Chapter 8 No.8

Chelsea ran down the stairs, her heart pounding so hard she thought it would crack a rib.

He knows. Or at least, he suspects.

That boy. Here. It was a variable she hadn't calculated. In her original timeline, she never broke the rules, never climbed to the roof. She was too busy following Brittany around. She had no idea he had been here.

What was his name? Hale. That's what the nurses had called him. A common enough name. But the way he looked at her... there was nothing common about him.

She reached the second-floor landing and leaned against the wall, gasping for air. She closed her eyes, trying to calm down.

Breathe, Chelsea. You are forty-three years old mentally. You are a trained fighter. He's just a man in his early twenties. And yet... the predatory stillness in him felt older than her own reincarnated soul. He wasn't a boy. He was a weapon in disguise.

But why was he hiding? That clinic in Switzerland catered to the children of the global elite. He wasn't some random kid. Was he in trouble?

Up on the roof, the man Chelsea knew as Hale watched the heavy iron door slam shut.

He waited a beat, then pulled a sleek, black phone from his pocket. It wasn't a standard smartphone; it was a custom prototype, encrypted military-grade tech.

He dialed a number.

"Speak," a distorted voice answered.

"I found her," he said. He walked to the edge of the roof, looking down at the students leaving the building. He spotted a figure with long brown hair hurrying toward the bus loop.

"Target confirmed?"

"Chelsea Molina. Senior. Get me everything on her. Not the school file-I want the real file. Medical history, family financials, the car crash. Everything."

"Copy that, Zero. Should we initiate protocol?"

"No," he said. He rubbed his thumb over his lower lip, remembering the way she had looked at him. There was fear, yes, but there was recognition too. And steel. She hadn't flinched when he stepped close.

"I'll handle this personally," he said. "She's... interesting."

"Understood. Zero out."

He hung up. He lit another cigarette, ignoring the school policy he was supposedly paid to enforce.

He had come to Crestview to escape the sharks in his family's boardroom, to plan his next move in the shadows. He hadn't expected to find the only person who had ever made him feel human during those dark months in Switzerland.

She lied about not knowing him.

"Good," he murmured, exhaling a plume of smoke. "I like a challenge."