I never thought my biggest problem would be a deadline. My fifth Argylle novel is due in three days, and I’m stuck—my mother says the ending lacks authenticity, that real spies don’t win through luck. As if she’d know.

On the train to her countryside cottage, I close my eyes, rehearsing scenes. Then—gunfire. Men in black breach the carriage. I freeze, convinced this is a nightmare.

Until a man tackles me to the floor, shielding me with his body. 'Elly Conway,' he says, pressing a pistol into my hand, 'if you want to live, shoot anyone who moves.'

He’s Aidan Wilde. A real spy. And he says my books aren’t fiction—they’re intelligence reports in disguise.

Now, as we speed through the English countryside, he turns to me: 'You’ve written the next move of a terrorist cell that doesn’t exist—yet. But it will. Unless we stop it.'

I stare at him. 'Then why me?'

'Because,' he says, 'you’re not Elly Conway. You’re someone they erased. And your next chapter might be the only thing that saves us all.'