Page 39 of Her Soul to Own

He huffs. He doesn’t laugh, not really. Just a gruff exhale that says,I’m too old for your shit.“I don’t call for nostalgia, Silas. We’ve got a problem.”

I sit up straighter. My body reacts before my brain catches up. “Talk.”

“There’s a file. Your file. It’s moving,” Marcus says.

“What do you mean it’s moving?”

“I mean, someone in D.C., someone with clearance and quiet gloves, is poking into sealed operations. Not new ones. Old, classified deep. Caracas, Vienna, the mess in Marrakesh that you still pretend didn’t happen.”

My throat dries instantly, and my fingers flex. “Impossible,” I rasp.

“That’s what I thought. Until your psychological evaluation pinged in three servers. It’s not flagged but copied. Someone’s building a profile.”

Every inch of me tenses.

“You sure it’s not internal?” I ask.

“Not a chance. This is external. FBI.”

The word lands like a goddamn sledgehammer. My heart doesn’t beat faster. It stops entirely.

“Jesus Christ.”

“Oh, it gets better,” Marcus adds. “The activity’s tied to an inquiry opened under personal protocol. It’s not through official channels, which means someone’s digging without permission. They’ve got a reason.”

My gaze flicks back to the studio.

Lyra has stopped painting. Now, she’s just standing there and staring at the canvas like it’s whispering back to her. A thin trail of paint drips down her forearm.

My stomach knots. “I think I know who it is,” I mutter.

“Yeah?” Marcus drawls. “The girl you’re shadowing?”

“Not directly. Probably someone she pulled in.”

“Well, I have a name. Elijah Blake,” he says. “That name ring a bell?”

Who the fuck is Elijah Blake?The floor tilts under me.

“You’ve already traced it?”

“I don’t sleep much, Creed. He’s clean on paper, ex-quant, now working cyber intel. But he’s had multiple encryptedexchanges this week with contacts inside the Bureau. And he pulled up your operational alias yesterday.”

I close my eyes, my jaw tight. “Fuck.”

“Didn’t think the girl would play that card?” Marcus asks like he’s disappointed but not surprised.

“She’s pissed, and she’s smart. But I gotta say, I underestimated how far she’d go.”

“Well,” Marcus says. “Now you know.”

“What do I do?”

I hate that I’m asking him this like a little boy in trouble, but this man knows me better than anyone. He pauses.

Then, he replies, “You protect your position. Or you burn it down.”

I stare at the screen.

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