AVA’S POV
Nicholas’s words hit me like thunder.
“And now you will help me get them back— whatever it costs.”
The way he said it, calm but dangerous, made it clear this wasn’t a request.
It was a final judgment. And I was now part of a war I didn’t start but was somehow central to.
“Whatever it costs?” I repeated, my voice shaky.
“What does that mean?”
He turned away from me, moving to the cabinet behind the bookshelf and opening a hidden panel. I didn’t even know it existed.
He pulled a black box and a file from it, thick, old, and sealed with a weak leather strap.
He tossed the file onto the table, the contents clinking together.
“It means you’ll learn things you were never meant to know about me. Things that’ll make you question everything, especially why someone would use ch
