The warehouse was silent but for the low crackle of fire and the distant hum of city noise filtering through rusted metal.
Ethan sat chained to the ceiling beam, arms aching, body sore, every muscle alive with pain and dull hunger. His mouth was dry. His stomach had stopped growling hours ago—now it just ached, hollow and bitter. It had been more than a full day since he'd eaten, and the wolf in him was beginning to stir—not in defiance, but desperation.
His nose twitched involuntarily.
Food.
There was something cooking on a dented, scorched metal pan placed atop a fire pit made of cinder blocks. Something seared and spiced. The scent of it slid into his awareness like a whisper he couldn't ignore—meat and onions and the faint, maddening sweetness of tomato paste and cumin.
Anna crouched by the flames, her forearm resting on her knee, the other flipping the pan's contents with a knife that didn't belong in a kitchen. She hadn't said a word since their last exchange.
And that was worse.
The longer she stayed quiet, the more his thoughts screamed.
He forced himself to look away from the food, to breathe through his mouth, to clamp down on the feral hunger snarling inside his ribcage. It wasn't just the lack of food. It was the silver still curling in his bloodstream like smoke. It had weakened him, burned him from the inside, just enough to keep him grounded. Human.
Barely.
She glanced over her shoulder. "You have until nightfall."
Her voice was calm. Her whole demeanor portrayed calm...Deceptively so.
"To give me Kellerman's location. Phone number. Security setup. Travel schedule. I want it all. If I don't have it by then…" she shrugged lightly, "I assume you're not ready to deal."
He blinked slowly. "And what then? Another beating? You put me down like a dog?"
Anna didn't rise to the bait.
"No," she said simply. "I move on. And you stay here. someone will pick up up soon enough".
She returned to the fire, scooping the sizzling food into a battered tin plate. She didn't offer him any.
He didn't ask.
Instead, he leaned his head back against the cold metal beam and exhaled.
The lawyer inside him—the predator in court, the chess master who could unravel testimony like thread—he was quiet now. Not gone, just… stunned. Injured. Like a lion with a bullet in its spine.
He understood his position. He always did. That was his gift. The rational voice.
And rationally?
He was screwed.
The video alone had destroyed everything. Even if she never released it, the threat was real. And it wasn't just about public shame. It wasn't about his career or the fact that his reputation would burn like paper. No.
It was about survival.
If even one of his clients saw that footage—one of the real ones, the ones he kept off official books—they wouldn't come after him with lawsuits.
They'd come with guns. Or blades. Or silver.
Ethan Cross had built his legacy defending people too powerful to fail and too dangerous to displease. If word got out that he wasn't entirely human… if it was discovered he could be controlled…
He'd become a liability.
A hunted one.
His mind swam through the possibilities. Running wasn't an option. Not anymore. The city he knew, the power he'd mastered—it was all a trap now. Every name in his phone, every deal he'd cut, every skeleton he'd helped shove into a polished closet... would now be clawing their way back out with teeth.
But giving Kellerman up wasn't simple either.
Kellerman wasn't just another client. He was plugged into something bigger. Pharma money. Government ties. Half of the Board of Health practically worshiped him. And beneath the glossy surface? The man had connections darker than the sewers under the city.
Rats didn't like daylight.
They devoured those who exposed them.
He shifted on the concrete floor, the chains clinking faintly as he pulled his knees up and rested his forehead against them.
If he gave Anna what she wanted… it wasn't just betrayal. It was suicide.
But if he didn't… she'd bury him slowly.
Anna finished eating. Licked the edge of her knife clean—not out of cruelty, but ritual.
"You were stalling in your head," she said without turning.
"I was thinking."
"You always were better at that than feeling."
He smiled grimly. "Feelings are what got people killed in my line of work."
She rose and walked toward him, crossing the room with a predator's stillness.
"You defended Kellerman because you believed the case was flawed? Or because the check cleared?"
He didn't answer.
She crouched, inches from his face.
"You didn't care those kids died. You didn't even flinch in court when the mother passed out during cross."
He remembered. Of course he did.
She had screamed something about God and monsters.
And he'd adjusted his cufflink.
Anna stared at him like she was willing him to flinch. To break. To confess.
"You think this is about vengeance," she said. "It's not. This is about plague control. You're not the plague, Ethan. But you are one hell of a carrier."
"You're wasting your time," he muttered.
"You said the same thing in court once. You told a jury they were wasting time chasing ghosts. That human error wasn't criminal."
She stood again.
"This time, the ghost is real. And I'm giving you one shot to atone before the hunt widens."
He looked up at her. "What are you planning?"
Her smile was small and humorless.
"I'm going to take them down, one by one. Not with claws. Not at first. I want the world to see them for what they are. I want a trail of receipts and corruption and cowardice so long they can't bury it under charity galas or blood money."
"And then?"
She shrugged.
"Then I burn the rest."
Ethan's throat was tight. Whether from hunger or fear, he didn't know.
Nightfall.
That was the cut-off.
If he gave her what she wanted, he'd make enemies he couldn't outrun.
If he didn't… he'd already made the one enemy who had nothing left to lose.
The fire crackled.
His stomach growled—audibly this time.
She heard it. Looked over. Considered something. Then turned away again.
He closed his eyes.
One name.
One location.
And the war would begin.
Ethan Cross had been many things.
But this… this was the moment that would decide whether he became a footnote in someone else's story…
Or rewrote his own.