Chapter 24 · He Remembers Every Run

"You chose wrong."

Cade's voice hit me from behind before the lights finished flickering back. I spun, pulse hammering against my ribs. He stood three feet away, perfectly still in the server room's cold glow. Not vanished. Not locked out.

Right here.

"You disappeared," I said. My hand found the edge of the console. "The system—"

"The system lied." He took one step closer. "Like Ethan's been lying. Like I've been lying."

I pressed back against the metal. "What the hell does that mean?"

"It means I didn't disappear. I let you think I did." His eyes stayed on mine, flat and cold. "Because you needed to see what choosing him would do."

"You let me—" My breath caught. "You manipulated the interface."

"I am the interface." He said it like he was telling me the weather. "Not the lock. Not a failsafe. I'm the operating core. Every reset runs through me."

The room felt too small. Too cold. "Ethan said you were cleared. That you didn't remember—"

"Ethan said a lot of things." Cade's jaw tightened. "Want to know what he didn't say? That he built the reset protocol to loop until you picked him.