The single gunshot echoed across the Thames River, slicing through the midnight fog like a blade. I squeezed my eyes shut, expecting the cold bite of a bullet, but instead, I felt David's grip tighten around me.
On the pier, the woman who claimed to be my mother gasped. One of the men beside her slumped to the ground, his weapon clattering against the wood. The shot had come from the boat—a warning from the darkness.
"Don't listen to her, Zoya!" David's voice was a low snarl, his eyes never leaving the woman in the grey suit. "She's not here to save you. She's here to reclaim her property."
"Property?" I managed to choke out, my brain reeling from the word 'brother'. "She said I'm her daughter. She said you're my..." I couldn't even finish the sentence. The word felt like poison in my mouth.
The woman laughed, a cold, metallic sound that sent shivers down my spine. "David always was a romantic, wasn't he? He'd rather you believe he's a monster who built a lover out of a corpse than admit the truth. You aren't just Eleanor's copy, Zoya. You are the key to the Blackwood Inheritance. Your father, Arthur, hid you away because he knew my son would eventually become obsessed with the very thing that destroyed our family."
She stepped forward, the moonlight catching the diamond pin on her lapel. "He isn't your brother, Zoya. But he is the man who watched Eleanor die and did nothing. He's using your face to soothe his own guilt."
David pulled me toward the edge of the pier, his movements desperate. "She's lying! Everything out of her mouth is a poison designed to tear you away from me! I created this world for us, Zoya! I kept you safe while they were hunting you like an animal!"
Suddenly, another explosion rocked the tunnel behind us. The Watchers were closing in. The air was thick with the smell of smoke, gasoline, and old blood.
"Jump," David commanded, pointing toward the boat.
"No!" I screamed, pulling back. "I don't know who to trust! You're both keeping secrets! If you're not my brother, then show me the truth! Show me why Eleanor died!"
David stopped. For a split second, the predator in his eyes vanished, replaced by a raw, agonizing vulnerability. He reached into his coat and pulled out a small, glass vial filled with a glowing amber liquid—the same liquid from the stone coffin.
"You want the truth?" he whispered, his face inches from mine. "The truth is that you are the only thing in this world that is real to me. Sister, muse, stranger—it doesn't matter. I will burn the world to keep you breathing."
Before I could react, he shoved me toward the boat just as a hail of bullets sprayed the pier. David didn't jump with me. He turned back toward his mother and the gunmen, a wicked, sacrificial smile on his face.
"David, no!" I yelled as the boat's engine roared to life.
The figure on the boat—a masked man I didn't recognize—grabbed me by the waist, pulling me into the cabin. "Stay down if you want to live!" he barked in a thick Eastern European accent.
As the boat sped away into the fog of the river, I looked back at the pier. In the distance, I saw David standing amidst the chaos, a dark silhouette against the fire. He wasn't running. He was fighting like a man who had already decided he was dead.
I collapsed onto the floor of the boat, clutching the sketchbook to my chest. My mind was a whirlwind of fire and ice. If David wasn't my brother, then why did his mother lie? And who was the man driving the boat?
I turned the final page of the sketchbook, and there, hidden in a secret flap I hadn't seen before, was a handwritten note from my father:
"Zoya, if you are reading this, David has found you. Do not believe his lies, but do not trust his mother either. You are not a clone. You are the original. Eleanor never died. She was stolen."
My breath hitched. If Eleanor never died... then who was in the coffin?
I looked up at the masked man steering the boat. "Who are you?" I demanded, my voice trembling.
The man slowly removed his mask, revealing a face scarred by fire but strangely familiar. He looked at me through the rearview mirror, his eyes filled with a terrifying recognition.
"I'm the one who started the fire at BlackwoodManor twenty years ago," he whispered. "And I'm the only one who knows that you aren't Zoya or Eleanor. You're the reason they both had to disappear."
The boat hit a wave, and the world tilted. Ahead of us, the lights of London Bridge loomed like a cage.
[To be continued in Chapter 7...]