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ThenITthrew her out, and the code that she understood, like she understood she and Nash needed oxygen, failed her. That landed hard. Her legs went weak. She stumbled back, bracing her hands on the bench, her vision starting to blur at the edges, the overload of what she’d witnessed blowing her mind. What was this about…stopping her from…wait…thelogs had been clean. There was nothing to indicate?—
Unless… the logs were never real to begin with. She blinked. Hard. Her thoughts stuttered, oxygen too thin now to focus. Cold to the bone and scared to death, Grace’s knees buckled. Nash reached the wall panel. Yanked the phone from its cradle.
His blank face told her the line was dead. Then his lips parted, determination filling that beloved dark gaze that saidI’m not leaving you. I’ll find a way.But all she could do was hang onto the man who had held her so closely, fought so hard against his own needs...for her. A man she'd found in a hopeless, empty place inside her. She didn't want that to end. His eyes softened, reaching out to her with a tenderness that made her gasp even harder. She had to fight, not for herself. But for them.
Oh, God. She gasped for air, trying to suck in anything that would give her the breath to figure this out. This wasalivecode,reactivecode. Code incommand. Her oxygen-starved brain tried to work her mind around this revelation. Who?Whatwere they up against? “Stop! I want to understand…” she whispered like a prayer.
Then everything snapped back. The vents whirred to life. The lights surged. Air rushed in. Grace collapsed to her knees, gasping, her fingers clawing at nothing. Nash was there before she hit the floor.
He caught her, crouched beside her, and pulled her forward. His hand cradled the back of her neck, the other pressed gently to her spine. A sob of relief wedged in Grace’s throat, and she swallowed hard against it, refusing to allow herself the luxury of falling apart. They were safe, and she had no idea if it had been her words whispered into the cold room or the system’s override that had saved them.
“Breathe with me,” he said, low and steady. “Come on, Harlan. In through your nose. Follow me. Ready? In. One, two. Out. One, two.”
Her head dropped forward, forehead nested against his strong shoulder. She sucked in air, shallow and sharp, but it came, his chest a solid resting place. That familiar scent grounding her again, leather, heat, the steady thrum of himstill breathing.
“There’s something alive in there,” she whispered, voice cracking. “I felt it. The pushback, like the code was giving me the finger.”
“What are you saying? Oxygen depletion can make you think strange-assed shit, Grace. It was just another malfunction, maybe for real.”
Her chest still burned, and she took a deep breath, now second-guessing herself as the air flowed in and out of her. “I guess you would know about that. Wouldn’t you?” Her breathing shuddered, mostly from relief, the sweet taste of oxygen and Nash.
“Trust me. I’ve been through it many times. Just take slow, even breaths.”
She shivered from the uncertainty, trying to process, trying to think. She knew what she saw. That had been real. Hadn’t it? The system had tried to kill them.
The ghost in the machine?
The realization opened up inside her the moment the oxygen dropped and her body couldn’t keep up. The panic had come fast. The old reflex had kicked in faster.Fix it. Prove it. Don’t need him.
But she had wanted to need him. Their connection…that wasn’t something she’d made up. It was there, still humming in her body, her heart.
He’d been there. No hesitation. No distance. Just Nash, grounded, steady, breathing her back to herself like he’d known exactly how to hold her without taking anything away.
She hated that her first thought hadn’t been about them dying. It had been about failing. Not just herself, but him. She never wanted to fail him.
Failing to see it. Failing to stop it. Failing to be fast enough, smart enough,usefulenough.
The console hadn’t responded. The code hadn’t saved her.IThad, and that terrified her.
He would have died with her. That look said it all. That selfless part of him wasn’t something the Navy trained in him. It was part of him like his black hair, his smoldering eyes, that delicious tension. But even now, even after everything, after the quiet warmth that had started blooming between them, after the way he looked at her like she wasn’t broken, she still didn’t know if she was enough without her brilliance leading the charge.
She kept her head down. Focused on the rhythm of her breathing, syncing it to his. Nash hadn’t said anything in the last minute, hadn’t moved away, hadn’t let go.
God, some part of her wanted to stay in that moment, juststay.
But the other part? The one that remembered what it felt like to be left behind, reassigned, erased? That part saidDon’t relax.Don’t need. Don’t trust. But it was quieter than it used to be. For the first time in a long time… Grace didn’t shut it down by default. She just listened. To both voices. Somewhere in the silence between them, she knew a choice had to be made, and would she make the right one when it counted?
This puzzle, this enigma? Did it have something to do with everything that had happened to her, Nash, all those supposed malfunctions? Or was it hallucination, a figment of her active mind?
The room was quiet again, but this time, Grace heard it differently. Had the system malfunctioned? HadITbeen in control?HadITwaited and chosen to show her something?
Not becauseITwanted them dead, becauseITwanted themgone.
Well, fuckIT. Furious, she glanced at the console as Nash helped her up and they headed for the exit. Her anger was as cold as the room, stark, like ice inside her. The system was supposed to serve them, not the other way around, and come hell or high water, Grace was going to get her answers, now with even more questions, but she wasn’t going anywhere.
* * *
Nash propelledGrace out of OrdoTech with one stop only to gather their things. She was still shaken, the tightness in her body, her mouth, the white brackets in the corners of her eyes, and the shaking. The shaking made him want to kill someone. The terror in those deep green eyes made him want to bring the world down around her feet.