The weight of the remaining forty-eight hours felt like a lifetime. I was a man of action reduced to a statue. After the confrontation with Agent Thorne at the hospital, the air in the Thompson Manor had become thick, almost unbreathable. Every vibration of my phone felt like the heartbeat of a countdown clock ticking toward our collective ruin.
We were gathered in the dining room for dinner, but none of us were eating. The silver platters of roasted lamb and vegetables sat untouched, a mockery of domestic normalcy. Emily sat to my right, her eyes red-rimmed and hollow, her hand resting near mine on the table—not quite touching, but close enough that I could feel the heat radiating from her skin. Across from us sat William Carter.
William wasn't my brother by blood, but he was the brother I had chosen in the trenches of the Brooklyn streets. He was the one who had helped me build the "Andrew Parker" identity from scratch, the genius who had scrubbed my digital footprints while I was busy breaking bones. He sat at the head of the table, staring at a glass of red wine, his expression eerily calm.
"Silas," William said softly, the name cutting through the silence like a blade. "He was the one who took you in when you first hit the streets, wasn't he, Andrew? He gave you a place to train, and in exchange, you won him a lot of money in those underground circuits. He's the only one left who can link Andrew Parker's DNA to Oliver Thompson's face."
"He's a good man, Will," I said, my voice strained with a desperate urge to move. "But he's old. And Thorne is a specialist in breaking old men. If they have my DNA on those hand wraps, it's over. The moment that sequence hits the federal database, 'Oliver Thompson' becomes a fraud. Everything we've built—the legacy, the protection—it all burns."
I looked at Emily. "I have to go. I can't let them take him."
Emily's grip on the edge of the table tightened until her knuckles turned white. "Andrew, your promise. You said one week. You said you wouldn't become the ghost again."
"The promise stands," William Carter interrupted. He finally looked up, and for the first time in years, I saw a spark in his eyes that wasn't just intelligence. It was a cold, calculating fire. "Andrew, you aren't leaving this house. You are going to stay right here, in the light, where every camera and every spy Thorne has planted can see you being the perfect, law-abiding CEO."
"William, what are you talking about?" Ethan asked, turning away from the window where he had been monitoring the perimeter. "If we don't move on Silas, the FBI wins by default."
William set his glass down with a precise clink. "Thorne thinks he's playing a game of hunters and prey. He thinks he can bait the 'monster' out of the cave by threatening his past. But he forgot one thing: he's not dealing with a monster. He's dealing with the man who designed the cage."
William leaned forward, his voice dropping to a whisper that commanded the room.
"I've already started the play," William said. "Andrew, you keep your promise to Emily. You stay here. Ethan, I need you to go to the precinct, but not as a vigilante. Go as a whistleblower."
"A whistleblower?" Ethan frowned.
"I've spent the last three hours digging into Silas's history," William explained. "It turns out Silas didn't just run a gym. He was an informant for the DEA ten years ago—a protected witness whose file was supposedly sealed. I've just 'leaked' that sealed file to a rival gang in Brooklyn—the very gang Silas helped put away."
I stood up, horrified. "Will, you just signed his death warrant! If they find out he was a snitch, they'll kill him before the FBI can even get him to a safe house!"
"Exactly," William said, a dark smile touching his lips. "And because the leak came from a 'glitch' in the FBI's own temporary server—thanks to a few lines of code I dropped—Agent Thorne is now legally responsible for Silas's immediate danger. By the time Thorne realizes the leak is fake, he'll be forced to move Silas to a high-security federal facility for his 'protection.' And while they are moving him..."
William tapped his laptop, and a map of New York appeared on the wall screen.
"I've hijacked the transport's GPS," William continued. "The FBI won't take him to the safe house. They'll be led to a decoy location—a warehouse I've leased under a shell company. There, Silas won't find a gang of killers. He'll find a private jet fueled and waiting to take him to a private island in the Mediterranean. By tomorrow morning, Silas will be retired, wealthy, and far beyond the reach of a DNA swab."
