The corridor was quiet except for the hum of fluorescent lights. She kept her head down, file in hand, passing the reinforced doors without a glance—until she caught movement through a tiny, barred window.

Her breath froze.

Lucien. Elias.

They were barely recognizable. Lucien sat slumped in a chair, wrists cuffed, head hanging, a thin line of blood drying along his temple. Elias was chained to the wall, shirt in tatters, his breaths shallow, chest bruised and mottled purple. Neither looked conscious.

She gripped the file harder, heart pounding. She should walk on. They were rivals, enemies. She had spent years fighting them in the shadows. But her feet wouldn’t move forward.

A guard’s footsteps echoed faintly somewhere down the hall. She scanned the empty stretch, pulled a slim tool from her boot, and picked the lock with swift, practiced movements. The heavy door groaned open.

“Hey,” she whispered, rushing to Lucien first. His head lifted weakly, grey eyes hazy with fever. He tried to focus on her face. “What—” His voice cracked, too raw to finish.

“Don’t talk,” she ordered, already working the cuffs. Elias stirred at her voice, blinking in disbelief.

“You’ve… got to be kidding me,” he rasped. “What the hell—”

“Save your breath,” she snapped. The cuffs fell from Lucien’s wrists. She slipped an arm under his, pulling him up with surprising strength. He hissed in pain but managed to stay upright.

When she reached Elias, he tried to wave her off. “Don’t bother. You’ll never—”

The chain hit the floor a moment later. She hauled him up, and despite his broader frame, she steadied him as though she’d done it a hundred times.

Neither could walk properly, but she kept them moving, every step calculated. She knew the patrol patterns, the blind spots in the cameras. She ditched the file she’d been carrying—her mission was over the second she’d seen them.

They slipped out through an unguarded side exit, down a narrow service tunnel, and into the night air. A black SUV sat idling under the cover of trees. She shoved them inside, Elias gritting his teeth as he collapsed onto the seat, Lucien sinking back with a wince.

For the first few minutes of driving, none of them spoke. Then Lucien’s voice, rough and quiet: “You just threw away your mission.”

She didn’t look at him. “I’ll live.”

Elias stared at her profile, disbelief written across his bruised face. “You hate us.”

“Still do.”

“Then why?” Lucien pressed.

She didn’t answer.

An hour later, she pulled onto a deserted stretch of road. “Someone will find you here. You’ve got enough time to call your people before anyone else does.”

Neither moved to get out. But when she shifted the SUV into park, they slowly climbed out. Lucien leaned on the doorframe for a moment, his gaze unreadable. Elias muttered something under his breath, but the wind swallowed it. She drove off without another word.

One week later

She shut her apartment door behind her, setting her keys on the counter—then froze.

Two figures sat in her living room.

Lucien in her armchair, immaculate in black, the faint scar from his temple still visible. Elias on the sofa, elbows on his knees, eyes locked on her.

Her hand twitched toward the hidden knife under her jacket.

“Relax,” Elias said. “If we wanted you dead, you’d already be bleeding on the floor.”

Lucien’s tone was colder. “We need answers.”

She crossed her arms, staying by the door. “For what?”

“For why you risked everything to get us out,” Lucien replied. “You don’t just throw away your mission for your enemies.”

Her jaw tightened. “You were about to die. That’s all.”

“That’s not all,” Elias shot back. “You could’ve walked past. You didn’t. I want to know why.”

Silence stretched between them. She looked away, her voice finally low. “I’ve seen enough good operatives rot in rooms like that. Even you two don’t deserve it.”

Lucien studied her for a long moment, as if weighing every micro-expression. Elias leaned back, running a hand through his hair, still not satisfied.