Chapter 2

The floor-to-ceiling windows of the Hotel Danieli suite offered an uninterrupted view of the Grand Canal, but Zohaib Khan wasn’t interested in the scenery.

He stood at the far end of the room, dressed in sharp black, hands clasped behind his back. The storm outside was thinning now, moonlight starting to seep through the clouds like silver smoke.

Behind him, Rayaan sat on the couch, his fingers moving across a touchscreen tablet. Code scrolled in green across black.

“Three lines,” Rayaan said. “That’s all she took. But it was enough.”

Zohaib turned his head slightly. “What did she see?”

“Not everything,” Rayaan replied. “But enough to understand what it was.”

Zohaib’s jaw tightened.

He wasn’t worried about law enforcement. The code was off-grid—so far off, not even international cybercrime units could trace it. But Amber hadn’t just seen it. She had understood it. Decrypted a line that even his own systems couldn’t auto-read. That changed things.

“She’s not just hiding,” Zohaib said softly. “She’s calculating. Preparing.”

Rayaan paused. “Should we force her hand?”

Zohaib gave him a long look. “No. She still doesn’t know the full value of what she stole. The moment she does... they’ll come for her too.”

Rayaan nodded once, understanding. “And you?”

Zohaib’s voice was steady. “I’ll get to her first.”

In Cannaregio, Amber’s morning began with fog.

Venice was always quiet early, but this kind of silence felt different—like the city itself was holding its breath. She sipped bitter black coffee at the corner café, a worn scarf wrapped around her head, her face half hidden behind dark glasses.

She didn’t notice the man watching her from the gondola dock.

But Nico did.

He sat across the canal on a bench, pretending to feed pigeons, eyes hidden behind mirrored sunglasses. He didn’t need to follow her today—her routine was mapped down to the second. He was only here for one reason: to report if she broke it.

She didn’t.

Amber paid in cash, left the café, and disappeared back into the maze of alleys. She never used the same route twice. Never stayed in one square for more than ten minutes. Smart. Trained. Paranoid. Everything Zohaib liked in a person—and everything that made her dangerous.

Back in her apartment, Amber connected to a hidden signal Mira had rerouted through three countries. The message she received was short:

> XGhost: They’re close. You’ve got 72 hours max.

Burn everything or come out swinging.

Amber’s fingers hovered over the keyboard.

She wasn’t ready to run again.

And deep down, a part of her was tired of it.

Instead, she reached under the floorboard and pulled out the flash drive again. This time, she plugged it in.

The screen flickered.

One encrypted file. No name. No extension.

She cracked the first layer of code—then stopped cold.

It wasn’t just tech. It was personal.

Names. Coordinates. Transactions.