The room was silent. I looked at William Carter. He was my best friend, my strategist, the brain to my brawn. He had just orchestrated a federal kidnapping, a witness relocation, and a cyber-terrorist distraction without leaving his dinner chair.
"And the hand wraps?" I asked.
"Already handled," William said. "I've sent a remote pulse to the evidence locker at the 13th Precinct where they were being held. It didn't destroy them—that would be too obvious. It just contaminated them with a synthetic enzyme. When Thorne's team opens that bag, they'll find nothing but degraded cotton and salt. No DNA. No link."
William stood up, smoothing his vest. "Checkmate, Agent Thorne."
He turned to me, his expression softening just a fraction. "Andrew, you gave us your strength for years. You wore the mask so we didn't have to. Now, let me use my mind to protect yours. Stay with Emily. I've got the shadows covered."
Emily looked at William, her eyes filled with relief, then she turned to me. The tension that had been strangling us for days finally snapped. She didn't hug me—not yet—but she reached out and squeezed my forearm, her eyes searching mine.
"You're a dangerous man, William Carter," I whispered.
"I'm your friend, Andrew," William replied, picking up his wine glass again. "And Thorne is about to learn that you don't mess with a Thompson's inner circle."
The Aftermath: 03:00 Hours
I couldn't sleep. The adrenaline was still humming in my veins, even though I hadn't thrown a single punch. I walked out onto the balcony of my room, staring at the sprawling gardens of the manor.
A light was on in the library below.
I headed downstairs and found Emily. She was curled up in a large armchair, a book open on her lap, but she wasn't reading. She was staring at the fireplace. She looked up as I entered, a soft smile playing on her lips—the first real smile I'd seen in days.
"William says Silas is in the air," she whispered. "The FBI is in a frenzy, but they have nothing."
"He's a genius," I said, leaning against the doorframe. "I'm lucky to have him."
"We're both lucky," she corrected.
I walked further into the room, stopping a few feet from her chair. The air between us changed. It wasn't the heavy, suffocating tension of the "Hotdog" secret anymore. It was something lighter, yet far more intense. I thought about the kiss in the library—the accident that felt like an awakening. We hadn't spoken about it. We were both too afraid of what it meant.
"Emily," I said, my voice low. "I know this week has been... a nightmare for you. I know you hate the lies. I know you hate the person I have to become sometimes."
"I don't hate you, Andrew," she said, looking up at me, her emerald eyes shimmering in the firelight. "I just hate the idea of losing you. To the police, to the Circle... or to the darkness."
I stepped closer, close enough to see the pulse fluttering in her neck. I wanted to tell her. I wanted to say that the only reason I could ever return from that darkness was because she was the light at the end of the tunnel. But I couldn't say it yet. Not while Thorne was still out there.
"I stayed in the light for you," I said, my voice dropping to a whisper. "The promise was hard to keep. But seeing you breathe easier tonight... it was worth more than any mission I've ever finished."
I reached out, my fingers grazing the hair near her temple, tucking a loose strand behind her ear. My hand lingered there, the back of my fingers brushing against the soft skin of her cheek.
"You're the only part of 'Oliver Thompson' that feels real, Emily," I hinted, my eyes locking onto hers. "Everything else is a mask. The money, the company, the ghost... it's all just noise. But this? Being here with you? This is the only thing I'm actually afraid to lose."
Emily's breath hitched. She didn't pull away. Instead, she leaned into my hand, just a fraction of an inch, her eyes searching mine for a truth I wasn't ready to voice.
"Andrew..." she started, her voice a fragile thread.
"Get some sleep, Emily," I said softly, forcing myself to pull my hand back. "We still have two days of the promise left. And I intend to spend every second of them being exactly who you want me to be."
I turned to leave, but I felt her eyes on my back. I knew she felt it. I knew she understood that I wasn't just talking about family loyalty. I was talking about a heart that had been frozen for twenty years, finally starting to melt because of her.
Behind me, in the silence of the library, I heard her whisper, so soft I almost missed it.
"I'm already starting to like the man you are, Andrew. Mask or no mask."