The penthouse was empty when I walked in. No jacket slung over the armchair. No whiskey poured and left on the bar. No Luca.


    Just silence. That was four hours ago. He’s been gone for nine.


    Nine.


    I paced in front of the surveince wall, the glow from the monitors lighting the room. Cameras flipped between static hotel floors, street-level angles, and the casino vault entrance, but none of them showed him.


    My brother. My twin. The only fucking person who wasn’t allowed to vanish.


    I checked his location again. Still fucking nk. No ping. No trace.


    I mmed my palm t against the edge of the desk, hard enough to rattle the panel.


    “This doesn’t make sense.”


    Troy, one of our techs, flinched. “Sir, we…he might’ve gone dark on purpose. Maybe the signal?—”


    “He doesn’t go dark without telling me.” My voice cut sharp, “And you don’t offer theories. You get me answers.”


    Troy nodded too fast. “I’ve rerouted the ping tower. Triple-checked the IP traces. He’s not at the penthouse, the Orpheum. Not on any Crow-owned grid.”


    Not on any grid we control.


    My fingers flexed against the surveince desk. He’d shut me out.


    Luca.


    The one person who was supposed to bleed when I did. Who’d built this empire at my side with code, silence, and obsession.


    And now he was gone.


    Without a word.


    I pulled up the timeline again. Last verified sighting: 6:11 p.m. at the Orpheum event. East corridor. He never checked out. Never came home. Didn’t even tripped the motion lock on our door.


    Something happened.


    My throat tightened.


    I picked up my phone again and texted him for the twelfth time.


    [3:34 a.m.]


    Where the fuck are you.


    No read receipt. No delivery.


    I turned to the wall and kicked the metal door behind me, the sound echoing.


    Troy startled. “We’re still running heat map oveys. I’m trying?—”


    “Try harder,” I snapped. “Try fucking harder, or I’ll tear every building in Viin apart myself.”


    I didn’t breathe for a moment. Just stood there, ring at a city that we owned and somehow, it had taken my twin with no trace.


    Then I exhaled hard and forced my hands t on the table.


    I’d spent three years managing every risk, dynasty threat, vtile fucking deal Luca dropped the second it got too emotional.


    I took the weight.


    That was the deal.


    He spiraled. I cleaned.


    I broke. He carried.


    But now he was gone….and I didn’t know if he was hurt, dead, bleeding, or doing something so reckless it would bring the entire Crow Dynasty to its knees.


    And the worst part?


    I felt it.


    In the way the hours dragged, the silence where his voice should’ve been. The fucking hollowness of the room we’d built to watch the world together.


    He should’vee home.


    He always came home.


    Even when bloodied, spiralling, even if the whole city was burning and he’d set the match himself, Luca always came home.


    But not tonight. Nine fucking hours. While I was down in the tunnels, my twin disappeared. My hand was still braced against the console when my phone buzzed.


    ROME: Nothing. No one’s seen him. Checked the back alleys & the underground passages. Orpheum roof. Nothing.


    I read the words and didn’t move. My fingers stayed numb, gripping ss like it was a weapon I couldn’t throw.


    ROME: He turned off his chip. He doesn’t want to be found.


    The words sliced deeper than they should’ve. I mmed my palm into the desk again, this time harder.


    “Troy,” I said. My voice came out wrong. “I need ten minutes.”


    “But sir?—”


    “Get out.”


    Troy grabbed hisptop. The others didn’t even argue. They cleared the floor like I was about to explode. Because I fucking was.


    The second the door shut behind them, I paced. Hard. Sharp turns. Jaw clenched so tight I could taste blood from grinding my teeth.


    Why would he disappear like this?


    Why would he leave me alone?


    My chest was getting tighter. I couldn’t breathe. Like something was caving in.


    The lights above flickered. Just once. Barely a second. But it made my skin crawl.


    Suddenly, I was back there.


    Back in the dark. In that fucking cage.


    No.


    My fists mmed into the wall, once, twice, then a third time until something cracked in my knuckle. I didn’t stop.


    Luca screaming through metal. His pain. The burn of the cor as I screamed for him, to stop.


    Grabbing his hand.


    Curled in the corner, trying not to cry. Not to set the cor off again.


    My breath hitched.


    I can’t feel him.


    That was the worst part.


    I couldn’t feel him.


    His cold controlled anger humming next to mine. Or him spiralling and needing me to reel him back. Fuck. I couldn’t even feel the pressure behind my eyes I always got when he was in pain.


    Nothing.


    Like the line between us had been cut.


    And all I could hear was, silence. Cold, cruel and loud.


    I braced both hands on the wall, forehead pressed to the cool surface like it might anchor me.


    My phone buzzed.


    Security warning.


    I smeared blood across the screen as I swiped it open.


    EMERGENCY EXIT — LEVEL 72 (CROW PENTHOUSE)


    BREACH: SOUTH HALL ACCESS DOOR


    RESPONSE TIME INITIATED: 00:18


    No.


    Either Luca triggered it… or someone hade to finish the fucking job. To take the other half.


    I didn’t remember leaving the war room. Just running. Typing the override code as I got in the elevator.


    CROW EMERGENCY OVERRIDE.


    Floor 72. Lockdown: disabled.


