Chapter 3 The Bait and the thread

Back in the estate, Damian Arceo stood in the library, rolling the thin gold locket between his fingers.

The photo inside had faded edges, but it was clear enough. Celina Vale he remembered her. She'd worked in the outer circles of his father's business decades ago. Quiet, beautiful, loyal. She disappeared after a scandal no one dared bring up. And now this girl, this bold stranger with her fire eyes and forged name, had come clawing into their world like it owed her something.

She had no idea what she'd walked into.

Or that she'd been watched from the moment she crossed the gate.

He turned to Lucien. "Did Sera get a hint?"

"Working on it. The ID and background were expertly forged. But we're running facial matches now. And--" Lucien handed over a USB. "Footage. Full body trace from three different cameras."

Damian raised a brow. "Three?"

"She thought she slipped past one."

He smirked. "Arrogant."

Lucien hesitated. "You want me to leak her presence to the council?"

"No." Damian pocketed the locket. "Let them think the night was clean. I'll handle her."

He wasn't angry. Not yet.

He was maybe intrigued.

In the safehouse, Lyra stood at the mirror in the bathroom, scrubbing off the remnants of makeup and dust, heart still hammering from adrenaline.

She didn't even know the man's face.

He had vanished like smoke. Helped her. Vanished again. Why?

She told herself it didn't matter. That the files mattered more.

But something about him unsettled her.

You don't just get helped in places like that.

Someone always wants something. Maybe Marco was right after all.

The envelope came in the morning, unmarked and slid neatly under the safehouse door.

Marco spotted it first, weapon drawn by instinct. No return address. No postage.

Just Lyra's fake name written in elegant cursive across the front.

Leona Velasquez.

He stared at it. "You expecting royal letters now?"

Lyra took it wordlessly, a chill crawling up her spine. She opened it slowly, fingers brushing the creamy paper inside. There was no message.

Just a photo.

Her, inside the Arceo basement. Kneeling before the file cabinet. Her hand mid-air as she reached for the ledger. The timestamp on the lower right corner read: Last night. 11:36 PM.

They had footage. They were watching.

And someone wanted her to know it.

Across the city, Damian Arceo leaned back in his office chair, watching a screen filled with freeze-frames of Lyra Vale's infiltration. He had sent the photo without a signature, without a warning because it wasn't a threat.

It was an invitation.

Let her know she was seen. Let her wonder who saw her. Let her spiral just enough to act without thinking.

People like her improvisers, drifters, con artists - they cracked under pressure when the rules changed. When the shadows looked back.

Lucien entered quietly. "We got a hint. Facial recognition came back."

Damian looked up.

"Name's Lyra Vale. No known father. Mother- Celina. Died ten years ago. Minor records of fraud, but she's been off-grid for a while."

"She's been watching us, "

Lucien crossed his arms. "Want me to bring her in?"

"No." Damian's voice was a slow cut. "She thinks she's still in control. That's the only reason she'll keep dancing."

He tapped the photo on his screen - Lyra's face frozen in motion.

"She wants something. We don't know that yet."

Lyra paced in the living room, jaw tight. Marco and Isla watched from opposite ends of the room, both tense.

"We need to disappear," Marco said. "They know what you look like. We go dark, change cities-"

"No."

Lyra turned sharply. "I'm not running. Not yet."

"This is suicide."

"No. This is something else. If they wanted me dead, I'd be dead. But they sent this," she held up the photo, "like it's a game."

Isla frowned. "Or a warning."

Lyra shook her head. "No. If they were going to warn me off, they wouldn't be this subtle. This is someone watching. Testing. Waiting for us to make a move."

She dropped into the chair, pulled out the stolen papers again. "Then let's give them one."

Later that evening, Lyra returned to the digital scans of the photos and files she'd taken. One, in particular, stood out: a photo of Benito Arceo with a child in his arms - not a public photo, not one she'd ever seen online. The woman beside him had her face turned away, but the necklace...

Her mother's necklace.

Lyra's hands trembled slightly as she zoomed in.

The file stapled behind the photo had a strange number written on the corner. A code. She couldn't decrypt it, but Isla might.

She didn't say it aloud, but something inside her cracked open: He really was my father.

But that only made the game more dangerous.

Because now she wasn't just a thief in the castle.

She was blood.

And the blood of a Mafia Boss to top it off.

Back in the Arceo estate, Damian opened his drawer and stared at the old black book Lyra had broken into. She had seen the edges of something too big for her to understand. Now, all he had to do... was let her follow the threads deeper.

He smirked, voice low. "Welcome to the family, Vale."