Emma's POV
The lights go out.
Eleanor screams.
Glass shatters somewhere downstairs.
I freeze in the dark bathroom, my heart hammering so hard it hurts. Footsteps pound through the mansion—heavy boots, multiple people, moving fast.
This is real. Someone actually broke in.
The anonymous text warned me. "They're coming for you."
I fumble for my phone in the dark. Use the flashlight. The weak beam barely cuts through the blackness.
"Emma!" Damien's voice roars from somewhere below. "STAY WHERE YOU ARE!"
More crashing. Something heavy falls. A gunshot rings out—loud, sharp, terrifying.
Oh God. Oh God, there are guns.
I drop to the bathroom floor, shaking. Should I hide? Run? I don't even know where the door is anymore in the pitch black.
Another gunshot. Then Damien's voice: "I SAID GET OUT OF MY HOUSE!"
Silence. Horrible, heavy silence.
Then Eleanor's voice, shaky but alive: "Damien? Damien, are you hurt?"
"I'm fine, Mom. Stay down."
Footsteps on the stairs now. Coming up. Coming toward me.
I scramble backward until my back hits the bathtub. Grab the only weapon I can find—a hairbrush from the counter.
A hairbrush. Against armed intruders. I'm going to die.
The bathroom door bursts open.
I scream.
"Emma, it's me!" Damien's voice. His phone flashlight finds my face. "Are you hurt?"
"What's happening?!"
"They're gone. I chased them off." Damien extends his hand. "Come on. We need to leave. Now."
"Leave? Why—"
"Because they'll come back with more people. And next time I might not hear them in time." Damien pulls me to my feet. "Grab only what you absolutely need. We have two minutes."
My brain can't process this. "Who were they?"
"I don't know yet. But they knew exactly where to cut the power and which windows to break." Damien's face is hard in the phone light. "Someone gave them information about this house."
We run downstairs. Eleanor stands in the living room holding a baseball bat, looking fierce despite being sixty years old.
"Mom, we're leaving. Get your emergency bag."
"Already got it." Eleanor holds up a small black backpack. She planned for this. She has an emergency escape bag ready.
What kind of life do these people live?
Damien grabs a duffel bag from a closet. Pulls out my suitcase and wedding dress from where we left them. "Emma, take these. We'll get everything else later."
"Where are we going?"
"Somewhere they can't find us." Damien's phone buzzes. He checks it and curses. "We need to go NOW."
We rush to the garage. Damien's sports car is there, but he ignores it. Instead, he opens a panel in the wall I never noticed. Behind it is another car—plain, ordinary, completely forgettable.
"Get in."
We pile in. Damien drives out through a back exit I didn't know existed. No lights. The car is nearly silent.
Eleanor sits in back with me, holding my hand. "It's okay, dear. We've done this before."
"Done what before?"
"Disappeared." Eleanor's voice is calm. Too calm. "When Damien was younger, after his father died, people tried to hurt us too. We learned to have backup plans."
We drive through dark streets. Damien takes random turns, doubles back, clearly checking if we're followed.
After twenty minutes, he finally relaxes slightly. "I think we're clear."
"Who were those people?" I ask again.
"I'm having my security team pull the mansion cameras right now. We'll know soon." Damien glances at me in the rearview mirror. "Emma, did you tell anyone where you were staying?"
"No. I didn't talk to anyone except you."
"What about that attorney? Margaret Frost?"
My stomach drops. "I didn't go to meet her. You said it was a trap."
"But you responded to the texts, didn't you? Confirmed your location?"
I think back. Did I? I don't remember typing anything.
Damien's phone rings. He answers on speaker. "What did you find?"
A man's voice: "Boss, the intruders were professionals. Military-grade equipment. They disabled your security system from outside before entering. These weren't random thieves."
"Who hired them?"
"Working on it. But sir, there's something else. We tracked the burner phone that texted Emma tonight. The one claiming to be an attorney."
"And?"
"The phone pinged from a location two blocks from where you picked up Emma earlier. Someone was watching you. Following you."
Ice runs through my veins.
"How long were they following us?" Damien asks.
"Can't say for sure. But Boss, the phone was purchased yesterday morning. Right after the wedding scandal went public. Someone planned this fast."
Damien ends the call. Drives in silence for a moment.
"Someone is trying to kill me," I whisper.
"Or kidnap you," Eleanor says quietly. "Emma, dear, you publicly humiliated some very powerful people today. People with money and connections."
"My family wouldn't—they wouldn't actually hurt me. Would they?"
Neither Damien nor Eleanor answers. That's answer enough.
We drive for another thirty minutes. Finally pull up to a tall building downtown. Not as fancy as Damien's mansion, but still nice.
"Where are we?"
"Safe house," Damien says. "Building is under a shell company name. No one knows I own it."
We take a service elevator to the top floor. The penthouse here is smaller than Damien's mansion but still incredible. Modern. Clean. Ready to live in.
"How many safe houses do you have?" I ask.
"Enough." Damien locks the door behind us. Multiple locks. Heavy duty. "Eleanor, take the east bedroom. Emma, you're in the west. I'll take the couch."
"You don't have to—"
"Yes, I do. Someone just tried to break into my house to get to you. Until we know who and why, I'm not taking chances." Damien's eyes are intense. "Emma, I need you to think carefully. Is there anything else you didn't tell me? Anyone else who knew where you were?"
