“Elena!”
She screams my name like it’s a lifeline.
The sound rips through the warehouse, raw and panicked and real, echoing off concrete and steel until it feels like the building itself is crying out with her. She thrashes against the ropes, chair scraping faintly against the floor, terror tearing loose every ounce of restraint she has left.
I surge forward.
My body moves before thought can catch it. Before strategy. Before caution. One step, fast and desperate, boots splashing through shallow water as everything in me locks onto her and nothing else.
Then the light changes.
A second spotlight slams on from the right, harsh and unforgiving, slicing through the darkness and pinning another figure in place.
Adrian.
He stands just beyond the circle of light, rainwater dripping from h
