68

68
“I need to write to him.”

Alexander looked up from where he was checking the security feed on his laptop. “To Nikolai?”

Sophie nodded, curled up on the couch with a blanket around her and Ethan asleep in the next room. “Not for the press. Not for the public. Just for him.”

Alexander didn’t speak right away. Then—“Why?”

“Because I need him to hear me. No more shields. No more silence. Just the truth—from me to him. For once, not filtered through games or fear.”

Alexander leaned back in his chair. “Sophie, if you give him anything… even emotionally… he’ll twist it.”

“I’m not doing it for him.” Her voice was steady. “I’m doing it for me. I need to take my voice back.”

He stared at her for a long moment. Then he stood and crossed the room. Sat beside her.

“What would you say?”

She looked down at her hands, then slowly up at him.

“I’d tell him the things I should’ve said years ago. I’d tell him what it cost me. What it stole from Ethan. And what he will never get back.”

Alexander reached over, brushing a strand of hair behind her ear. “Then write it.”

“I don’t know how to start.”

“Yes, you do,” he whispered. “You always do.”

She pulled her laptop onto her lap and stared at the screen.

Then—typed:

Nikolai,

This isn’t a letter to change your mind. This isn’t an apology or a plea. This is what you don’t get to take from me—my voice, my choice, my truth.

Alexander read over her shoulder, silently.

You once said you loved me. I believed you. And maybe, in some version of reality, you did. But love isn’t something that leaves bruises on the soul. Love isn’t control. Love isn’t surveillance.

Sophie paused, her throat thick.

Alexander reached for her hand. Squeezed.

You say Ethan is yours. That blood gives you claim. But blood never tucked him in at night. Blood didn’t hold him when he had nightmares, or stay up with him when he had a fever. Blood didn’t teach him kindness or make him laugh until he couldn’t breathe.

She wiped her eyes.

He calls Alexander his father. Not because we told him to. Because Alexander earned it. With patience. With gentleness. With love.

You say you want a family. But family isn’t built on fear. And this time, you don’t get to rewrite the story.

She hit save.

Closed the laptop.

Breathed.

Alexander rubbed slow circles into her back.

“That,” he said, “is how you take back power.”

“I’m not sending it,” she whispered.

“You don’t need to.”

“It’s for me.”

He nodded. “And maybe for him. One day.”

They sat in silence for a few more minutes.

Then her phone buzzed.

Unknown number.

One message:

“Meet me. One final time. This ends tonight. 10 PM. No guards. No wires. Just you. Or I go to the press.”

Alexander read it with her.

“No,” he said immediately.

Sophie stared at the message.

“No,” he repeated, firmer. “He’s manipulating you.”

She looked up. “I know.”

“Then why are you even considering it?”

“Because if I don’t… he’ll twist the story again.”

“He already is.”

“He’ll make it worse. You saw the photo. He’s not bluffing. If he wants to take this public, we lose control.”

Alexander’s jaw tightened. “Then let me go in your place.”

“He won’t talk to anyone but me.”

“This is insane.”

“I have to go.”

Alexander stood, pacing. “You realize what he’s doing, don’t you? He’s cornered. That article blew a hole in his power. He’s losing control of the narrative and you’re the one thing he thinks he can still use.”

“I know.”

Alexander turned to her, voice shaking. “Then why are you walking into it?”

Sophie stood too.

“Because if I don’t… he wins by default.”

They stared at each other.

Alexander’s voice broke. “You said no more secrets.”

“There won’t be.”

“Then take me with you.”

“I can’t.”

“Sophie—”

“I’ll take a tracker. You’ll be parked nearby. I’ll use the signal if anything goes wrong.”

“I hate this.”

“I know.”

Alexander stepped closer, pulled her into his arms.

Held her so tight she could barely breathe.

“I can’t lose you,” he whispered.

“You won’t.”

“I mean it.”

“I know.”

He kissed her—slow and deep, like he needed to memorize her.

When they parted, his eyes were glassy. “Come back to me.”

“I will.”

She pulled on her coat. Picked up her phone.

Mei appeared in the hallway. “Are we really doing this?”

“Yes.”

“We’re close enough to intercept within ninety seconds.”

Sophie nodded.

Mei placed a tiny tracker just under the hem of Sophie’s sleeve. “Do not go off grid.”

“I won’t.”

Alexander took her face in his hands again, just one more moment, one more silent promise.

Then she stepped into the night.

The meeting place was a rooftop.

Downtown.

Empty.

Windy.

Lit only by the flicker of city lights far below.

Sophie stepped out of the elevator and found Nikolai standing near the edge, hands in his pockets.

He didn’t turn when she arrived.

“You came,” he said.

“You knew I would.”

“You always did know how to finish a story,” he said softly.

“I didn’t come for stories.”

“No,” he said. “You came for endings.”

She moved closer, just enough that he turned.

There was something different in his eyes tonight. Not triumph. Not menace.

Something quieter.

“We were good once,” he said.

“No, we weren’t.”

He smiled faintly. “You’re colder now.”

“No,” she said. “I’m free.”

“You think this ends with an article? With a photo? You think truth lives in ink and headlines?”

“I think truth lives in what we do with it.”

He looked at her.

“Then do something,” he said.

“I already did.”

He stepped forward.

One pace. Two.

Close enough to touch.

“Tell me,” he said. “Was there ever a moment you missed me?”

“No,” she said. “But there were years I missed who I thought you were.”

He flinched.

“That’s the real loss, Nikolai. Not me. Not Ethan. The version of yourself you were too afraid to become.”

“You think he’s yours now?”

Sophie blinked. “He’s his own.”

Nikolai reached into his coat pocket.

Sophie tensed.

He pulled out a folder.

And held it out.

“What is it?”

“Proof,” he said. “Of everything I said. Everything Viktor did.”

She hesitated.

Then took it.

Flipped it open.

Papers.

Dates.

Records.

Photos.

One of her.

One of her mother.

A bill from a private medical foundation.

Another note.

Viktor paid. And never told you.

Sophie froze.

“You think he let your mother die,” Nikolai said. “But he didn’t. He saved her. Quietly. Without asking. And then let you carry the guilt.”

“No,” she whispered.

“I told you,” Nikolai said. “You’ve been fighting the wrong ghosts.”

Sophie looked up at him, trembling.

And for the first time—

She didn’t know who the villain was.

She only knew this—

She had one final truth to uncover.