Adriana's POV
"Drive!" I screamed. "Dominic, drive!"
But he just sat there, frozen, staring at his mother on the porch. His face had gone completely white.
"Dominic!" Marcus shook his shoulder. "We need to go NOW!"
Victoria took a step forward, Elena right behind her. Two men in black suits emerged from the cabin, carrying guns.
That broke Dominic's trance. He slammed the car into reverse, tires spinning on gravel. We flew backward down the driveway as gunfire erupted.
Bullets shattered the back window. Marcus and I ducked as glass rained over us.
"She sold us out," Dominic said, voice hollow. "My own mother sold us out."
He jerked the wheel, spinning the car around. We raced back down the forest road, trees blurring past. Behind us, two black SUVs pulled out from behind the cabin, giving chase.
"How did they know?" Marcus demanded. "How did they know we'd come here?"
"Because I'm an idiot," Dominic said bitterly. "This place was my safe space. My father's place. Of course she'd guess I'd come here when I ran out of options."
More gunshots. A bullet hit the side mirror, tearing it off.
"We can't outrun them!" I said. "Not on these roads!"
Dominic didn't answer, just drove faster. We hit the main highway going eighty miles an hour. The SUVs stayed right behind us.
My phone buzzed. Unknown number. I almost ignored it, then answered anyway. "What?"
"Ms. Vale." Elena's smooth voice filled my ear. "I must say, you're far more resourceful than I gave you credit for."
"Go to hell."
"Temper, temper. I'm calling with a proposition."
"I'm not interested in anything you—"
"Give me the flash drive and I'll let you live."
I laughed. Actually laughed. "You're going to kill us anyway."
"Perhaps. But this way, you die quickly instead of slowly. I'm offering mercy, Ms. Vale. Take it while you can."
"I'd rather die fighting than surrender to you."
"How noble. How stupid." Elena's voice hardened. "You can't win this. I have hundreds of people working for me. Police. Judges. Federal agents. You have nothing but a traitor, a hacker, and your own stubbornness."
"We have the truth."
"The truth?" Elena laughed coldly. "The truth is whatever I say it is. I've been deciding truth in courtrooms for fifteen years. No one questions me. No one stops me. And no one—especially not some disgraced prosecutor with delusions of justice—will bring me down."
"We'll see about that."
I hung up and threw the phone out the window.
"That was stupid," Marcus said. "Now we can't call for help."
"Who would we call? Everyone's either working for her or too scared to help." I turned to Dominic. "Where can we go? Nowhere's safe anymore."
"I know." He took a sharp turn, tires screaming. "But I have one last idea. It's crazy. Probably won't work. Might get us all killed."
"Better than the alternative," I said.
"We stop running." Dominic's eyes met mine in the rearview mirror. "We make our stand. Right now. Today. We release everything on that flash drive to the public before Elena can stop us."
Marcus leaned forward. "How? We need internet access, a secure connection, enough time to upload everything. Elena's people will find us in minutes."
"Not if we do it somewhere they can't shut down," Dominic said. "Somewhere public. Somewhere they can't just storm in with guns."
"Where?" I asked.
Dominic's jaw set with determination. "The federal courthouse. Downtown Manhattan. Middle of the day, hundreds of people around. We walk in, upload everything from the public computers in the law library. By the time Elena realizes what we're doing, it'll be too late."
"That's insane," Marcus said.
"Yes."
"They'll arrest us the moment we walk through security."
"Probably."
"We might not even make it to the building alive."
"I know."
I thought about it. Every instinct screamed it was suicide. But what other choice did we have? Keep running until Elena's people caught us? Hide forever? Die without even trying to expose the truth?
"I'm in," I said.
Marcus groaned. "You're both crazy. You know that, right?"
"Completely," I agreed. "You don't have to come. We can drop you somewhere safe—"
"And miss watching you two idiots try to save the world?" Marcus shook his head. "No way. Someone needs to keep you alive."
Dominic smiled—the first real smile I'd seen from him in five years. "Thank you."
We drove back toward the city, the SUVs still following. But we had a head start now. Maybe enough time to make it work.
"What about your mother?" I asked Dominic quietly. "Are you okay?"
His smile vanished. "No. But I will be. After we destroy everything she and Elena built."
The drive took two hours. Two hours of watching our backs, taking random turns, trying to lose the tail. By the time Manhattan's skyline appeared, we'd shaken the SUVs.
We ditched the car three blocks from the courthouse and walked the rest of the way. It was noon. The streets were packed with people on lunch breaks.
The courthouse rose in front of us—marble columns, American flags, everything that was supposed to represent justice.
"Ready?" Dominic asked.
I took a deep breath. Touched the flash drive in my pocket. Thought about Hammond dying in my office. About five years of lies and pain. About every person Elena had destroyed.
"Ready."
We climbed the courthouse steps together.
Security waited at the entrance—metal detectors, guards, cameras everywhere. We'd have to get through all of it without being recognized.
I was three steps from the door when someone grabbed my arm.
I spun around, ready to fight.
Ryan Blake stood there. The federal prosecutor who worked with Dominic. The one who'd helped us during the raid on the safe house.
"Thank God I found you," he said breathlessly. "Don't go in there."
"Ryan? What are you—"
"It's a trap. Elena knows you're coming. She has agents inside waiting for you." His eyes were wide, desperate. "I overheard her on the phone. She's planning to kill you all the moment you enter."
My heart sank. "How did she know?"
Ryan's expression turned apologetic. "Because I told her."
He pulled out a gun.
And suddenly I understood—Ryan Blake had been working for Elena all along.