Chapter 4 - The Dead ListThe ship was now sealed.
Nobody could leave the lower decks.
Nobody could enter.
The captain announced a “technical emergency.”
But I knew the truth.
Someone had taken control of the ship.
Daniel looked at the screens.
“That's impossible.”
I walked toward him.
“No.”
He looked at me.
“This is exactly what Blackfall was designed to do.”
A communications network.
Emergency systems.
Shipboard infrastructure.
Surveillance.
Blackfall wasn't a weapon.
It was a method.
A way of disappearing people without leaving a battlefield behind.
Daniel's expression changed.
“You were trained for this.”
“I was one of the people who built it.”
The words tasted like poison.
He stared.
“Why did you leave?”
“Because I discovered what they were really using it for.”
“For assassinations?”
“Worse.”
I turned toward the casino.
“Erasure.”
People didn't merely disappear.
They were erased.
Identity.
Financial records.
Travel history.
Medical files.
Every trace.
A living person could become administratively dead within minutes.
And once the world believed you were dead, nobody came looking.
Daniel pulled out a tablet.
A classified database opened.
“Then explain this.”
He showed me a list.
Twenty-six names.
Twenty-six women.
All reported missing.
All married within six months before disappearing.
I scrolled.
Lauren Hale.
Sarah Mercer.
Nadia Price.
My finger stopped.
The last name.
Emily Cross.
I looked at Daniel.
“Who is Emily?”
He shook his head.
“That isn't your husband's sister.”
“Then who?”
He zoomed in.
My stomach turned.
It was me.
My photograph.
My maiden name.
The system had a second identity prepared for me.
Emily Cross.
Created eight years before I met Ethan.
“That's impossible.”
Daniel stared at me.
“Apparently, your marriage was scheduled before you met your husband.”
A noise came from behind us.
A chair scraped across the floor.
Everyone turned.
An elderly passenger stood slowly.
He had been sitting alone at the bar.
He smiled.
“You finally figured it out.”
Daniel drew his gun.
“Hands where I can see them.”
The man ignored him.
He looked at me.
“Your husband didn't choose you.”
My throat tightened.
“He was assigned to you.”
“By whom?”
The man's smile faded.
“By your father.”
My world stopped.
“My father died when I was sixteen.”
“No.”
The man shook his head.
“Your father disappeared.”
Daniel grabbed the man's collar.
“Who are you?”
The man whispered something in his ear.
Daniel suddenly released him.
His face had gone pale.
“What did he say?”
Daniel didn't answer.
The elderly man took a small key from his pocket and placed it in my hand.
“Locker 31.”
“Where?”
“Engine room.”
Then he smiled.
“One more thing.”
“What?”
He leaned closer.
“Ethan knows your father is alive.”
The man collapsed.
Dead.
No poison bottle.
No visible wound.
Just dead.
Daniel stared at him.
I stared at the key.
Then my phone vibrated.
A message.
Unknown number.
LOCKER 31. COME ALONE.
A second message followed.
BRING THE WOMAN WHO WAS SUPPOSED TO BE YOU.
I looked up.
Across the casino, Lauren was gone.
May you like
Again.
And this time, someone had left a trail of blood leading toward the engine room.
