Aria's POV
The 15th precinct sits on the corner of 10th Avenue like a fortress.
Concrete walls. Barred windows. Armed officers everywhere. Security cameras covering every angle. This is where they bring the worst criminals in Manhattan.
And I'm about to walk right in.
I circle the building twice, my enhanced vision cataloging everything—guard rotations, camera blind spots, weak entry points. Information floods my brain like I've studied this building for months. I know where the holding cells are. I know which door has a faulty lock. I know exactly how to get in and out.
The devil's gift makes me perfect at everything.
Including breaking impossible rules.
I slip through a service entrance that connects to the underground parking garage. The lock takes me twelve seconds to pick. Inside, fluorescent lights buzz overhead. The smell of old coffee and sweat fills the air.
Two officers stand by the elevator, chatting about a basketball game. I wait in the shadows until they turn away, then move past them silent as smoke. Up the emergency stairs to the third floor where holding cells are located.
My heart pounds but my hands stay steady. This is insane. Reckless. Probably going to get me killed.
But Damien sacrificed himself for me. I owe him this.
Cell 7 is at the end of a long hallway. Four officers patrol this floor. I wait until three of them go into the break room, leaving only one guard—a young cop who looks barely twenty-five.
I step out of the shadows, hood pulled low.
"Hey!" The guard reaches for his gun. "This is a restricted area! How did you—"
I move faster than he can process. My hand shoots out and hits a pressure point on his neck—knowledge I shouldn't have, skills I never learned. He collapses unconscious.
I catch him before he hits the ground and drag him into a storage closet.
"Sorry," I whisper, even though he can't hear me.
The guilt I should feel is distant. Muted. Just like Veronica said—the emotions are fading.
I unlock cell 7 with the guard's keys.
Damien sits on the metal bench, head in his hands. He looks up when I enter, his blue eyes widening.
"Aria? What the hell are you doing here?"
"Rescuing you. Obviously." I keep my voice low. "Can you walk?"
"I'm not injured. I'm arrested." He stands, tall and imposing even in this tiny cell. "This is insane. They'll catch you. You'll be thrown in a cell right next to mine."
"Then we better move fast." I grab his arm. "Come on."
"No." He pulls away. "I told you to run. To survive. Not to throw your life away breaking me out of police custody."
"You sacrificed yourself for me—"
"Because I've had these powers for five years! I know how to handle arrest. I have lawyers, money, connections. I'll be out in forty-eight hours on bail." His voice is urgent. "You're a fugitive with no resources. If they catch you here, it's over. No bail. No trial. Just maximum security until Veronica arranges your convenient suicide."
He's right. This is stupid. Reckless.
But I'm so tired of running. Of hiding. Of being weak.
"I'm not leaving without you," I say firmly.
"Stubborn idiot." But something flickers in his cold blue eyes. Something that might be gratitude. "Fine. But we do this my way. Follow my lead and don't improvise."
We slip out of the cell together. Damien moves with the confidence of someone who's done this before—checking corners, timing camera rotations, avoiding guard patrols with surgical precision.
"How do you know all this?" I whisper.
"I broke someone out of here two years ago." His voice is flat. "A witness Veronica had silenced. Didn't end well, but I learned the layout."
We make it to the emergency stairs when alarms suddenly blare.
Red lights flash. Steel doors slam shut, blocking our exit.
"They found the guard," Damien curses. "Move!"
We run down the stairs but officers pour up from below. At least ten of them, weapons drawn.
"Dead end," I gasp.
"Not quite." Damien grabs a fire extinguisher from the wall and smashes the window. Glass explodes outward. We're three stories up overlooking an alley.
"You're insane!" I shout over the alarms.
"You're the one who broke into a police station." He grabs my hand. "Jump or get caught. Choose."
Officers burst through the stairwell door behind us.
"FREEZE!"
Damien and I exchange one look—and jump.
The fall is terrifying and brief. We hit the dumpster below with a crash that knocks the wind from my lungs. Pain explodes through my body, but I roll and keep moving. Damien hauls me to my feet.
"Run!"
We sprint through back alleys while sirens wail behind us. Police cars screech around corners. Helicopters thunder overhead, searchlights cutting through the darkness.
My legs burn but I don't stop. Can't stop.
Damien pulls me into a narrow gap between buildings—so tight we have to turn sideways to fit through. On the other side, an abandoned subway entrance that's been closed for years.
