Secrets

Secrets
Sofia’s POV

I didn’t stop walking.

I didn’t give Aurelio the satisfaction of seeing me panic or stumble. My heart was hammering, yes. My fingers trembled slightly as I opened the car door and slid into the driver’s seat but my face didn’t crack.

Not until I was halfway back to Leandro’s house.

That’s when the fear started to claw its way through my chest.

What the hell was Aurelio doing outside the police station? How long had he been watching? And why show up now like a ghost crawling out of the past just to smirk at me?

I gripped the steering wheel harder and pressed harder on the gas.

I needed to get to Leandro.

Now.

\---

He was in the living room when I got back. Dressed in a black shirt, sleeves rolled up, collar loose. His phone was pressed to his ear, and his brows were tight, sharp.

He looked up the moment I walked in.

Our eyes met—and he knew. Just like that. Something had gone wrong.

He ended the call without even saying goodbye. “Where were you?”

I dropped my bag on the couch. “With the police.”

His entire body went still. “You what?”

“They called. Said my name was connected to the Veracruz mess. I went down there to answer questions.”

His jaw tensed, eyes narrowing. “You left the house alone?”

“You left me alone,” I said, heat rising in my voice. “What was I supposed to do? Sit in the dark and wait for the sky to fall?”

He didn’t answer. Just stared at me like he was trying to peel back layers and see straight into my brain.

“And there’s more,” I added. “When I left the station, I saw someone outside.”

Leandro stood fully upright now. “Who?”

I didn’t look away. “Aurelio.”

It was like I’d fired a bullet across the room.

Leandro’s face changed instantly. His shoulders tensed. His hands clenched at his sides.

“You’re sure?”

“Yes. He didn’t come near me. Just stood there. Watching.”

His mouth twisted into something dark. “That bastard…”

He turned away and ran a hand through his hair, pacing once, twice.

“He’s not just trying to take down the business,” I said softly. “He’s trying to get into your head. And mine.”

“He’s playing with fire.”

“And he knows exactly how close he is to setting everything ablaze.”

Leandro stopped pacing and looked at me again. His eyes were heavy now, not just with anger, but something else. Something deeper.

“I should’ve seen this coming,” he muttered. “I thought keeping you out of it would protect you. I thought if I pulled away for just a little while…”

My heart ached at the way he said it. Quiet. Regretful.

“I don’t need your distance,” I said. “I need the truth. All of it.”

He stared at me for a long moment. “The truth is… Aurelio’s been waiting for this. He’s wanted to knock me down for years. He just needed the right angle. And now, with you…”

He didn’t finish the sentence. But I understood.

Now, with me, he had a target.

“You think he’s framing me to get to you?”

“I don’t think. I know.” His voice was low, deadly. “And if he hurts you, if he even breathes wrong around you, I’ll make him regret ever crawling out of his mother’s womb.”

The words sent a chill down my spine, but not out of fear.

It was the way he said it. Not as a threat but as a promise.

Still, I took a step toward him. “I’m not fragile, Leandro. I don’t want to sit on the sidelines while this war happens around me. I want to fight it with you.”

His eyes softened a little. “I know you do.”

“Then let me in.”

He exhaled, something in him loosening. “There’s a storage facility under one of our old safehouses downtown. It’s where we keep backups, records, videos, hard copies of things we’re not supposed to have. I think Aurelio’s move has something to do with what’s missing from there. That VIP guest list? It didn’t get altered from the main server. It got pulled from somewhere older. Deeper.”

“You think the answer is there?”

“I’m sure of it.”

“Then let’s go.”

He blinked. “Now?”

“Unless you have somewhere else to be.”

That crooked smile I hadn’t seen in hours finally tugged at the corner of his lips.

“I’m starting to think you enjoy danger.”

“I’m starting to think I enjoy annoying you.”

He grabbed his keys, handed me a jacket, and without another word, we were back in motion.

Together.

\---

The safehouse was tucked behind an old bakery that hadn’t seen customers in years. The front looked abandoned, shuttered windows, cracked walls, a faint smell of flour still clinging to the air like a ghost.

Leandro keyed in a code at the back entrance, then led me down a narrow hallway to a trapdoor hidden beneath what used to be a walk-in freezer.

Down below, it felt like stepping into another world.

Cold. Silent. Lined with shelves and locked cabinets. Rows of outdated monitors hummed softly in the corners. Dust floated through the air like forgotten memories.

“This is where your secrets sleep?” I whispered.

“This is where truth comes to rot,” he muttered.

We worked in silence for a while. Digging. Sorting. Pulling files.

Then Leandro froze in front of one of the cabinets.

“What is it?” I asked, stepping closer.

He held up a small flash drive. The label was smudged, but I could still make out the words etched in sharp ink.

Veracruz | External Guests | Internal Review.

He plugged it into one of the older monitors.

What popped up next made my skin crawl.

There I was—walking through the club. Wearing the same dress I wore the first night I ever met Leandro. Same hair. Same everything.

Except it wasn’t that night.

“It’s fake,” I breathed.

“They used footage from the club’s security tapes,” Leandro said. “Overlaid it with that night’s timestamp. They edited you into the footage.”

“And no one would question it, because I’ve been seen at the club before.”

He looked at me, eyes sharp with fury. “They’re trying to bury you. And if we hadn’t found this…”

He didn’t finish. He didn’t need to.

I already knew how close I’d come to being lost in the lie.