I rack my brain. "No one. I swear. My phone has been off most of the evening except when you called."
"What about before that? At the reception?"
"I had it on. I was getting texts from—" I stop. "Oh no."
"What?"
"The anonymous texts. The ones warning me about you. What if they weren't warnings? What if they were tracking me? Making sure I'd respond so they could trace my location?"
Damien and Eleanor exchange a look.
"That's smart," Eleanor says. "Evil, but smart."
Damien pulls out his laptop. "Give me your phone."
I hand it over. He plugs it in, types rapidly.
"You've been hacked," he says flatly. "Someone installed tracking software. They've been monitoring everything—your location, your texts, your calls. Everything."
My blood runs cold. "Since when?"
"Since..." Damien scrolls. "Yesterday morning. Right after the first anonymous text came in."
"So every move I made, they knew?"
"Every single one." Damien removes something from my phone. "I'm wiping this. You'll get a new one tomorrow."
I sink onto the couch, shaking. "Someone was watching me this whole time. Following me. Waiting for the right moment to—to what? Kill me? Kidnap me?"
"We'll find out." Damien's jaw is tight. "I have people who are very good at finding answers."
My phone buzzes one last time before he wipes it. One final text from unknown number: "You can run, Emma. You can hide. But we know everything. We've been inside your head for days. There's nowhere you can go that we won't find you. And when we do, you'll wish you'd never crossed your family."
Damien reads it. Curses viciously. Then wipes the phone completely.
"That's it," he says. "No more phones until we get secure ones. No social media. No contact with anyone from your old life."
"But—"
"Emma, someone wants to hurt you. Really hurt you. Until we know who, you're completely off the grid." Damien looks at me seriously. "Starting tomorrow, Emma Chen doesn't exist anymore."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean we're going to create a new identity for you. New name. New background. New everything." Damien's voice is firm. "They're hunting Emma Chen. So Emma Chen dies tonight."
Eleanor puts her arm around me. "It sounds extreme, dear. But Damien's right. You need to disappear completely."
"For how long?"
"Until we destroy whoever is hunting you," Damien says. "And trust me, Emma. We will destroy them."
I should be terrified. I should be running away from this dangerous situation.
But part of me—the part that's been humiliated and betrayed and stolen from—feels something else.
Anger.
"Okay," I say. "Kill Emma Chen. Let's build someone new. Someone strong."
Eleanor squeezes my shoulder. "That's my girl."
Damien nods approval. "Get some sleep. Tomorrow we start over."
I go to the bedroom he indicated. It's nice. Safe. But I can't sleep.
Someone tried to hurt me tonight. Someone who knows everything about me.
My family? The Kanes? Someone else?
I stare at the ceiling for hours, jumping at every sound.
Finally, around 3 AM, exhaustion takes over. My eyes drift closed.
I dream of running. Of being chased. Of faceless people hunting me through dark streets.
I wake up screaming.
Damien bursts through my door. "Emma! You're okay. It was just a nightmare."
But it wasn't just a nightmare. It was a memory of tonight. Of real danger.
"I can't do this," I whisper. "I can't live like this. Looking over my shoulder. Hiding. Being afraid."
"You won't have to. Not forever." Damien sits on the edge of my bed. "We're going to find whoever is behind this. And then we're going to end them."
"How?"
"By being smarter. Richer. More powerful." Damien's eyes gleam in the darkness. "Emma, you have something they don't expect. You have me. And I've been planning to destroy the Kanes for ten years. I know all their secrets. All their weaknesses. All the skeletons they've hidden."
"Tell me," I say. "Tell me everything."
"Not now. It's 3 AM. You need rest."
"I can't rest. Tell me. Please. I need to know what I'm fighting."
Damien studies me for a moment. Then nods.
"Alexander's father James Kane built his empire on stolen patents and destroyed lives. My father wasn't the only one. There are dozens of people he's crushed." Damien's voice is cold. "And your father Richard? He married your mother for her money. Her business. The accident that killed her? I don't think it was an accident at all."
My breath catches. "What?"
"I've had investigators looking into it for years. Patricia was driving. The car mysteriously swerved off the road. Your father had the investigation shut down within 24 hours." Damien leans forward. "Emma, I think your family murdered your mother. And I think I can prove it."
The room spins.
"Tomorrow we start building new you," Damien continues. "But tonight, Emma Chen dies. And when you rise again, you'll rise as someone they can't touch. Someone powerful enough to destroy them all."
Eleanor appears in the doorway. "Damien, let her sleep."
"She needs to know what she's up against."
"And she will. Tomorrow." Eleanor's voice is firm. "Emma, come. Let's get you some warm milk. It'll help you sleep."
I follow Eleanor to the kitchen in a daze. She makes warm milk with honey like I'm a child.
"Is it true?" I ask. "Did Patricia really kill my mother?"
Eleanor's silence is answer enough.
I drink the milk. Let Eleanor tuck me back into bed like she's my real mother.
"Tomorrow everything changes," Eleanor whispers. "Tomorrow you become someone new. Someone strong. Someone who can fight back."
"I'm scared."
"Good. Fear keeps you sharp." Eleanor kisses my forehead. "Sleep now, Emma Chen. Because tomorrow, onyou die. And Emma Sterling is born."
She leaves me in the dark.
I close my eyes.
And when I finally sleep, I dream of fire. Of burning everything down. Of rising from the ashes as someone new.
Someone dangerous.
Someone who makes people pay.