A heavy silence settled inside the abandoned warehouse they had taken refuge in after their bitter escape.
The smell of dust and rust choked the air—but it was still kinder than the scent of death they had left behind in the alley.
"How did they find me?" she whispered, touching the small cut on her cheek with trembling fingers. "The office, the street—even that alley… how did they know where I was so fast?"
The man stopped checking his gun and looked at her—his cold gaze enough to freeze the blood in her veins.
"They didn't find you, counselor… they never lost you in the first place."
She frowned, confused. "What do you mean?"
"The file…" He gestured with his chin toward the papers clutched tightly in her hands. "Do you really think a document this important would just be left by chance in a yellow envelope on your desk? Do you believe a courier made an innocent mistake with the address?"
Her eyes widened as her memory snapped back to that morning.
The file hadn't arrived with the usual mail. It had been placed directly on her desk while the secretary was on lunch break.
There was no sender's name—just a single sentence, written in shaky handwriting:
"Justice has many faces… and this is its ugliest one."
"You were chosen," he continued, stepping closer, his shadow swallowing the space around her. "Someone wanted this document to surface—and wanted you, specifically, to be the one to decode it. Maybe because you're stubborn enough not to walk away… or maybe because you're the perfect scapegoat."
"Who would do that?" she asked bitterly. "Who would throw me into the middle of this fire?"
"That's the question that will keep us alive… or get us killed trying to answer it," he said, pulling a small laptop from his bag. "But first—you need to remember. Did you notice anything unusual about the envelope? A mark? A stamp? Anything that shouldn't have been there?"
She shut her eyes tightly, forcing herself to recall every detail of that cursed envelope.
Then suddenly—
She jolted.
"The number."
"What number?" he asked sharply.
"In the corner of the last page… there was a serial number, written in ink that only shows under strong light. I thought it was just an administrative code—but it started with a reference to an old case… a case that was closed ten years ago."
For the first time, his expression changed.
The calm was gone.
He stepped toward her quickly, grabbing the file and flipping through the pages with urgency. "Which number? Show me!"
She pointed with a trembling finger to the bottom corner.
The moment he saw it—his face went pale.
"Impossible…" he whispered, barely audible. "That number… it's my father's case."
The words hit her like a shockwave.
She was no longer the only target.
Now, this stranger had a personal war buried inside those pages.