Chapter 77: Lost in the lie he chose

The door didn’t creak when it opened, and that alone made me stop. I had learned to listen for small things lately—the sound of hinges, the way air shifted, the way silence felt heavier than it should. Inside, the room smelled old and sharp, like metal and dust that had been locked away for years. One light hung from the ceiling, swinging slightly, throwing uneven shadows across a long table covered with objects I didn’t expect to recognize. But I did.

My father’s watch lay near the center.

I stepped closer before anyone could stop me and picked it up. The leather strap was worn thin where his thumb used to rub it. The glass was scratched at the edge. The ticking was steady, stubborn. He used to say a good watch didn’t panic just because time was running out. My hand closed around it without thinking.

“He was here,” I said.

The woman across the table nodded. She didn’t reach for the watch, didn’t rush me. “Yes. Months before he disappeared.”

The door behind me opened. I didn’t turn right away. I already knew who it would be. His footsteps were too familiar.

“Seraphina,” Xander said.

I turned slowly. He stood there like nothing had changed. No wounds. No panic. Calm in a way that felt wrong now that I was seeing it clearly.

“So this is where you’ve been,” I said. “Not missing. Not searching. Just waiting.”

“I wasn’t waiting,” he said. “I was keeping you alive.”

I laughed once, sharp and tired. “You led them straight to me.”

“They already knew where you were.”

“Then why were you still getting paid?”

The silence stretched long enough to answer for him. His eyes dropped for half a second. That was all I needed.

One of the men at the table slid a file toward me. Xander reached it before I could. He opened it without asking. Inside were dates, locations, transfers. His name appeared more than once. Too many times to explain away.

“You tracked me,” I said.

“From the beginning,” he answered. “I didn’t lie about that.”

“You lied about why.”

The woman moved closer, her voice steady. “Your father didn’t trust him. He kept him close, but he never gave him the full picture.”

“That’s not true,” Xander said, stepping forward.

“It is,” she replied. “You were useful. You weren’t essential.”

I backed away from both of them. The room felt smaller now, tighter. I placed my father’s watch back on the table carefully, like it might break if I moved too fast.

“So this was the plan,” I said. “Let me think I had a choice while you made deals behind my back.”

“I was trying to control the damage,” Xander said. “If I hadn’t stayed involved, they would’ve taken you already.”

I shook my head. “You don’t get credit for choosing the least terrible betrayal.”

The sound came before anyone moved. A low vibration through the walls, deep enough to rattle the table. The hanging light flickered. My pendant warmed against my skin.

Everyone felt it.

One of the men cursed under his breath and reached for his radio. “They’re closer than predicted.”

Weapons came up. Orders were shouted. The woman grabbed my arm and pulled me toward the back door. Xander moved at the same time, reaching for me, his fingers brushing my sleeve.

“Don’t,” she snapped, shoving him back. “You made your choice.”

We burst outside into night that didn’t feel like night anymore. Shapes moved where shadows shouldn’t. Shots cracked through the air. Someone fell. I ran when she ran, not thinking, just following the pull forward, trusting my legs to keep up. We slid down a rocky slope, scraping skin, landing hard, but I stayed upright. Pain could wait.

Behind us, the sounds broke apart—shouting, gunfire, something else I didn’t have a word for yet.

We didn’t stop until the ground leveled and the noise faded into distance. I bent over, hands on my knees, trying to steady my breathing.

“That wasn’t supposed to happen,” I said.

“No,” she replied. “It wasn’t.”

“You said this was about my father.”

“It was.”

“And now?”

She looked at me carefully, like she was measuring how much truth I could take without breaking. “Now it’s about what he left behind.”

We reached another shelter before dawn, smaller and empty. I sat on the floor and wiped dirt from my hands, watching it streak across my skin. Somewhere out there, Xander was still alive. And now I knew what that meant.

“You’re not safe with us,” the woman said quietly. “And you’re not safe without us.”

I looked up at her. “Then we stop playing both sides.”

She nodded. “We break away.”

From everyone.

Outside, the sky began to lighten, and for the first time in a long while, I didn’t wait for someone else to decide what came next.

If you want, I can: • tighten spacing even more • strip it down further to pure action • or rewrite the next chapter so it opens fast and hooks readers immediately

Just tell me which.