We climb down rusted stairs into darkness. The sound of sirens fades above us.
For a long moment, we just breathe in the dark silence.
"That was the stupidest thing I've ever seen," Damien finally says.
"You're welcome."
"I didn't say thank you."
"But you're thinking it."
A pause. Then, incredibly, he laughs. It's short and rough, like he's forgotten how. "You're completely insane."
"Takes one to know one." I pull out my phone—the screen is cracked from the jump, but it still works. "We need to disappear. They'll be searching the whole city."
"I know a place." Damien starts walking deeper into the abandoned tunnel. "A safe house I set up years ago. No one knows about it. We can lay low until morning."
I follow him through the darkness, my eyes adjusting faster than they should. Another gift from the devil.
"Why did you really come for me?" Damien asks quietly.
"Because you saved me first. At the warehouse."
"That's not a good enough reason to risk your life."
I think about it. About the ice in my chest that's spreading. About the emotions that feel distant now. About becoming something cold and perfect and alone.
"Because," I say slowly, "you're the only person who understands what I'm becoming. What this curse feels like. And I can't do this alone. Can't fight Veronica alone. Can't survive thirty years of this alone."
Damien stops walking. Turns to face me in the darkness. His blue eyes catch the faint light from my phone.
"I've been alone for five years," he says softly. "Thought that's what I deserved. That getting close to people with this curse would only hurt them."
"And now?"
"Now I think maybe we're stronger together than apart." He holds out his hand. "Partners?"
I take his hand. His grip is cold but solid. Real.
"Partners."
We shake on it in an abandoned subway tunnel while the city searches for us overhead.
Then my phone rings. The FBI agent again.
"Miss Chen, you missed our meeting."
"I was busy."
"Breaking your partner out of police custody, yes. Very busy." Agent Winters sounds amused. "Good news—that stunt bought you credibility. The FBI now officially believes you're serious about taking down Veronica Chen. Bad news—you're now wanted for assaulting an officer and aiding a fugitive. Your bail just jumped to $500,000."
"Get to the point."
"The point is, I have the information about your father that you need. And I have a deal for you." She pauses for effect. "Work with the FBI. Help us bring down Veronica's entire operation—not just her, but her network of corrupt officials and traffickers. Do that, and we clear your name. Give you immunity. Let you walk away free."
"And if I refuse?"
"Then you spend the rest of your thirty years running from both Veronica and the law. Your choice, Miss Chen."
I look at Damien. He can hear the conversation—super-hearing, apparently another gift we share.
He nods slightly. Permission. Or agreement.
"What do you need from me?" I ask.
"Everything. Names, locations, evidence. Veronica's been building her empire for three years. We need someone on the inside to tear it down." Agent Winters's voice hardens. "Your father tried to stop her and ran out of time. Now you get to finish what he started. Interested?"
My father. Running out of time with ten years gone, trying to expose Veronica before his deal ended.
I have thirty years. Enough time to do what he couldn't.
"I'm interested."
"Good. Meet me tomorrow, 10 AM, coordinates I'll text you. Come with Thorne. We'll discuss terms." She hangs up.
Damien and I stand in the abandoned tunnel, processing everything.
"Working with the FBI," he says. "That's not how I expected this night to end."
"Nothing about tonight went as expected."
"True." He starts walking again, and I follow. "For what it's worth—thank you. For breaking me out. Even though it was stupid."
"You're welcome. Even though you're ungrateful."
Another rough laugh. "I think this partnership is going to be complicated."
"Everything about our lives is complicated."
We walk in silence for a while. Then Damien's safe house appears—a hidden door in the tunnel wall that opens into a small furnished room. Generator, running water, supplies.
"Home sweet home," he mutters.
I collapse onto an old couch, exhaustion hitting me all at once. My phone buzzes with a text from the coordinates Agent Winters mentioned. Tomorrow's meeting location.
But another text comes through. Unknown number. A video file.
I open it with shaking hands.
The video shows Veronica in what looks like a luxury office. She's talking to someone off-camera.
"—don't care how you do it. Find Aria and Damien. Kill them both. Make it look like they killed each other—a lovers' murder-suicide. Poetic, don't you think?"
The camera pans to show who she's talking to.
Marcus. My ex-fiancé. His eyes glow purple.
Marcus made a deal too.
And Veronica just ordered him to murder me.