Part 118
At first, it was just noise.
A phone that wouldn't stop buzzing.
A flood of unread messages from unknown numbers.
Aura frowned as she scrolled through the notifications on her old phone — numbers she didn't recognize, emails that had somehow found her through the studio's ancient contact link.
"Hi! I think you uploaded something incredible — are you Adrian's producer?"
"We need to verify the origin of For Those Who Still Believe."
"If this is real, please reach out immediately."
Her stomach dropped.
The song.
She blinked at the screen, reading the subject lines again and again as though she could change the meaning by refusing to understand it.
They found it.
Her first instinct wasn't panic — it was denial.
No one could have found that. She'd watched him the entire time.
He hadn't touched her phone. He hadn't used the computer.
But then… she remembered the old tablet. The one she'd let him use "just to edit."
Her blood went cold.
Aura sat down slowly, the world spinning around her.
The hum of the refrigerator, the faint clink of dishes in the sink — all of it faded into a quiet roar in her ears.
She opened one of the links from a message, and there it was: the song — his song — spreading across social media like fire.
Comments everywhere. Theories.
People were even talking about the coordinates.
Her coordinates.
She looked up from the screen, staring at the closed studio door down the hall.
Behind it, Adrian was asleep — or pretending to be.
His calmness these last few days suddenly made sense.
He'd done this.
Her throat tightened, rage and betrayal clawing their way up from somewhere deep, somewhere raw.
He lied to me again.
She clutched the phone so tightly her knuckles went white.
The betrayal burned hot — not because he had escaped, but because he had made her believe he didn't want to.
The thought of the world trying to take him again filled her chest with something heavy and dangerous.
"No," she whispered, voice trembling. "Not again. You won't take him from me."
She stood, every movement deliberate, her pulse pounding in her ears.
If they were coming, she'd be ready.
If he wanted freedom — she'd remind him what it cost.