The phone vibrating in my pocket felt like a countdown to execution. I didn’t need to look. I already knew the message.

I already knew the photo that came with it—my sister, Ava, bound to a chair in some filthy basement, terror carved into her face in a way no sixteen-year-old ever should experience.

Forty-eight hours. Six hundred thousand dollars.
Or they’d send her back piece by piece.

I stood in the service alley behind Blackspire Tower, rain soaking through my thin server uniform, the cold biting into my bones. My hands trembled—not from the weather, but from the weight crushing my chest. I had sixty-three dollars to my name. A waitress. A nobody. And the men my father owed had decided my sister was the payment.

I looked up at the tower slicing through the clouds like a blade.

It belonged to one man.

Elliot Crowe.

Everyone in New York knew the name. A tech prodigy who built an empire before thirty. Brilliant. Untouchable. Then, three years ago, a crash shattered his spine—and his life. Since then, he’d sealed himself inside the tower, whispered about as cold, brilliant, and unreachable.

That was why I was here.

Security was tight, but a catering badge and a stolen tray got me through the service entrance. The elevator rose silently, opening into the penthouse—cold steel, black glass, and city lights bleeding through the windows.

He sat facing the storm, his wheelchair unmistakable.

“I didn’t order food,” he said without turning. “Explain why you’re here before I call security.”

“I’m not delivering,” I said, stepping forward. “I’m here to make a trade.”

He turned then. The magazines never captured it—how sharp his gaze was, how alive he looked despite the chair.

“A trade?” he scoffed. “What could someone like you possibly offer me?”

“Your legs.”

The air went still.

“Leave,” he said quietly. “Now.”

“I can heal you,” I said. “I can restore nerve function. Make you walk again. But my sister has been taken, and I need the ransom paid.”

He laughed—dry, hollow, bitter. “I get lunatics like you every week.”

“Test me,” I said. “One touch. If nothing happens, I walk out in cuffs.”

He studied me, skepticism battling something darker beneath the surface.

“Ten seconds,” he said finally. “Then you’re done.”

I dropped to my knees and placed my hand against his leg.

And I pushed the heat.

The energy tore through me like fire.

His body jolted violently. His leg spasmed—moved.

The glass in his hand shattered against the floor.

Silence swallowed the room.

His face drained of all color.
“What did you do?” he whispered.

“I told you,” I said softly. “I can fix you.”

Hope flared in his eyes—raw, almost feral.

“No more,” I said, forcing myself upright. “You help my sister first.”

He didn’t hesitate.

The call was made.

Minutes later, we were racing through the city in an armored SUV, rain slamming against the windows as we sped toward the docks—the territory controlled by the men who had taken Ava.

“She’s asthmatic,” I said, my voice shaking. “If they keep her damp—”

“We’ll get her,” he said flatly. “Alive.”

The gates crashed open.

Money hit the mud. Guns were raised.

Then gunfire—sharp, efficient, final.

The men fell.

And then they dragged her out.

Alive.

I ran to her, collapsing to my knees as I wrapped her in my arms. She was shaking, terrified—but breathing.

Whole.

We left the money behind and vanished into the rain.

Back at the tower, the deal resumed.

I warned him it would hurt.

“I don’t care,” he said. “Burn me.”

I poured everything I had into him.

He screamed.

I bled.

The room spun.

Then he stood.

For the first time in three years, Elliot Crowe stood on his own legs—trembling, unsteady, alive.

He collapsed forward, catching himself against me, breath ragged, eyes wild.

“You’re not leaving,” he whispered.

He kissed me.

I should have stopped him.

I didn’t.

Reality returned fast.

The power faded.

He needed more.

When I refused, he locked Ava away.

That was when I understood.

He needed me more than I needed him.

So I healed him again—but this time, I left something behind.

A knot.
A switch.

At the board meeting, cameras flashed as Elliot walked in on his own two feet. Applause erupted. Power rushed back into his hands.

Then came the betrayal.

Police flooded the room. Accusations. Evidence. A setup.

They reached for me.

I triggered the switch.

The surge ripped through the building. Windows shattered. Guards were thrown back like dolls.

Elliot collapsed.

I fell with him.

When I woke, I was in a hospital bed. Ava was safe.

Elliot came later—back in his chair.

“The surge burned it out,” he said quietly. “I can’t feel anything now.”

I started to apologize.

He stopped me.

The criminals were gone. The debt erased. Five million dollars sat untouched on the table.

He had resigned.

“I thought walking would make me whole,” he said softly. “But when you fell… I realized power was never the point.”

He took my hand.

“For the first time in years, I’m free.”

I felt a spark stir in my chest.

“Give me time,” I whispered. “We’ll try again.”

He smiled.

“I’ll wait.”