Amelia Vance (The Unknown Series)

Chapter 2

Leo Pov

Leo, mesmerized, watched as the serene girl from the coffee shop dismantled a squad of trained operatives with an effortless, almost casual, precision. She was a living ghost, a whisper of a threat, and the most captivating thing he had ever seen.

"You have to go," she said, her voice a low command as she tossed the silver ring from her thumb. It glowed in the darkness before its light faded, and a small, humming device, no bigger than a coin, lay in her palm. "This is the Echo. And this is my life. Now you know. Go, before you get caught in the storm."

He didn't move. He couldn't. He had found his story, but he had also found something far more important. As the last of her attackers lay stunned or incapacitated, he saw the vulnerability in her eyes for the first time. The quiet barista, the fierce warrior, the woman who held a world of secrets in her hands. He took a step forward.

"I’m not going anywhere," he said. "The story isn't over yet.",

The aftermath was a blur of flashing lights and distant sirens. Leo, adrenaline still thrumming, found her a block away from the pier. She was sitting on the curb, her clothes soaked, her gaze distant and unseeing. The raw power of the Echo device had done more than just disable her pursuers; it had scoured her mind. When he knelt beside her, she looked at him with the clear, bewildered eyes of a child, and when she finally spoke, her voice was a quiet whisper. "Who are you?"

He didn't know what to say. The world's most dangerous woman, the one he had been so obsessed with, was gone. In her place was this lost girl. He made a decision then and there that had nothing to do with journalism and everything to do with a quiet, desperate need to protect her. He took her hand and led her away from the chaos, away from the life she no longer remembered.

He found them a small, nondescript apartment in a quiet corner of the city, a place of safety and anonymity. He introduced himself simply as Leo, and she accepted it without question. For the first few days, she was silent, a ghost in her own skin, but slowly, a new personality began to emerge.

She liked the way sunlight slanted through the windows in the morning. She hummed off-key tunes while Leo made coffee. She was fascinated by the mundane, by the simple act of choosing a t-shirt or watering the small potted plant on the windowsill. She was building a new life, a new self, and he was the architect of her world.