Chapter5
1060 Words
Liora
The note shook in my hand.
*She is not who they told you she is. Ask Cassian about the night the real Liora Hale died. *
I read it until the letters blurred. My name. My life. Declared dead by a stranger’s handwriting.
I stood from the park bench and walked. Not toward home. Toward that direction, Cassian had disappeared. My pulse hammered in my throat. The security men at the bakery would notice my absence soon. I did not care.
Three blocks later, a black car slid to the curb beside me. The rear window lowered. Cassian sat inside, watching me with those flat slate eyes.
“Get in.”
I did not move. “Explain the note.”
“Not on the street.”
“Now.”
He held my gaze for a long second, then pushed the door open wider. I climbed in. The car pulled away before I shut it fully. The partition between the driver and us was already raised.
Cassian turned the folded paper over in his fingers. “Where did you expect to find me? Walking the streets calling my name?”
“I expected the truth.”
He looked out the window. Buildings slid past in a grey blur. “The truth is expensive. Are you certain you want to pay for it?”
“Someone is using my name to claim I am dead. Yes, I want it.”
Cassian exhaled once through his nose. “Seventeen years ago, a girl named Liora Hale died in a fire on the east side of the city. The body was identified by a single relative. The relative collected a small insurance payout and vanished. Two years later, a different child with the same name appeared in the system under a new guardian pair—your parents. Daniel and Elena Hale. No birth records before age five. No hospital trail. Clean enough that no one looked closely.”
The car suddenly felt too small. “You are saying I am not their daughter.”
“I am saying the papers that make you their daughter begin at age five. Everything before that is missing.”
My mouth went dry. “And you knew this when your father chose me.”
“Marcus chooses tools that cannot easily be traced or claimed by anyone else. You fit.” His voice stayed even. “The people who left the note want you to question every foundation you stand on. That makes you unstable. Unstable people make mistakes.”
“Why tell me any of this?”
“Because the note reached you. Pretending otherwise wastes time.” He finally looked at me again. “The marriage still proceeds. The five-year term still stands. Your parents—whoever they are to you—still receive the money. Nothing changes except the weight you now carry.”
I laughed once. The sound cracked. “Nothing changes. You just told me my entire life might be a lie and nothing changes.”
Cassian leaned forward. For the first time, the cold mask slipped enough to show something harder underneath. “Listen carefully. The people hunting for leverage against my family already know this gap in your history. They will use it. They will try to convince you that Daniel and Elena stole you or sold you or worse. They will offer proof that looks real. If you run toward that proof, you will hand them exactly what they want—an emotional collapse that destroys the shield this marriage creates.”
The car slowed. We had circled back toward the bakery district without me noticing.
“What am I supposed to do with this?” My voice came out low.
“Survive it. Ask your parents nothing yet. They may not even know the full story. Let Rylan’s men keep the doors locked. Appear at the lawyer’s office tomorrow at six as planned. Sign what needs signing. And do not trust any new message that arrives without my confirmation.”
The car stopped two streets from the bakery. Cassian did not touch me. He simply waited.
I opened the door. Cold air rushed in. I stepped out, then turned back.
“One more question. The night the real Liora Hale died—were you there?”
Something flickered across his face too fast to name. Then the mask returned.
“Go home, Liora.”
The door closed. The car pulled away and vanished around the corner.
I walked the remaining distance on legs that felt borrowed. The bakery windows glowed warm in the late afternoon. Through the glass I saw Mum laughing at something Dad said while he shaped dough. The security man near the back pretended to examine a shelf.
They looked like my parents. They had always looked like my parents.
I pushed the door open. The bell above it rang the same way it had every day of my remembered life.
Mum glanced up and smiled. “There you are. I was starting to worry.”
I smiled back because the alternative was screaming.
Later that night, after the shop closed and the extra locks slid into place, I sat on my bed with the note and the piece of black fabric from the windowsill. My phone stayed silent. No new messages from Cassian. No fresh threats.
At midnight, a soft sound came from the hallway outside my room. Not the creak of old wood. A deliberate step.
I rose silently and pressed my ear to the door.
A folded square of paper slid underneath and stopped against my bare foot.
I waited until the footsteps retreated. Then I picked it up.
Different handwriting this time. Rougher.
The body in the fire was never identified properly. Ask Daniel what he burned that night. Or I will.
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