Page 26

Lea

Cold sheets. That’s what wakes me. Not a sound, not a nightmare, but the absence of warmth where Nico’s body should be. I blink in the darkness, disoriented, my hand patting the empty space beside me. The indentation of his head on the pillow remains, but the sheets have long since cooled. He’s been gone awhile.

I squint at the ornate clock on the bedside table: 3:17 AM. My throat feels dry, cottony. I tell myself that’s why I’m getting up, for water, but even in my half-awake state, I recognize the lie. I’m looking for him.

Sliding out from beneath the silken sheets, I wince as my bare feet touch the cold hardwood floor. Alessandro’s estate is all old-world luxury, but apparently heated floors didn’t make the cut in whatever century this place was built. I grab Nico’s discarded shirt from the floor and pull it on. It smells like him, that indefinable scent that’s just him. My chest tightens at the comforting smell, at how quickly it’s become a comfort to me.

The hallway outside our bedroom is dimly lit by small wall sconces that cast more shadows than light. During daylight hours, Alessandro’s mansion hums with quiet efficiency, staff moving purposefully, security personnel checking in, phones ringing in distant offices. Now, it’s unnervingly silent, as if the building itself is holding its breath.

My tread seems obscenely loud against the polished floor as I make my way toward the grand staircase. The massive oil paintings of Varela ancestors watch me pass, their eyes following my movements with aristocratic disapproval. You don’t belong here, they seem to say. You’re just passing through.

Maybe they’re right.

I pause at the top of the stairs, listening. The house remains stubbornly silent, but there’s a tension in the air that I can’t quite place, like the pressure drop before a storm. My journalistic instinct, the same one that’s led me into countless dangerous situations in pursuit of a story, prickles at the base of my neck.

Something’s happening. Something important.

I descend the stairs, careful to avoid the third step from the bottom that I’ve learned creaks loudly. The main floor is darker than upstairs, the elaborate chandelier in the foyer extinguished, leaving only the ambient glow from outside security lights filtering through the windows.

I’m halfway to the kitchen when I notice it. There’s a thin sliver of light beneath a door down the hallway. Nico’s office. The one place in Alessandro’s mansion that is exclusively his territory, where even the house staff enter only by invitation.

Water forgotten, I change direction, drawn to that ribbon of light like a moth to flame. It’s likely nothing, Nico suffering from insomnia, catching up on business, making calls to associates in different time zones. There are a dozen innocent explanations.

Then why does my heart suddenly hammer against my ribs?

As I approach the door, I hear the low murmur of voices, Nico’s and Alessandro’s, their tones hushed but intense. The rich scent of old wood polish hangs heavy in the corridor. I slow my pace, years of investigative instinct taking over. My bare feet make no sound on the thick carpet as I move closer, close enough to see that the door isn’t fully closed. A gap of perhaps two inches provides a partial view into the room.

I shouldn’t eavesdrop. This is the kind of boundary violation that would reinforce every suspicion Nico has about journalists, about my motives. We’ve moved beyond that in the past few days, found something real beneath the layers of calculation and performance.

Haven’t we?

I lean closer, telling myself I’ll just check if he’s okay. If it’s nothing important, I’ll announce myself, make up some excuse about insomnia or thirst. But what I see freezes me in place.

Nico is hunched over his desk, posture rigid with tension, so unlike his usual fluid confidence. Alessandro stands beside him, one hand braced on the desk’s edge, the other gesturing emphatically as he speaks. Between them, documents are spread across the polished wood surface, and Nico’s laptop casts a blue glow across both their faces.

“—confirmed by three separate sources,” Alessandro is saying, his voice sharp with urgency. “The timeline matches.”

Nico shakes his head. “It can’t be a coincidence. Not with the Moretti connection. Not with the university shipments.”

Alessandro’s response is too quiet for me to catch, but Nico’s reaction is immediate. His head snaps up, eyes hardening.

“She can never know,” he says, the words carrying clearly to where I stand frozen. “Not until we’re certain.”

Ice forms in my veins, an instant, visceral reaction. She. They’re talking about me. Or…

“Your sentiment is understandable, but misguided,” Alessandro replies, voice low but sharp. “The woman killed a man to save your life. She deserves the truth, however painful.”

My mind races. What truth? What are they hiding from me?

