Not a threat. A plan.
"You've done this before."
"Twice. Both times, the problem went away quietly." Her expression doesn't change. "I'm not interested in revenge. I'm interested in making sure they don't come back."
I believe her. Whoever sent that note has no idea what they've just triggered.
And that’s a problem.
Because I don’t want her to be the one holding the shovel when it comes down to blood.
Not anymore.
She leans back slightly, but her eyes stay fixed on mine. Measuring. Pressing. Pulling.
“What if this is all a setup?” she asks. “What if they left that letter so you’d react? So you’d break formation? So you’d do something you can’t walk back?”
“They might’ve.”
“And will you?”
