CHAPTER SEVEN
963 Words
CHAPTER SEVEN
Zariah
I didn’t cry.
I sat there for a long time—staring at the voice recorder, my hand still partially resting in Cassian’s like it might tether me to the earth.
I should have been furious. Shattered.
But all I felt was cold clarity.
My father’s lawyer—the man who once brought me candy as a child and whispered legal codes like lullabies—had tried to silence me. Permanently.
The betrayal cracked something open. Something buried.
“I remember more,” I said quietly, still staring at the device.
Cassian didn’t speak. He knew better than to rush me.
“I wasn’t in the room by accident that night. I was looking for you.” My throat felt dry. “But you were gone. The security door was open. I went in. I heard Viktor shouting.”
Cassian’s jaw tensed.
“He was talking to someone over the phone. He didn’t know I was there at first. But then he turned… and he saw me. He smiled. Like I was part of the plan.”
“And then?” Cassian prompted gently.
“I ran,” I whispered. “But he caught me. Said I knew too much. Said ‘daddy’s little lawyer thinks she can be a whistleblower.’ That’s what he called me.”
Cassian sat forward, still as stone.
“He pulled out a knife. Not a gun—a knife. Like he wanted it to be personal.”
I exhaled shakily. “I don’t remember anything after that… not clearly. Just the sound of metal. The scream. And then… blood.”
Cassian’s voice was low. “You didn’t kill him, Zariah. That’s what I’ve been trying to prove for years.”
Tears welled in my eyes, but I refused to let them fall.
“Then who did?”
He didn’t answer.
Instead, he reached for another file.
This one thinner. Labeled: San Pietro Incident — Witness Report.
Inside was a photograph. Grainy, like all the others.
But this time… it wasn’t Viktor.
It was Adrian.
Cassian’s right hand.
My breath hitched.
“He was there?”
Cassian nodded once. “He followed me that night. Said he didn’t trust the vibe at the gala. Saw Viktor drag you into the room.”
“Why didn’t he speak up?”
Cassian’s voice turned bitter. “Because he was working for someone else back then.”
My eyes widened. “You kept him close all this time… knowing?”
“I needed him close. The only thing worse than a traitor is a ghost you can’t track.”
I stood, pacing now, the fire behind my ribs roaring again.
“Cassian, if this is true—if Adrian was involved—then we’re not safe here.”
“I know,” he said.
And then: “That’s why we’re leaving tonight.”
---
Cassian
I watched her as she packed.
Precise. Fast. Emotionless.
It scared me more than her tears would’ve.
She wasn’t unraveling.
She was rebuilding.
The woman I remembered—the one with music in her soul and chaos in her smile—was still in there. But now she wore armor. And law degrees. And secrets.
She was no longer just the girl I once loved.
She was the woman who could ruin everything.
And maybe… maybe that’s why I couldn’t let her go.
“Where are we going?” she asked as she zipped up her bag.
“Marseille.”
“France?”
“My safehouse there is off-grid. Adrian doesn’t know about it.”
She turned to me, eyes sharp.
“Then why is he still here?”
“Because I need him to lead us to Viktor. And he will. Eventually.”
Zariah shook her head. “You play too many games.”
“I don’t play,” I said, stepping close. “I calculate.”
She looked up at me then—closer than we’d stood in days. Her eyes searched mine, unreadable.
“You once said you’d burn the world for me,” she whispered.
“I would.”
“What if I ask you to stop?”
I paused.
Then said honestly, “I won’t. Because they don’t get to walk away after what they did to you.”
Her breath caught.
But this time… she didn’t run.
---
Zariah
We left just after midnight.
No lights. No questions. Just shadows and the sound of my heartbeat in my ears.
Cassian had a private jet waiting.
Of course he did.
I stepped into the cabin and found myself surrounded by silence and steel and the scent of him—cedarwood and sin. He sat beside me, one hand on his lap, the other resting dangerously close to mine.
He didn’t touch me.
Not yet.
But his presence was a brand against my skin.
“You never told me why you were really looking for me,” I said as the plane took off.
He didn’t look at me.
“Because you were the only thing I couldn’t control.”
“And that scared you?”
“That obsessed me.”
My lips parted.
“You wanted revenge.”
“Yes.”
“And now?”
He finally looked at me.
And what I saw in his eyes made my breath catch.
“Now?” he said softly. “Now I want you to remember who you are. Before they broke you. Before I did.”
His voice cracked on the last word.
And for the first time… I saw the fracture in him.
Not the mafia prince.
Not the empire.
Just the boy who lost something he couldn’t name the night I vanished.
So I reached out.
And I touched his hand.
Just once.
But it was enough.
- Writer
