Chapter 7 Breached

Noah stared at me for a long moment, his expression completely blank. He didn’t say another word about the contract. He simply turned toward the door, walked to it, then paused with his hand on the handle.

“Make your decision before twenty-four hours,” he said without looking back. “There isn’t much time left.”

The door closed behind him with a soft click. The second he was gone, the strength left my legs. I sank down onto the floor with my back against the side of the bed and finally let the sobs break free. 

The pain of losing my father came rushing back all at once, like every month I had spent trying to move on had meant nothing. I pressed both hands over my face and cried until my throat felt raw and my eyes burned.

When the worst of the crying passed, my gaze landed on the thick folder still sitting on the bed.

Anger flared hot and sudden in my chest. I grabbed the folder, ripped every paper out of it, and tore them into pieces with shaking hands. The marriage contract, the fake identity documents, all of it. I threw the scraps across the floor.

“I will never sign these papers,” I whispered, my voice hoarse. “Never. Do you hear me? Never.”

I stood up and started pacing the room, wiping my face roughly with the back of my hand. There had to be a way out of this place. I checked the door again — still locked. 

Then I looked at the window. The heavy curtains were drawn, but when I pulled them aside I saw that it opened onto a dark stretch of the grounds. It wasn’t impossibly high.

I pulled the fitted sheet and the top sheet off the bed and knotted them together as tightly as I could. I tied one end around the heavy leg of the bed frame near the window and tested it with my full weight. It held.

My heart was pounding so hard I could hear it in my ears as I opened the window quietly and lowered the makeshift rope outside. I climbed out carefully, gripping the sheets, and began to slide down. 

The fabric burned my palms, but I didn’t stop. When my feet finally touched the cold ground, I stayed crouched for a second and let out a shaky breath.

Thank God. I actually made it down.

I looked left and right there was no immediate movement, no security lights flashing. I started moving along the side of the house, staying close to the wall, trying not to make a sound. Every step felt too loud in the dark. Every shadow looked like it might be watching me.

I had only taken a few more steps when a calm voice spoke behind me. “Trying to escape?”

I froze and then slowly , I turned around. Vivian stood a few feet away in the dark, arms loose at her sides, as if she had been waiting for me the entire time.

Before I could run, she stepped in fast. A dark cloth came down over my head. Strong hands gripped my arms tightly.

“Let go of me!” I struggled hard, twisting my body from side to side. “I said let go of me right now! You have no right!”

She didn’t say a word. She simply marched me back toward the house with steady, controlled force. A door opened and I was pushed inside and dropped onto a hard floor. The cloth was yanked off my head roughly.

I was back in the same room. Noah sat in the armchair across from me, one ankle resting on his knee, watching me with a faint, humorless look. Vivian closed the door and locked it again without any hurry.

“Hi, Maya,” she said, her voice completely flat. “Miss me?”

I pushed myself up from the floor, breathing hard, and glared at her with pure hatred. “You should have let me go, you fucking bitch. You had no right to drag me back in here.”

Vivian gave a short, cold laugh that held no real humor. “You must be out of your mind. There are people out there trying to kill you. Staying here is the only real chance you have. If you leave this place, you put a target on everyone still trying to keep you breathing. Including your mother. Is that what you want?”

I scoffed loudly and stood up fully, brushing dust off my knees with sharp, angry movements. “You don’t care about my mother. Don’t stand there and pretend you do. You don’t care about anyone.”

“You’re right,” Vivian said without even a second of hesitation. Her tone stayed ice cold. “I don’t. I care about the mission. And right now the mission is keeping you alive long enough to find out who ordered the ferry explosion and why. You dying in the driveway because you’re angry at Noah helps absolutely no one.”

Noah finally spoke, his voice low but firm. “Enough. Both of you.”

I let out a short, bitter laugh and looked straight at Vivian, my eyes burning.

“You’re just like him. Cold. Controlling. You talk about protection like it’s some kind of favor you’re doing me. Both of you make me sick to my stomach.”

Vivian stared at me, her eyes calm and completely unreadable. There was no anger on her face. Just ice.

“Then listen carefully, because I don’t like repeating myself. Your childhood friend, Ethan Brooks, held a press conference six hours ago. He cried on camera. He called Noah a murderer. He said Sinclair Industries needs to be investigated for your death. The story is already spreading. By morning every major network will be running it.”

I went completely still.

Ethan.

The one person who had always been there when everything fell apart. The one who used to sit with me on the floor of my apartment after my father died and just let me be quiet. Of course he was looking for answers. Of course he was angry. He thought I was gone forever.

“I don’t blame him,” I said quietly, my voice rough. “He’s the only one who actually cared about me. The only one who didn’t treat me like a problem to solve.”

Noah stood up from the chair slowly and walked toward me. “You cannot leave this place, Maya. I won’t allow it.”

“Ethan is looking for me,” I shot back, my voice rising with every word. “I need to tell him I’m alive. I need to tell him I’m okay. He deserves to know the truth instead of crying on television because of you.”

I moved toward the door. Noah’s hand closed around my wrist, firm and unyielding. “You cannot trust him.”

I tried to yank my arm free, but he held on tightly. “And you think I trust you?” I snapped, glaring up at him with pure hatred. “After everything you did to my family? After you stood there and watched my father break? Get a grip, Noah. You are the last person on this earth I will ever trust.”

I pulled harder and reached for the handle with my free hand. This time Vivian stepped in. She gripped my other wrist and stopped me cold, her strength surprising and completely controlled.

“That’s enough,” she said, her voice like ice. “You’re not walking out that door.”

I turned my head and glared at her, chest rising and falling fast with anger and frustration. My voice came out low and shaking.

“You both think you can just decide my life for me. You think locking me in this room and tearing up my name is protection. It’s not. It’s control. And I am so tired of it.”

Before I could spit out another word, Vivian’s entire body went rigid.

In one smooth motion she drew a black sidearm from under her jacket and pointed it past my shoulder, straight at the window.

A sharp red laser dot appeared on the wall beside my head, dancing slightly in the dim light.

“Down!” Vivian’s voice cut through the room like a blade. “We’ve been breached! They found the perimeter!”