Alessandro reaches into his jacket pocket and extracts something small, a thumb drive. He places it on the desk between them.

“Everything’s here,” he says. “The border crossing records. The academy photos. The chemical shipment manifests. It’s comprehensive, Nico. Irrefutable.”

Nico takes the drive, inserts it into his laptop. The blue glow intensifies, illuminating the harsh angles of his face as he scrolls through whatever contents the drive holds. His expression transforms from skepticism to stunned disbelief.

“Jesus Christ,” he mutters, the profanity shocking coming from his usually controlled lips. “All these years. Right under everyone’s noses.”

A cold dread spreads through me. They’re not talking about me.

Alessandro leans in closer, lowering his voice further. “What about Lea? She’ll have to be told?—”

“Not yet,” Nico cuts him off. “There’s still a chance this isn’t what it appears to be.”

My fingers grip the doorframe, knuckles white with tension. What isn’t what it appears to be?

Alessandro sighs, the sound heavy with resignation. “Nico, if Professor Song is actually a North Korea operative coordinating a fentanyl pipeline through Moretti’s distribution network, we need to?—”

A sound escapes me, half gasp, half strangled cry, before I can stop it. The words slam into me like physical blows: North Korean. Operative. My mother. Fentanyl.

Both men whip toward the door. Nico’s face, when he recognizes me, does something I’ve never seen before. It crumples, just for an instant, with what looks like genuine regret. Then the mask slides back into place, but it’s too late. I’ve seen beneath it.

I push the door fully open, stepping into the room on legs that threaten to give way beneath me.

“What did you just say about my mother?” My voice sounds foreign, distant, as if someone else is speaking through me.

Nico rises slowly from his chair, hands raised in a gesture that might be meant to calm but feels patronizing. “Lea?—”

“Don’t.” I cut him off, turning instead to Alessandro. “Say it again. What you just said about my mother.”

Alessandro’s eyes flick to Nico, seeking permission, I realize with a flare of anger. As if I’m some delicate flower who needs protection from the truth. As if I haven’t spent the last six years digging for buried facts that powerful men would prefer to keep hidden.

Nico gives an almost imperceptible nod, and something in his expression shifts. The diplomat retreating, the strategist emerging.

Alessandro straightens, assuming the formal bearing that seems to come naturally to him. “Your mother, Professor Eunji Song, emigrated to the United Kingdom about twenty-five years ago, and then together with you and your father, moved to the United States under false pretenses. Your mother…” he hesitates, but only briefly, “is not South Korean. The evidence suggests she is a deep-undercover North Korea operative, using her academic credentials to facilitate a major drug trade operation to help finance military expenses for the regime.”

The words hang in the air between us, monstrous and incomprehensible. I want to laugh, to dismiss this as an absurd conspiracy theory, but the gravity in Alessandro’s tone, the documents spread across the desk, the way Nico won’t quite meet my eyes. The room seems to shrink, the air thinning until I can barely draw a breath.

“SHOW ME!” I demand, the words tearing from my throat.

Nico hesitates only a moment before turning his laptop toward me. The screen is split into two images side by side. On the left is a young woman in a crisp North Korea military uniform, her posture rigid, her expression severe but unmistakable; my mother’s eyes, my mother’s mouth, my mother’s distinctive cheekbones. On the right is the graduation photo I’ve seen a hundred times on her office wall. Eunji Song accepting her doctorate from Seoul National University, beaming with pride.

“That’s…” I start, but can’t finish. Because it is her. Unmistakably her, in both images.

My fingers move to the trackpad, scrolling through the open files with a detached, mechanical precision that belies the earthquake happening inside me. Shipping manifests for pharmaceutical components moving through shell companies with innocuous names. Bank transfers through offshore accounts, the money trail obscured by layer upon layer of corporate facades. Surveillance photos, recent ones, of my mother meeting with a man I recognize as one of Moretti’s lieutenants, the same one who confronted me at the gala.

Each new piece of evidence is another blow, dismantling the foundation of everything I’ve ever known. A lifetime of memories reconfiguring themselves in sickening new patterns.

The bedtime stories she told me about escaping from an oppressive regime—true, but not the one I’d been led to believe. The “research trips” that took her away for weeks at a time. The locked filing cabinet in her study that I was never allowed to open. The way she stiffened whenever certain political topics came up, steering conversations in safer directions.

