CHAPTER ONE – The Woman who was not supposed to return.
Emilia’s Point Of View
“Dead girls are not supposed to come home.”
Those words pierces my brain the moment I get out of the cab and the smog of the city is smacking my flesh: hot and heavy, like a nightmare. It is as though a pair of fingers of a ghost has held me and is telling me that I ought to have remained a corpse in that life I immediately entered after all that happened.
But here I am: with a new name, new identity, new haircut that I am yet to get used to. And the aching heart that keeps on beating so loud in my shirt.
I stretch the strap of my backpack and attempt to walk through the congested sidewalk. All these faces are threats. With every look my chest tightens. I hold my head low and my walk very short. I have rehearsed this posture - small, difficult to recognize, simple to forget.
What I used to be is not the Elise North I act like I am. The woman Julian Crane loved. The lady Damian nearly killed me. It was the woman who perished in that explosion.
A ghost.
An error that managed to get through. The witness protection saved my life in two years. Then they defunded me, apologized, and goodnight, Desdemona, as I continued to hold on to the fragments of a life that was never mine.
So I came back.
This is since in some cases, living is more of a struggle than a fight. Crane industries erect to lift me like a glass knife on the grey sky. Money, power, forty-five stories and a man I had trusted more than I had trusted myself. My heart is all over the place.
There, I mutter my little secret line to myself and reach the revolving doors. “He won’t remember. He can’t.”
I’ve changed a lot. New hair. New posture. New city in my records. My cheek bones are sharper, my eyes are colder. Emilia Hayes was gentle. Elise North was forced to know how to disappear.
Nevertheless... my hands are oily as I force the doors open.
The lobby reeks of granite and ambition. The giant skylight brings in the light, which is reflected on glass and chrome like a promise. It is rather pretty and clean--just as I remember. And again some part of me is drawing away.
I breathe in slowly. The air is filled with memories which I have attempted to drown. The laugh of Julian going down a hall.
His hands warm on my waist. His voice that night when he said, I will protect you, always.
My defense does not cease when I am running away as he is standing next to the man who reported us.
I grit my teeth and make my way to the check-in desk. Even the receptionist does not look at the holographic screen she is working on. “Name?” I say, Elise North, I hope you do not think my voice is trembling.
Finally she looks at me: Interview?
“Yes. Ten o’clock.”
She scowls a little and goes rap-a-dub. “HR is full today. A man has told me that you should go up instead.
My stomach drops. “Upstairs…?”
“Forty‑five.” She tells the point of the private elevator.
My blood turns cold.
That’s Julian’s floor. His office, his world.
Not HR. Not a secure spot where any old manager might inspect me and send me off on my way.
Someone changed the plan. I-I assumed the interview was with the HR, I control.
She shrugs. “From the CEO’s office.”
My breath catches. “From… the CEO?”
“Yes, Miss North. You’re expected upstairs.”
Expected. It should not be a word that suits me. I want to run. Not just walk. Not thinking. All I have to do is run out of this tower till my lungs start making freaky noises. But rent is due next week. My money’s low. Witness protection closed the door and left me without an alternative. I must have this job or I lose everything--this time.
I gulp and head down to the elevator and press the smooth black button. The walls inside are also a mirror of my face, tight jaw, pale skin, and eyes, which cannot hide even with a lot of mascara. I make an attempt to take a breath but flashbacks of the past collide. The relaxed smile on the face of Damian the night before the explosion.
The next morning Julian is not there. The atmosphere of betrayal creeping in my bones. And the terrorous silence, which succeeds. The elevator dings. Forty‑five.
My legs shake at the entry of the silent corridor. Sandy carpet deadens my feet. There is frosted glass on both sides which leaves slight indications of shadows indoors.
Opposite the far end of the hall is the door I am all too familiar with: it is just midnight black, brushed steel handle, gold plaque: JULIAN CRANE -CEO.
My chest tightens painfully. He will not remember, I repeat to myself. “He can’t.” I lift my hand and knock once. Still, call in, the voice says across. The music nearly causes my knees to tremble, and I push the door open.
The office has sunlight and shadow, floor-to-ceiling windows, dark wood shelves, a suspended light fixture that looks like an abstract constellation. Papers are neatly stacked. Everything is minimalist, precise, expensive. But my eyes lock onto the man behind the desk.
Julian Crane.
His shirt sleeves are rolled to his forearms, revealing the faint scar I remember tracing once. His hair is slightly tousled, as if he ran a hand through it too many times today. He’s older, sharper around the edges, as if the years carved something harder inside him. His head lifts. His gaze hits me like a punch.
The air stalls between us. Not recognition, at first. But a stunned, disbelieving intensity that sends a shiver down my spine. I force myself to speak. “Mr. Crane, I’m here for—”
He stands. Too fast. A glass paperweight at the corner of his desk tips, slides, and crashes to the floor. The sound fractures the silence like gunfire.
I jump despite myself.
His eyes are huge, dark, locked onto me with something jagged and raw underneath.
“Elise North,” I say again firmly, trying to steady the moment. “For the position—”
His lips part. Not in shock, not in confusion, but in recognition. Full, devastating recognition.
My breath dies in my throat.
He steps around the desk slowly, as if afraid I’ll vanish if he moves too quickly. His gaze sweeps my face—every line, every shadow, every change since the day I disappeared.
Then his voice breaks open, soft, disbelieving, and trembling with a grief I don’t know what to do with.
“Are you Emilia…?”
The name slams into me like a collision.
My real name. The name no one here should know. The name I buried under dust and forged documents and a funeral that never had a body. I took back a step, blood roaring in my ears.
He takes a step forward. “Emilia,” he whispers again, closer this time, “is it really… you”
The ground tilts beneath me. My fake world, my safety, my distance, everything I fought to rebuild… Scattered.
