Shattered Illusions: Love, Lies, and Redemption

"Let's do it tomorrow."

Remington's voice was deep, a cigarette dangling unlit between his fingers. He was a man of discipline, rarely indulging in the habit unless under the weather. Yet, the past two months of fruitless searching had seen him reaching for the pack more often than not.

Now, with Lizetta right in front of him, he didn't want his smoking to affect her, so he had been trying to kick the habit for the past few days. But to his annoyance, what had been a casual indulgence seemed to have morphed into a full-blown addiction, stirring up an unexpected irritability within him.

Crushing the cigarette between his fingers, Remington withdrew his gaze and repeated, "Let's do it tomorrow."

Turning to enter the house, Ray ran his hands through his hair, practically on the verge of screaming.

'Remington, you said the same thing last night and the night before!'

driven to tears over the phone begging for his return,

with cameras and an alarm system, so when Remington mentioned this, Ray knew that someone was planning another wall-scaling

But Mr

She's bound to find out, and the longer you wait, the angrier shelt be!" Ray tried to reason, feeling like he was turning into a love guru

bear the thought of leaving her here,

knew that Lizetta was unlikely to willingly leave with him. Coming clean meant facing resistance or, worse, another escape. These thoughts made

deep into the night. Back in his room, he reset the surveillance and alarm systems

he didn't know was that, mere minutes after his departure, six shadows approached Lizetta's courtyard and breached it. They managed to tamper with a couple of cameras, but as one of them touched the

up abruptly, grabbing a gun before peering out. Her eyes glinted sharply as