The sight burned into Bella's vision long after her phone's screen dimmed.

Ethan.

His usual slouch, his backpack worn across a shoulder, his head forward toward his phone while he was walking.

It might have been any typical instant—a lad going to school. It was not.

Because someone had been close enough to take it. Close enough to let her know.

Her fingers trembled as she went back to the message. No message. No familiar number. Only the image. A threat in a blanket of silence.

She breathed fast, shallowly. Sounds around her in the city blurred. People went rushing past, horns were honking, the sky above was a bleak wash of gray—but it was all muffled. All that she could hear was the sound of her pulse thundering.

They weren't sitting there watching her any longer. They were watching him.

"Ethan," she whispered, her breath trembling.

She was immobilized. She could not move. She was rigid, legs weighed down, as if the weight of her darkest nightmare finally froze her.

Then instinct kicked in. She jammed the phone in her pocket and ran.

It was burning in her lungs when she reached their apartment complex, but she didn't quite register it. She ran up the stairs two steps at a time, slipping on the banister rail, her heart beating like it was going to snap her ribs.

It was locked. She struggled with the key, coming perilously close to dropping it before jamming it into the lock. Just as soon as the door came open, she strode in.

"Ethan?" Her voice echoed in this small confinement. Much too loud. Much too beseeching.

No response.

She ran through the apartment--his bathroom, bedroom, kitchen. It was empty. All rooms smelled faintly of detergent and cologne, but he was nowhere around.

It tightened around her chest until she could not breathe. Her darkest fears came to life in her imagination—Ethan gone, abducted into the same shadows that took their father.

It buzzed again. She ripped it out of her pocket and was shaking so violently that she might have dropped it.

There were words this time.

"You can't guard him."

Her knees nearly buckled. She took a step back, holding on to the phone as if it were going to detonate. Whoever this was, they were now in her territory. Her universe.

A new wave of terror erupted—but below it, a fiercer burning. Rage.

No one threatened her brother. Not again. Never.

She sat on the bed alongside Ethan, forcing herself to breathe, to think. Her mind ran around in circles in memories like old film reels–her father's absence at her school plays, her family home's silent emptiness after he'd died, nights upon nights that Ethan sneaked into her bedroom and whispered, "Are we safe?"

She'd assured him they were. She'd assured herself she'd never let the world harm him again.

And now—someone was calling her a liar.

Her phone buzzed once more. Another photo.

Ethan went into a subway without realizing.

Bella's fists clenched until her nails pressed into her palms. She longed to yell, to bang the phone into the wall. She took a harsh breath instead and rubbed her hands against her eyes until spots hit her.

She could not collapse. Not now. Not when Ethan required her.

Throughout the town, Alex Moretti remained silent while his chief security officer completed the report.

Unmarked car seen tailing the Russo boy," stated the man standing rigidly in front of Alex's desk. "Licence plates are counterfeit. Professional. Whoever this is isn't some amateur thug.

Alex's jaw tightened, muscles jerking as he took in the message. He turned slowly, skyline blazing behind him, and fixed his steel-gray eyes on the man.

“And you’re only telling me this now?” His voice was calm, deadly quiet.

The man fidgeted. "We wanted to make sure before calling it—"

"Escalate." It was a word that cut through air like a knife. Alex's tone never rose in pitch, but the air seemed to decrease in temperature. "Now."

The man quickened his nod and left, closing the door behind him.

Alex remained still for a moment, looking at the space in front of him. He clenched his hand around the glass tumbler on his desk; the liquid within was untouched, a burnished amber. His reflection gazed back at him out of the glass—sharp, disciplined, merciless.

But beneath that reflection, something stirred.

It was a plan, he convinced himself. Control. Nothing else.

But he knew better.

Bella Russo was not another pawn on his board any longer.

And the person who had stooped low enough to attack her brother had declared war against him.

By the time her front door creaked open to a knock, Bella was pacing her living room, phone gripped in hand, mind storming between terror and outrage.

She thought about them first. Whoever was messaging these things. Whoever took this picture.

It almost stopped. She slowly stood up and went to the door. "Who is it?"

"Open the door, Bella."

His voice was deep-toned and commanding. Familiar.

Her stomach twisted. Alex.

All instincts clamored to make him depart. To shut the door, keep him out, not have his shadow reach any further into her life.

And another urge—the one that recalled the black car, the picture, the message—caused her fingers to clutch around the handle and open it.

Alex loomed in the doorway like he was the owner, his suit neatly pressed against the peeling paint on the structure. He took up the doorway, his gaze locked on her, firm.

"Why did you come here?" she demanded imperiously, making an effort to be calm and still despite her chest remaining constricted due to fright.

"Me? I should be asking that of you," he said nonchalantly. He flashed his eyes at her hand, still holding her phone. "You got the message."

She lost her pulse. "You knew?"

"I know everything." His voice was low, contained, but he could sense the spark underneath—the treacherous promise of a man who was used to distorting reality to his will.

Something in her snapped. She shoved the phone against his chest, her voice shaking with fury. “Then stop playing games and tell me who the hell is watching us!”

For a moment, Alex didn't budge. His gaze scourged hers, hot enough to make her want to retreat. But she didn't. She stood her ground, steel against fire.

And then he talked, his tone soft but lethal. "Someone who doesn't mind if you get burned in a crossfire. Someone who sees threatening your brother as a bargaining chip."

She went stiff. "Leverage for what?"

Alex did not immediately answer. He went in and shut the door behind him. The small apartment seemed to draw in around his figure.

I have leverage against you," he eventually declared.

Bella's breath stopped. "This is about you?

"No," Alex corrected him, his tone gruffer now. "It's about us. Whether you want to admit it or not, you're in this now. They know that you count."

The words lingered between them, electric, perilous.

Bella longed to disbelieve it, to kick him out and act like none of this was happening. But again her phone buzzed in her hand. Another photo.

Ethan alighted this time from the train.

It constricted in her chest, her vision becoming cloudy with panic. She hadn't even realized she'd stood until Alex's hand wrapped around hers firmly to immobilize her trembling grasp on the phone.

"Breathe," he directed. His tone was smooth, unwavering, drawing her back from the brink.

She looked up at him, and in a split second, she could see a raw emotion flit across his eyes. Not power. Not control. Something closer… worry.

And that, more than anything else, frightened her.

Since it meant Alex Moretti was no longer simply her captor. He was becoming something even worse.

Deep in the city, Miranda Vaughn put her wine glass down happily when her phone sprang to life with a new message.

"Phase One complete. Girl is scared."

Excellent.

She leaned back in her chair, her laughter soft and cold. The apartment around her was filled with the faint hum of expensive silence, the kind only money could buy. On the table lay a stack of photographs—Bella in her waitress uniform, Bella on the street, Bella unlocking the door to her building. Let's have Alex be the savior. Let him believe he can save the little waitress. Regardless, it would not make a difference. As Bella Russo was no longer Alex's weakness but was going to be his knife, Miranda was going to use it against him.