Oh god. My father. Did he know? Was he part of it? Or was their relationship just another cover to hide behind?

I can feel myself swaying, the room tilting around me. A strong hand grips my elbow, steadying me. Nico. I jerk away from his touch as if burned.

“Did you know?” The question scrapes my throat raw. “Is that why you targeted me? Was I just collateral intelligence to you, so you could get first dibs at the biggest fentanyl distribution deal the world has ever seen?”

Silence stretches between us, heavy with unspoken truths, with all the calculations and manipulations that have defined our relationship from the beginning. Nico’s face hardens, the vulnerability of moments ago replaced by something cooler, more controlled.

“That’s not how it happened,” he says finally.

A bitter laugh escapes me, sharp and ugly. “Bullshit! You’re the brilliant manipulator, the master diplomat! You’re the one who got me that job straight out of college, got me the dream exclusive just like that, all so you could get close to me and my mother!”

The pieces fit together with terrible clarity. I already knew he facilitated the circumstances so the publisher would assign me, a rookie, to profile Chicago’s most powerful criminal mediator, but of course he also made sure I got the job at The Journal in the first place. Heck, he’s probably even responsible for my accolades in college. It was all a setup, a long con with me as the mark.

But Nico is shaking his head, his expression grim. “You’re right that I arranged the expose, but I didn’t get you that job, Lea.”

“More lies? Really?” I spit the words at him, fury burning away the shock, cauterizing the wound with white-hot rage.

Alessandro shifts uncomfortably behind the desk, exchanging a look with Nico that sends a fresh wave of dread through me. Something worse is coming. Somehow, impossibly, there’s more.

Nico nods almost imperceptibly. “Show her.”

Alessandro hesitates, actual concern flickering across his aristocratic features. “Are you sure? This will?—”

“Show her,” Nico repeats, his voice leaving no room for argument.

With obvious reluctance, Alessandro reaches for a folder on the desk, extracting a single sheet of paper. He places it with the care one might use handling a live explosive.

It’s a handwritten note, the paper high-quality, the ink a distinctive shade of blue that I recognize. My mother has used the same fountain pen with the same indigo ink for as long as I can remember, a gift from my father, she always said.

The note is dated a few weeks before I started at the newspaper. The handwriting is unmistakable, each perfectly formed character a testament to her meticulous nature. The message is brief, devastating in its simplicity:

“Asset now in place at Chicago Investigating Journal, starting 08-22 . Confirmation received.”

My legs finally give out. I sink into the chair behind me, the world narrowing to this single sheet of paper, these nine words and one date that demolish everything I thought I knew about my life.

Not Nico, but my mother. She orchestrated my entire career. The university scholarship that seemed like such a blessing. The internships that led me step by step toward investigative journalism. The sudden job offer from Chicago’s premier newspaper when dozens of more qualified candidates were passed over.

All of it, every achievement I’d been so proud of, every obstacle I’d congratulated myself on overcoming—nothing but careful manipulation, pieces being moved into position on a board I couldn’t even see.

“No,” I breathe, the word a plea rather than a denial. My fingers are numb as I push the paper away. “No, that’s not…she wouldn’t…”

But she would. She did. The evidence is right in front of me, written in her own hand.

The laptop slides from my knees, clattering onto the desk. I barely register the sound, barely notice as Nico lunges to catch it before it falls to the floor. My mind is elsewhere, racing backward through a lifetime of memories, re-examining every conversation, every choice, every seeming coincidence through this new lens.

My mother’s quiet pride when I announced my journalism major. “You have the mind for it, Lea. You see connections others miss.” Had she been grooming me even then? Steering me toward a profession that would give me access to powerful people, to sensitive information?

Her sudden interest in my exclusive with Nico. “Be careful, Lea. Men like him see only assets and liabilities.” Not a warning from a concerned mother, but from a rival operator worried about her asset being compromised.

The mysterious man warning me. The texts about Moretti, had those been from her too? Part of some elaborate game between criminal enterprises with me as an unwitting pawn?

I’m on my feet without consciously deciding to stand, backing away from both men, from the evidence, from the truth that’s shattering me from the inside out.

“Lea—” Nico reaches for me, his expression softer than I’ve ever seen it, almost pleading.

