He Didn’t Kidnap Me. Not Exactly novel Chapter 324

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d to find her looking at Aria, who slowly lifted her head at the sound, eyes red and swollen, sniffing

“Come to me, dear.”

Confusion flooded through me so fast i couldn’t hold it in. “But Mom-

‘She’s confused, Daisy, my mother said, cutting me off gently.

I stared, still tense, still completely lost, as Aria rose on shaking legs and started toward her.

“She might be tagged the enemy,” my mother continued, “but let me speak to her. She saved us in that restraining room. That was real. I could tell.”

Aria reached her, hesitant, tears still falling, studying my mother’s face like she expected the warmth there to vanish at any second.

It didn’t.

My mother pulled her in, one arm settling over her shoulder.

“What’s your name, dear?”

Aria. Her ice cracked. “My name is Aria, ma.”

“Call me mother.”

She said it so gently, so simply, that it took my brain several full seconds to catch up to what I’d just heard.

I had absolutely no idea what to make of any of it.

We moved as a group now

search of a way out.

me and my mother supporting DeLuca between us, Aria walking close at our side, all of us pushing through the hallways in

I still didn’t know what to make of Aria bombing with us but then I was distracted from that as we moved.

My mother had already shot two people since we left that room. Casually. Efficiently. Like flicking off a light switch. Aria carried a gun too, and so did DeLuca, despite barely being able to keep his footing, but it was my mother doing the actual work, dropping threats without so much as a change in her

breathing.

I was supposed to be losing my mind over that.

I filed it away instead, next to everything else tonight had handed me that I didn’t have room to process yet. There’d be time for a full meltdown about my mother a secret assassin skill set later. Right now, survival came first.

Volkow was dead That fact hadn’t slowed down the rest of his organization even slightly–gunfire still cracked somewhere in the distance, proof the fight raged on even without him at the center of it, pust quieter now, more scattered.

Which was, honestly, the maller problem

bas no sons, the survivor said.

That’s- The hoarse man’s voice cracked with disbelief. That’s terrible. No children at all? What happens to his bloodline? Everything he bust, just gone?

“I didn’t say he has no children,” the survivor said. “I said no sons.”

The hoarse man’s voice sharpened. “What are you saying?”

“He has a daughter.”

My pulse spiked so hard I heard it in my own ears.

“A daughter is still his blood.” The hoarse man’s eyes swept the group until his finger landed, unmistakably, on Aria. “Where is she?”

He studied her for a long moment, something clicking into place behind his eyes, and I held my breath without deciding to.

I know her. His tone shifted, half recognition, half disdain. “The black sheep. The one who’s spent years soiling her father’s name, proving herself unworthy of it. We all know her. A pause, softer. “Still. She’s young. Mistakes can be forgiven, or at least worked through. As long as Volkov’s blood runs in her, she

qualifies.

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