    The elevator jolted, doors mming shut. My hand gripped the railing. Heart in my throat. Every second dragging slow, cruel.


    If he was dead, if he was bleeding out on those floors, then I wasn’t leaving either. Let the bastard who came kill me too.


    You don’t split a soul and expect the other half to keep walking.


    The elevator stopped. Doors opened.


    The penthouse was pitch ck. Silent.


    No motion triggers. Even the climate system dead, like the whole ce had been cut off.


    I slipped a hand to my side holster. One gun. One knife. One twin.


    “Luca?”


    Every footstep echoed, too loud, like I was walking into the kind of silence that didn’t want to be broken.


    My chest locked. Then, dark red. Low across the wall by the master suite. I lowered the gun without even knowing it, fingers shaking as I stepped closer.


    Please, don’t let it be his blood.


    I turned the corner, and saw him.<fnf38e> This update is avable on Find_Novel(.</fnf38e>


    Slumped against the bed. Shirt torn open, soaked through. One hand braced on the frame, the other pressed to his ribs. His head dipped forward, too heavy to lift.


    He wasn’t unconscious. Just… stopped. Like he’d tried to get up, then decided against it.


    “Luca.”


    No answer.


    I crossed the room in seconds, dropped to my knees. “Luca, look at me. Hey.”


    His head tipped up. Eyes unfocused. But when theynded on me—reallynded—something broke.


    He shook his head faint, like he couldn’t believe I was real.


    “I didn’t think, Bas.” His voice slurred. “I didn’t fucking think.”


    My chest locked.


    His hand slid from his ribs and brushed my arm. His whole body dropped forward, slow and heavy, and I caught him before he hit the ground.


    His forehead hit my shoulder.


    “I fucked up,” he choked. “So bad. I always knew I would.”


    “Stop.” My voice cracked. “I don’t care what happened. I don’t care.”


    He didn’t answer. Didn’t look at me.


    “We handle it. Together. Like always.”


    “But what if I broke it?” His voice was quiet. “What if this time I can’t fix it?”


    “Then I’ll fix it,” I snapped. “That’s the deal. That’s always been the fucking deal.”


    He shook against me. Like he’d fought the whole world and still lost.


    I caught his hand. Laced our fingers. Pressed my other palm t against his chest, firm. Forcing him to feel.


    My hand shook, but I pressed harder. Better he feel it as strength than know how close I was to breaking.


    We’d done this since we were five. Proof we weren’t dying alone. It was survival then.


    Now it was ritual.


    His jaw clenched. For a second, I thought he’d slipped too far. Thought I’d lost him back to the dark. Then his fingers moved against mine. Weak. Shaking. But there. Just like the cages.


    Something cracked in me too. Hours cut off from him felt like the darkness all over again. His pulse under my hand proof I wasn’t walking this world without him.


    “One pulls us back,” I told him, “Always. That’s the rule. That’s the only way we made it this far.”


    His grip tightened. Eyes clearing, inch by inch.


    “If you break, I break. If you bleed, I bleed. That’s not poetry. That’s fucking fact.”


    My breathing too sharp until I forced it steady with his. “I can live with blood on my hands. I can’t live with yours. So don’t you fucking dare leave me here.”


    He dropped into me. My hand locked in his. My pulse against his chest, steady. Mine for him. His for me.


    “One pulls us back,” I whispered again, this time like a vow. “Always.”


    His shoulders eased.


    He stayed there, curled into me like the world couldn’t touch him. And for a moment, it didn’t. Because I wouldn’t let it.


    Every crack in him lived in me too. Because we weren’t two people. We never had been. We were one soul split down the middle. He hurt, I bled. I broke, he shattered. If he went down tonight, I’d follow.


    I got him to the bed. Barely. His body was all weight. The side of his shirt was soaked through. Blood everywhere.


    My hands moved fast, ripping back fabric, cataloguing damage. Gashes. Split knuckles. A slice at his ribs, clotting, not deep enough to cause this amount of blood. Shoulder out of ce. Wrists bruised.


    Which meant this blood wasn’t his.


    I swallowed hard, forced my hands steady.


    He didn’t talk. His body was here, but his head was somewhere colder. Somewhere darker.


    “Where do we have to go?” I asked, pressing a towel to his side.


    No response, his eyes unfocused and hollow.


    Back in the cage.


    “Luca.” My voice dropped, steady. I had to be the restraint tonight. “Where do we have to clean?”


    Nothing. His chest rose shallow, like he didn’t think he deserved air.


    I grabbed his hand,ced our fingers. Pressed my other palm t over his chest, firm. Forced him to feel again.


    “Look at me. You’re not in there. You’re here. With me. So answer.”


    His jaw clenched. “My car.”


    “Where else?”


    “The service lot behind the Gilded Cage.” His voice empty, in a way that scared me. “And… one of the emergency ts above Pce Noir.”


    Fuck.


    I locked it down. No reaction or judgment. Just squeezed his hand tighter.


    “Okay,” I said. That was all. I’d tear the city apart before I let him go under alone.


    We’d clean it. We’d cover it. We’d keep the Syndicate calm.


    And then I’d figure out how to drag back the part of Luca that hadn’te home tonight.