I don’t want his pity, or his comfort. I don’t want anything from him or from my mother or from anyone in this godforsaken world of lies and manipulation.

I turn and run, out of the office, down the hallway, bare feet slapping against the cold floor. I don’t know where I’m going, just away, anywhere but here, anywhere but this moment where everything I believed about myself has been revealed as fiction.

Behind me, I hear Nico call my name, his voice sharp with command and something else… concern? Fear? I don’t stop to analyze it. I can’t bear to look at his face, to see the calculation behind his eyes as he decides how best to handle this new development in his grand strategy.

The front door looms ahead, massive and ornate. I wrench it open, the night air hitting me, cold and damp, carrying the scent of approaching rain. I don’t care. I charge down the steps, across the manicured lawn, my feet numb to the rough texture of gravel and then grass.

I keep running until my lungs burn and my legs tremble, until the mansion’s lights have receded to distant pinpricks behind me. Only then do I slow, gulping air that tastes of earth and the coming storm.

The reality of my situation penetrates the fog of betrayal and fury. I’m standing at the edge of Alessandro’s vast property in the middle of the night, wearing nothing but Nico’s shirt, with no phone, no money, no identification. Out there stretches the dark mass of forest that surrounds Alessandro’s estate with miles of wilderness between here and the nearest town.

Behind me, the lights of the mansion burn like a false beacon of safety. Inside wait one of the two greatest manipulators in my life: Nico Varela, who seduced my body and perhaps my heart in service to his ambitions, and somewhere out there, my mother, or whoever the hell she is, who engineered my entire existence to serve her own hidden agenda.

A drop of rain strikes my face, then another. The storm is breaking.

I have nowhere to go. No safe harbor in a world that has revealed itself as built entirely on lies. Every instinct screams at me to run, to put as much distance as possible between myself and those who have used me so thoroughly.

But run where? To whom?

Lightning splits the sky, illuminating the forest edge in stark white relief. In that brief flash, I see a path leading into the trees. It’s narrow and overgrown, but unmistakably a path. Somewhere to go that isn’t back to that house of lies.

Thunder follows, a deep rumble that seems to resonate with the turmoil inside me. The rain intensifies, soaking through the thin fabric of Nico’s shirt, plastering it to my skin. I barely feel it. The physical discomfort is nothing compared to the psychological devastation of the past thirty minutes.

I take one step toward the forest path, then another. The darkness seems to vibrate, alive and waiting. Is this wise? Absolutely not. The rational part of my brain, the part that isn’t howling with betrayal and rage, knows that wandering into unfamiliar wilderness during a thunderstorm is the textbook definition of a terrible decision.

But what’s the alternative? Return to Nico’s arms, pretend I can trust anything he says? Call my mother and listen to more lies?

Lightning flashes again, closer this time, the accompanying thunder almost immediate. The forest path beckons offering escape, and solitude, a chance to process the implosion of my world without Nico’s calculating gaze or Alessandro’s cool assessment.

Behind me, I hear a door slam, then a voice calling my name. Nico, coming after me. Of course he is. I’m a loose end now, a complication in his careful plans. Can’t have the journalist daughter of a North Korea operative running around uncontrolled, especially one who’s seen the evidence, who could expose everything.

I take another step forward. The forest looms, dark and forbidding, yet somehow less frightening than what waits behind me. Rain courses down my face, mingling with tears I hadn’t realized I was shedding.

“LEA!” Nico’s voice is closer now, urgent, almost frantic. So unlike his usual controlled tone.

Just another performance. Another mask. I can’t trust anything about him, not his touch, not his words, certainly not the tenderness I thought I’d glimpsed beneath his methodical exterior.

I take a final step forward, crossing the threshold between the manicured lawn and the wild unknown of the forest. The path is barely visible in the darkness, muddy and treacherous beneath my bare feet. Each step takes me farther from light, from comfort, from the people who have shaped my life through deception.

Into the storm. Into the dark. Into a world where everything I thought I knew about myself, about my mother, about Nico was built on lies.

Lightning flashes one last time, illuminating the path ahead. In that brief, brilliant moment, I make my choice.

I step forward into the darkness.

Continues in Savage Reckoning , the conclusion to The Diplomat, coming August 1st.