Elite Council Headquarters – After Hours
Security badges clicked.
The steel doors sighed open.
Veronica stepped inside the forbidden heart of the city's power—the archive vault beneath the Elite Council's headquarters. White walls. Fingerprint-only locks. Every corridor was sterile and precise, like truth itself had been scrubbed and repackaged here.
She wore a simple black coat. Her hair was pinned. Her expression was cold.
Not heiress. Not Amy.
Veronica Lin, the mafia queen reborn.
The badge clipped to her lapel belonged to Councilwoman Tian. Stolen, not borrowed. Acquired last week during a charity gala with one well-timed champagne spill and a distraction Lucas orchestrated in the garden.
"Eyes on the east wing," his voice crackled through her hidden earpiece. "Security patrols loop every 4.5 minutes. You've got two full passes before the next sweep."
Veronica's lips curved. "Copy that, ghost."
Lucas's amused exhale reached her through the line. "You're not supposed to enjoy this, you know."
"I never stopped," she whispered, brushing her fingers across the coded scanner.
The door clicked open.
Inside: shelf after shelf of black binders, each labeled in crimson ink.
Council Investigations.
Each one a life reduced to pages. Betrayals catalogued. Lives are rearranged by the puppeteers above society.
Veronica moved quickly. She found the letter "L" and scanned until she reached "Lin, Yara."
She pulled the file.
The edges were singed.
Deliberate.
Inside, half the pages were missing—torn or burned.
But one photo remained: A woman in chains, her hair matted with blood, sitting in a concrete room marked only "Facility 6."
Veronica's heart stilled.
Below the image:
"Mother to subject: A.L. Subject deemed unstable. Extraction authorized. Surveillance to begin under Brother's care."
Her hand trembled.
She whispered, "Amy wasn't adopted by strangers. She was taken."
Lucas's voice turned sharp in her ear. "Veronica, I just cracked a data cluster. You're not going to like this."
She moved to the shadows. "Say it."
"There's a pattern going back seventeen years. Girls between the ages of four and seven. Missing. All from powerful families… but the connections were covered with fake deaths, 'natural causes,' or fire incidents."
Veronica closed her eyes.
"Not runaways," she whispered. "They were hunted."
"Amy's name shows up in internal transfer documents twice. First, as a 'witness child.' Then as a 'reintegration experiment.'"
Veronica felt a nausea twist her stomach. "And the man listed both times?"
Lucas's answer was clipped.
"Only a codename. 'Brother.'"
Ten Minutes Later – Council Surveillance Archives
Veronica moved swiftly to the digital servers.
She inserted a flash override Lucas had rigged. The fan hummed. Data flooded the portable drive.
Photos. Documents. A sealed video archive marked:
"Facility 6 Incident: Subject AL Breakdown. Emergency Protocol Initiated."
Veronica's heart punched against her ribs.
"Lucas… there's footage."
"Don't watch it there," he warned. "You need to—"
But the file auto-launched.
The screen lit up.
A white room. Cameras in all four corners. A small child sat at a table, eyes hollow, lips moving with no sound.
Then the door opened.
A tall man in a white coat entered. Masked. His face was obscured.
But his voice—
"Sunshine, look at me."
The child flinched.
Amy.
She looked up, tears spilling.
"Don't call me that!"
He stepped forward.
"I'm your brother. Don't you remember?"
She shook her head. "You're not my brother! My brother had kind hands! You're—YOU'RE NOT HIM!"
The man moved so fast that the camera jolted.
A slap cracked through the room.
Veronica felt bile rise.
Amy fell from her chair, curling into herself.
"You're my subject. My test. And you'll love me because no one else will."
Veronica tore the flash drive from the port, severing the feed.
"Veronica?" Lucas's voice was sharp. "What happened?"
But she couldn't answer.
Her hands were shaking.
Her mouth tasted of iron.
Back in the SUV – Ten Minutes Later
Veronica sat in the passenger seat, staring at the black drive in her hands.
The silence between her and Lucas was suffocating.
"Say it," he said at last. "What did you see?"
She met his eyes.
"That man isn't Amy's brother. He was her captor. Her puppeteer. And she she tried to fight, even as a child."
Lucas leaned forward, eyes intense. "That's why she was so broken. Not because she was weak. Because she survived him."
Veronica swallowed hard.
"She wasn't just murdered. She was erased after resisting him. After trying to speak."
Lucas reached over, his fingers threading through hers with a fierceness that grounded her.
"You're shaking again."
She gave a bitter laugh. "She died terrified. And I—"
"You're not her," he interrupted softly. "But you're carrying her legacy."
His thumb brushed her knuckles. "And I'm not letting you carry it alone."
Veronica looked away, blinking fast. Her voice cracked.
"He called her 'Sunshine.' Just like Amy's real mother did."
Lucas stilled.
Her eyes met his. "You think that's a coincidence?"
His silence said everything.
"That man knew Amy's mother. Knew her real name. And I think… he's not just a Council asset. He's family."
Lucas swore under his breath.
Veronica's voice dropped to a whisper.
"Don't call him 'Brother.' Not ever again. That word is poison."
Later That Night – Lin Estate Rooftop
The wind tore at her coat as Veronica stood alone, a drive clutched in her fist.
She heard Lucas behind her before he spoke.
"I sent copies to three safe contacts. If something happens to us…"
She turned. "You think it'll come to that?"
Lucas stepped forward.
His eyes searched hers.
"You tell me."
They stood face to face, the wind howling between them, but neither looked away.
"I'm not fragile," she said. "But some nights, I feel like I'm living two deaths at once. Mine. And Amy's."
Lucas didn't answer with words.
He simply stepped forward—close enough that their foreheads almost touched—and whispered:
"Then let me give you a third life. One worth fighting for."
Her breath hitched.
She didn't pull away.
"Lucas…"
He leaned in.
But before their lips could meet, the security alarm on her phone buzzed—a breach alert.
She whipped around.
Her eyes widened.
The nursery window was open.
And someone—or something—had left a single word scratched into the crib's wood.
"Sunshine."