Page 50 of Broken Sentinel

"You knew?" My voice comes out barely above a whisper. "All this time, you knew what I was and never told me?"

"I couldn't tell you," he says, voice tight with tension. "Your modifications were designed to activate naturally. Premature awareness could have disrupted the process, caused psychological rejection. I was ordered to observe and protect, nothing more."

"Ordered?" I repeat, pulling my hand away from his. "By who? Unity?"

He shakes his head. "By the network. The same people who've been helping Splinters and sympathizers for decades. The same people who brought us here tonight."

I step back, the betrayal cutting deeper with each revelation. "So our entire partnership was just...what? An assignment for you?"

"It started that way," he admits, reaching for me again. I sidestep his touch. “Just as any partnership starts out through Unity.”

"How much of it was real?" I demand, anger rising to replace the shock. "The training? The missions? Our neural synchronization?"

"All of it was real," he insists. "Zara, please?—"

"What about today?" My voice rises as the full implications hit me. "You escaping with me, was that just completing your mission? Delivering the package safely to its destination?"

"No," Trent says forcefully. "I chose to follow you because?—"

"Because it was your job!" I cut him off, fury building with each heartbeat. "God, I'm such an idiot. I actually thought you were risking everything for me, but you were just following orders the whole time!"

"That's not true." He moves toward me, but I back away until I hit the wall. "Yes, I was assigned to watch over you, but everything that's happened between us, everything we've shared? That was never part of any mission."

I laugh, the sound harsh and bitter. "Sure it wasn't. Just like our 'exceptional neural compatibility' wasn't part of the plan either, right? Tell me, Trent, was that engineered too? Some special enhancement to help you keep track of your assignment?"

His jaw tightens. "Our synchronization was genuine. What you felt from me during those sessions was real."

"How would I know?" I throw back at him. "My whole life has been manipulated from the start. My parents, my career, my partner, all orchestrated to serve someone else's agenda."

"That's not fair," he says, frustration evident in his voice. "I couldn't tell you the truth without compromising everything."

"Fair?" My voice rises dangerously. "You want to talk about fair? I just found out I was designed as some kind of genetic bridge, hidden in Unity as part of an elaborate plan I never consented to, and now I discover that the one person I trusted completely has been lying to me for our entire relationship!"

The hurt is so intense it's physical, a crushing weight on my chest making it hard to breathe. Three years of partnership, of trust, of whatever was growing between us—all founded on deception.

"How long were you going to wait to tell me?" I ask, wrapping my arms around myself. "Or were you ever planning to? Maybe it was just another secret you'd keep, another thing I didn't need to know about myself."

Trent's expression tightens. "I was going to tell you once we were safe, once you'd had time to process everything else."

"How considerate," I snap. "Spacing out the betrayals so they hurt less."

"It wasn't a betrayal!" His control finally cracks, frustration bleeding through. "Everything I did was to protect you!"

"Without giving me a choice!" I shout back. "Just like my mother, just like Unity. Everyone deciding what's best for Zara without ever asking what Zara wants!"

We stare at each other across the room, both breathing hard. The air between us feels charged with anger and hurt and something else, the wreckage of what might have been.

"Did you ever actually care about me?" I ask, my voice dropping. "Or was I just a successful mission?"

His eyes widen, pain evident on his face. "How can you ask me that after everything we've been through?"

"Because I don't know what's real anymore," I admit, hating the tremor in my voice. "I don't know if anything about my life has ever been real."

Trent takes a step toward me, his face showing a vulnerability I've rarely seen. "What I feel for you is real, Zara. It has nothing to do with assignments or duty or anyone's grand plans. I requested the position because I believed in what Haven was trying to achieve, yes. But I stayed because of you."

I want to believe him. God, how I want to. But the trust that's been our foundation for three years lies shattered between us.

"I need time," I say finally, turning away from him. "I need space to process all of this."

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