CHAPTER TWELVE: THE HEART IS A WEAPON
418 Words
The message arrived at 2:14 a.m.
Mira was awake when her phone vibrated, the screen lighting the ceiling in a pale wash of blue. She knew before she looked. Her body reacted before her mind—heart accelerating, breath tightening, the old instincts dragging her upright.
She stared at the number.
Unlisted. But familiar.
She didn’t need to open it to know who it was from.
Adrian stirred beside her. “What is it?”
She didn’t answer right away. Her thumb hovered, then pressed.
Come alone. Let him live.
Six words. Perfectly balanced. A promise and a threat folded together.
Adrian sat up fully now, already reading over her shoulder. The tension in his body snapped tight, like a wire drawn too far.
“He wants you,” Adrian said.
Mira swallowed. “He wants leverage.”
Adrian swung his legs off the bed, pacing. “This is a trap.”
“Yes.”
“You can’t go.”
“I have to.”
He stopped abruptly and turned to her, eyes blazing. “No. We find another way.”
“There isn’t one,” she said quietly. “Crowe doesn’t negotiate. He orchestrates.”
Adrian dragged a hand through his hair. “He’s using me against you.”
“He always was,” she said. “I just didn’t see it before.”
She stood and crossed the room, steady despite the storm inside her. Adrian reached for her, fingers catching her wrist.
“Look at me,” he said.
She did.
“I won’t survive this if you walk into his hands alone,” he said. “Not again.”
Her chest ached at the word again.
“You told me love makes people predictable,” she said. “This is him betting on that.”
“And you’re going to prove him right?”
“No,” she said. “I’m going to prove him wrong.”
She freed her wrist gently. “I need you to trust me.”
His laugh was sharp, humorless. “You’re asking the impossible.”
She stepped closer, cupping his face. “You already did.”
They stood there, breathing the same air, both knowing this might be the last moment that belonged only to them.
“Say you’ll come back,” he said hoarsely.
“I always do,” she whispered.
She kissed him then—not desperate, not hurried. Deliberate. Memorizing. When she pulled away, she didn’t look back.
If she did, she might not leave.
- Writer
