A Fatal Accomplice

4.

The door swung shut behind me, as I left Jaydon's room, but my thoughts remained trapped inside with the echoes of our conversation. Lupe's image lingered, vivid and clear, until a jarring collision snapped me back to the present.

"I'm so sorry, I didn't see you....." The familiar voice said.  Time seemed to freeze as our eyes met, the intervening years melting away like morning mist. A surge of warmth flooded me, a testament to the enduring bond we shared. 

"Lupe?...." 

His face was almost unchanged from the last day I saw him, as if time had paused. The same familiar features stared back at me—every line, every detail just as I remembered. It was as though no days had passed, yet the moment felt surreal, caught between memory and reality.

The moment our eyes met, my heart skipped a beat, and the air seemed to thicken around me. It felt as though the ground had been pulled from under my feet. Grief, which had been lurking beneath the surface, suddenly surged, but something else followed—confusion, doubt. My mind raced with a whirlwind of questions.

How was this possible? How could he still be alive? Was everything I believed a lie? My thoughts spiraled. Had he somehow faked his death? How had he pulled off something so elaborate, so cruel? And more importantly, why? What had driven him to disappear, to let everyone think he was gone? I searched his  face for answers, desperate for clues, but all I found was silence.

My chest tightened as I grappled with the truth I didn't want to confront. If he was alive, if he had truly deceived everyone, then what did that make of everything I thought I knew? The world I thought was solid suddenly felt fragile, built on foundations that were crumbling beneath me.

"Hey," he said softly, his voice barely more than a whisper, as if he was afraid of being heard.

I could feel my earlier happiness drain away in an instant, replaced by a hot wave of anger that surged through my veins. My chest tightened, and before I could even think, words began pouring out of me—sharp, biting, and laced with bitterness.

"You selfish bastard!" I spat, my voice trembling with emotion. "How could you? How could you do that to everyone? To me?"

Each word felt like a knife, cutting deeper into the space between us. His face fell, but I couldn't stop myself. I was too far gone, consumed by the betrayal, by the hurt that I hadn't even known was festering until that very moment. Every ounce of trust I had in him shattered, and the pieces felt jagged, sharp enough to hurt if I held onto them any longer.

I took a shaky breath, but the fury wouldn't subside. "How could you look me in the eye and act like everything is fine? Like none of it mattered? After everything we've been through!"

He threw his hands up in a frantic gesture of defense, eyes wide with a mix of panic and desperation. "Quinn, I swear it wasn't my idea!" His voice trembled as he yelled, his words tumbling out in a rush, almost tripping over each other. His breathing was ragged, his chest heaving as if he had run miles, not just spoken. The dim light from the overhead bulb cast sharp shadows across his face, highlighting the beads of sweat that had begun to gather on his brow.

"It was all part of Jay's plan," he continued, his voice breaking slightly. "I had no choice, Quinn, you have to believe me. Jay set everything up—taking down MI6, every step of it—it was his idea from the start. I swear, I wanted to tell you!" His eyes darted to the floor for a brief moment, unable to meet Quinn's piercing gaze, before snapping back to her, pleading. He took a small, shaky step back, the fear in his voice palpable. "I just... I didn't know how to stop him."

I stood motionless, arms crossed ,my was face unreadable, the silence between us thick and suffocating.