CELESTE POV
"That's impossible," I whispered, looking at the screen. "My mother is dead. She died six years ago. I was at her funeral. I watched them bury her."
But the woman on the video looked exactly like my mother. Same dark hair. Same sharp cheeks. Same eyes that had always seen too much.
"Hello, my darling daughter," she said, and that voice—God, that voice was hers. "I imagine you have questions. You'll get your answers at midnight. Both of you will. Come to the old Armitage Pharmaceutical building. Come alone. And Celeste?" She smiled, cold and terrible. "Don't trust anyone. Especially not the man sitting beside you."
The screens went dark.
I couldn't move. Couldn't think. My mother was dead. She'd died of cancer when I was nineteen. I'd held her hand while she took her last breath. I'd planned her funeral. I'd mourned her for years.
She couldn't be alive.
"It's a trick," Dante said, his voice cutting through my slide. "Someone's using technology to fake her look. Deep fakes, voice manipulation—it's possible."
"But what if it's not?" The words came out broken. "What if she's been living this whole time? What if everything I thought I knew was a lie?"
Dante grabbed my shoulders, causing me to look at him. "Listen to me. Whoever's behind this is playing mind games. They want us confused, scared, making mistakes. We're not going to that building."
"Yes, we are."
"Absolutely not. It's definitely a trap."
"I don't care!" I shoved his hands away. "That's my mother, Dante. Or someone claiming to be her. Either way, I need to know the truth. I've spent three years with nothing but questions and lies. I'm going to that building."
"Then you're an idiot."
"Maybe. But I'm going anyway."
We stared at each other, electricity sparking between us again. I could see him thinking, trying to decide if he should lock me up or let me walk into danger.
Finally, he turned to Ghost. "Take us to the Armitage building. Full security process."
"Boss, that's—"
"I know what it is. Do it anyway."
Ghost sighed but changed direction. I should have felt relieved. Instead, I felt sick.
Because if my mother was really living, that meant she'd abandoned me. Let me think she was dead. Let me suffer through Dad's death alone.
Let me get sold at an auction.
What kind of mother would do that?
The Armitage Pharmaceutical building stood empty and dark against the night sky. My father's heritage, now just a hollow shell owned by Dante's company.
We pulled up at 11:58 PM. Two minutes until midnight.
"Stay behind me," Dante directed, pulling his gun. "Ghost, cover the rear. Anyone shows up who's not us, shoot first."
We walked through the front door. The doors were opened, hanging open like a mouth waiting to swallow us.
Inside, everything was exactly as I remembered. The lobby where I'd met clients. The lift I'd ridden every morning. Even the spot on the carpet where someone had spilled coffee three years ago.
But now it felt like a tomb.
"Celeste," a voice called from upstairs. My mother's voice. "Third floor. Your father's old room. Come alone."
Dante's hand tightened on his gun. "Not happening." "She said alone. " "And I said not happening. We go together or we leave."
I wanted to fight. Wanted to run upstairs by myself, find my mother, get answers.
But the truth was, I was scared.
So I nodded, and we climbed the stairs together.
Dad's office looked exactly as it had the day he died. His desk. His chair. The awards on the wall. Even his coffee mug, still sitting where he'd left it.
And standing behind the desk, bathed in moonlight from the window, was my mother.
She looked older. Tired. But living.
So incredibly alive.
"Mom?" The word came out like a prayer.
She smiled, but it didn't reach her eyes. "Hello, Celeste. I'm sorry it had to be this way."
"Sorry?" I took a step forward. "You're sorry? You let me think you were dead for six years! You let Dad die alone! You let them sell me like—"
"I let you live," she interrupted, her voice sharp. "If I'd stayed, they would have killed you too. Everything I did was to protect you."
"Protect me from what?" "From him." She pointed at Dante. "From the Morelli family. From the people who've been running this city like their personal playground for generations."
Dante raised his gun. "Explain. Now."
My mother—if it really was her—didn't even move. "Your father didn't build his kingdom, Dante. He stole it. From my family. From the Armitage line. We've been the real power in New York for over a century. Your father was just our guard until he got greedy."
"That's a lie," Dante said, but I heard doubt in his words.
"Is it? Ask Victor Kane. He was there. He helped your father steal everything." She turned back to me. "Celeste, your father didn't kill himself. And he wasn't killed by Dante. He was killed by the same people who've been influencing both your families for decades. The same people who faked my death to protect me while I gathered proof."
"What people?" I asked.
"The Council. A group of New York's oldest families who rule everything from the shadows. They decide who rises, who falls, who lives, who dies. And they've decided that both the Armitage and Morelli lines have become too strong. Too difficult to control."
She walked around the desk, moving closer. "They set you two against each other. They knew Celeste would blame Dante for her father's death. They knew Dante would buy her at the sale. They've been creating this moment for three years."
"Why?" Dante asked. "What do they gain?"
"When you two destroy each other—which they thought was inevitable—they sweep in and claim everything. Your empire, Dante. Our medicine patents, Celeste. All of it."
My head was spinning. "This is crazy. You're saying there's some secret group controlling New York?"
"I'm saying there's always been a secret group controlling New York. And we're about to blow it wide open." She pulled out a flash drive. "Everything's on here. Names, bank accounts, proof of murders, bribes, conspiracies. Enough to destroy the Council forever."
She held it out to me. "Take it. Use it. Burn their power down."
I reached for the flash drive.
Dante grabbed my wrist. "Don't."
"What?"
"Think about it," he said quickly. "She shows up after six years, tells us a convenient story that makes us allies instead of enemies, and hands us proof that will start a war? This is trickery."
"She's my mother!"
"Or she's someone pretending to be your mother to get us to do exactly what she wants."
I looked between them—Dante's storm-gray eyes filled with distrust, my mother's familiar face pleading with me to trust her.
Who was lying?
Before I could decide, the windows burst.
Not smoke bombs this time. Real bullets, breaking through glass, ripping through walls.
Dante shoved me to the ground. My mother dove behind the desk.
"Ghost!" Dante shouted. "We're under fire!"
No answer.
"Ghost!"
Still nothing.
My mother looked at me across the floor, her eyes wide. "Celeste, you have to choose. Trust me and take the drive, or trust him and leave it. But choose now, because they're coming."
"Who's coming?"
"Everyone."
The door burst open.
Men in black tactical gear rushed in, guns raised.
But they didn't shoot at me or Dante.
They aimed at my mother.
"Evelyn Armitage," the lead man said, "you're under arrest for treason, conspiracy, and the murder of seventeen Council members."
My mother's face went white. "No. No, it's too soon. I wasn't ready—"
She looked at me one last time. "The drive, Celeste. Take it. It's the only way to save—"
They fired.
My mother's body jerked backward, blood bursting across her chest.
I screamed.
Dante dragged me toward the other door, firing at the tactical team, but there were too many of them.
And as they closed in, I saw it—the flash drive, lying on the floor in a pool of my mother's blood.
The only proof of everything she'd just told us.
The only proof that might explain the truth about my father's death.
I had one second to decide: grab it and risk getting shot, or leave it and lose the answers forever.
I lunged for the drive.
Pain exploded in my shoulder.
Then everything went dark.