The paper lay crumpled on the floor, the dark ink seeping like a fresh wound.
**I SEE YOU, LILY.**
The letters were weighted and scored, sliced into the page and felt like a blade. My name stood out like a snare, something I couldn't remove, and the more I looked at the letters, the more they became real to me — as if the page was alive with eyes that watched me.
Caspian's chest moved up and down as he balled the note in his hand. His jaw was clenched so hard that I swear his teeth would have broken, and the vein down his temple pounded like a bomb ready to explode. His eyes, however, took my breath away. The ice was present again — the unresponsive, shut-down coldness. But beneath it, now, was something new. Fear.
Caspian Grey wasn't afraid of anything. But he was afraid of this.
He was feared for me.
I placed my hand against my sternum, trying to smother the flame there. The room spun, the heat of the moment choking until my lungs couldn't fully expand.
"Pack a bag," Caspian snarled, voice a blade. "Now."
I blinked, attempting to catch up to the command. "What?"
"We need to leave." He snatched his phone and strode back and forth like a furious cage animal barking commands into the phone to the person who answered on the other side. "Total lockdown. Troops within sixty minutes. Surveillance on grounds — all doors, all windows."
My body wasn't going to play along. Whirling in my head was leave.
"We can't just leave," I gasped. My voice coming out as a whisper.
Caspian whirled, the anger in his eyes paralyzing me. Two steps and he stood in front of me, his hands cupping my face in a gentleness that was the antithesis of the rage coursing through his body.
"Because he destroy me," he said to me, words spoken slowly and quietly, as if it hurt him to utter them. "And now he'll use you to do it."
I couldn't breathe.
The danger had lurked in the shadows all along — a shadow I'd tried not to name. I'd understood that Caspian's life was all rosy. I'd understood that there were ghosts in his past. But this? This was different.
"He sent a message here," I whispered, the shock sucking the air out of me. "In the villa."
"He's tracking us," Caspian growled, his fingers digging painfully into my jaw. "Which means he's nearby."
My throat closed. My skin crawled with the crawly sensation of being watched. I glanced up at the windows, my heart racing, half expecting to see some figure just beyond the panes.
"We have to call the police," I said, grasping for reason as if it were a rope to a lifeline.
No. Caspian's voice snapped like a whip. "The police can't help us."
I was going to make him explain why when the lights started flashing.
Once.
Twice.
And then there was darkness all around us.
I took a deep breath.
The villa closed around us, the big room dwindling into a cold and dark corridor of stifling quiet. There was only one part with the silver glow of light — the balcony doors — dimly lit, barely illuminating the edge of the room.
Caspian's arm shot out, his fingers closing around mine, his hold unbreakable.
"Put your hand around me," he gasped, struggling to catch his breath.
The shadows deepened with every sound. The groan of ancient wood settling. My own heart pounding so loudly I knew the world could hear it.
Then we moved it.
A gentle scrape of shoe on marble.
Inside the villa.
My stomach dropped out through the floor.
Caspian stepped into the darkness, dragging me behind him as he pulled something from under an end table — a gun. He inserted the bullet in one smooth motion, the ringing metal echoing through the blackness like a death knell.
"Take off your heels," he was whispered.
My hands trembling as I pulled them back, the chill of marble beneath my own bare feet. Caspian's arm wrapped around me, holding me in place, his body a shield against mine. The tension that ran through him — the coiled, barely-contained anger underneath.
The scrape came again. Closer.
I couldn't think. Couldn't breathe.
We floated down the stairs like ghosts, Caspian's hold on my hand unbreakable. I tried to step softly, to keep pace, but fear made me clumsy. Each step too slow, my heart a war drum.
We arrived at the kitchen, and Caspian halted.
The door was ajar.
The wind shrieked in through the door, curtains dancing like ghosts. The security system — the one Caspian had said was impenetrable — was severed.
He pinned me against the wall, his chest on mine as he leaned back in the doorway. His warmth on my skin should have been comforting, but it seemed to increase the fear. He could not be my shield. He could not block every bullet.
A shadow moved across the lawn.
I pressed my hand over my mouth to suppress the gasp.
"We run," Caspian panted, his warm breath in my ear.
"No stopping. No looking back."
I nodded, understanding through tears streaming down my face.
We ran.
The wet grass squelched with every step beneath my feet as we sprinted towards the gate, the villa receding behind us. All was a haze, my body screaming fear and adrenaline. I didn't even feel the hurt as I slit my foot wide open on the jagged stone.
Then I saw him.
A man stepping out from in between the trees.
"Caspian!" I shouted.
He turned around, and the man struck him.
They slammed onto the ground with a crash of thudding, rolling around on the ground in a mangled mass of fists and anger. The moon glared down at the man's face, the very same evil leer I had seen in the ballroom.
I should have gotten up and gone. But I didn't.
I grabbed a broken branch and swung with every ounce of strength, the rough wood cracking into the side of the man's face. He fell back, and Caspian did not hesitate — punching the man in the throat with a ferocity that made my stomach turn.
The man crumpled, gagging.
Caspian didn’t hesitate. He grabbed me, lifting me into his arms and running the rest of the way to the gate as headlights and sirens burst through the night.
Even then, he didn’t let go.
He cradled me against his chest, his body shaking, his lips pressing frantic kisses against my temple, my hair, my face.
“I’m so sorry,” he whispered, voice wrecked. “I’m so sorry, Lily.”
But all I could do was recall the voice of the man ringing in my head.
You should have stayed out of it, Lily.
I wasn't out of it.
I was in.
And now there was no return.