Page 29

Kabir

“You need to eat, Kabira.”

Logan’s voice didn’t carry its usual edge today. It hadn’t all week. Not with me.

Amelia’s transfer to Blackthorn Clinic had gone off without a hitch, at least technically. Ninety-eight minutes of silent dread. I hadn’t breathed the whole flight.

She didn’t even look like herself anymore.

I’d seen her the first couple of days after she was stabilized—wired up and still, a ghost of the woman I loved. Since then, I hadn’t dared step into that room. Not because I didn’t want to. But because I couldn’t.

She’d lost weight too fast. Her cheeks hollowed out, her skin almost translucent under the clinic lights.

I stared at the egg salad in front of me like it might explain how everything went to hell.

The Command Center had become my hiding place. My buffer from the world. From questions. From pity. From the guilt chewing through my spine.

Delara had taken over the White House debrief. Dylan hadn’t said a word since we brought her back, so she was left explaining what little there was to explain.

I hadn’t touched the Sentrix. Hadn’t looked at the data we risked everything to get. I couldn’t. Every time I opened my laptop, the interface loaded, and all I could see was her. Amelia—standing strong in that damned Situation Room. Alive. Whole.

And now?

Now she wasn’t either of those things.

Dr. Stacey kept using phrases like ‘be prepared’. But prepared for what?

There was no preparing for this. There was no plan for her not being here.

If she goes, I go.

It was as simple as that.

It always had been.

“Please, brother.”

Logan’s voice dipped—rougher this time. Not a command. A plea.

But I couldn’t eat. Couldn’t drink. Could barely stand upright half the time.

I glanced up at him, and the way he winced told me enough. I must look like a fucking corpse.

Of all the missions, all the firefights, all the reckless shit we’ve survived—why did it have to be this? Why her?

Why didn’t I insist we stick together? Why did I let her split off?

“Just have some juice, then,” Logan said softly.

I took the glass from him, because it was easier than resisting.

But the thoughts wouldn’t stop. They coiled tighter. Louder. Meaner.

I should’ve moved faster. I should’ve turned back sooner. Fuck—better yet, I should’ve dragged her with me. Made her stay.

“She’s not gone,” Logan said, reading my silence like a goddamn mirror. “Stop blaming yourself. You’ll spiral this way.”

“I…” My voice cracked, dry with disuse. It hurt just to speak. “I just need to redo that minute.”

Logan leaned in, his brows pulled tight. “What minute?”

I looked up, and I hated the way his concern almost broke me. His voice—so gentle, so steady—it made my chest ache.

“The minute I let her leave,” I said, the words barely making it out. Shaky. Fragile. My voice quivered like it was trying to hold itself together.

But there was no strength left in me.

Logan’s hand landed on my shoulder. Firm. Warm. But it didn’t fix anything.

He just let out a breath. Long. Defeated.

Footsteps broke through the fog in my mind, pulling my attention toward the hallway.

Kaylan.

She’d been working at the clinic ever since Operation Tantalus, overseeing Amelia’s case personally. But why was she here now? Why wasn’t she in her room?

Something tightened in my chest. Had something happened?

Panic crawled up my spine like fire licking up bone. My breathing hitched—I didn’t even realize I was shaking until Logan cupped my face between his hands, grounding me.

“Nothing’s wrong. Hey—hey, hey. Look at me.” His voice was urgent, firm. “She’s fine.”

I didn’t understand why his reaction felt so desperate—until I felt it.

The sting. The warmth.

Hot blood was dripping from my hand. My fingers had clenched around the glass so tightly I’d shattered it. I hadn’t even noticed. Shards embedded deep, crimson drops staining the pristine white marble.

Kaylan was beside me in seconds, calm and efficient. She took the glass from my hand, gently pried my fingers open, and checked the cuts. Cleaning them with a napkin.

I didn’t feel any of it.

“Is she okay?” I croaked.

Kaylan looked up, offering a soft, sad smile. “She’s fine. Stable.”

I nodded, but it didn’t really land.

“I talked to Dylan,” she continued, her tone shifting into something more resolute. “Managed to convince him to go into her room. And I’m here to do the same for you.”

Her voice was firmer now, the Kaylan I knew—the woman who didn’t leave room for argument.

“You haven’t seen her in three days, Kabira,” Logan added quietly.

The way he said my name— Kabira —felt like a punch to the chest. I should’ve told him not to, but the truth was… it made me feel like I was still tethered to something. To someone. Family.

I wasn’t about to give him that ammunition, though.

“Go see her,” Kaylan said, her hand cupping my cheek. “She’s doing better, I promise.”

I nodded, because I knew I had to. I wanted to. But it was hard—so fucking hard—to watch the person you love disappear in slow motion.

“I’ll see you later, Chaos. Let me take him.” Logan gave Kaylan a quick kiss and helped me to my feet.

“Have his hand checked,” she called out gently.

We left the Command Center in silence, heading for the clinic upstairs.

???

I heard him before I saw him.

The soft, ragged sobs. The uneven breaths pulled from lungs that weren’t built to tremble like that.

I had asked Logan to let me go alone. He’d returned to Kaylan, but not before making sure my hand was cleaned, bandaged. No stitches needed—just a warning that I’d clench too tightly again if I didn’t get my shit together.

But how could I?

Because the sound I heard now—that broken, unfamiliar sound—was Dylan.

I’d never heard him cry like this. Not even when Riley had died. That kind of grief didn’t fit a man like him. It felt wrong. Alien. Like the world had tilted sideways and hadn’t corrected itself.

How the fuck was I supposed to face him?

I had let his sister down. Let him down. And I had no way to make it right.

He didn’t hear me come in. Just stood there—towering, quiet but unraveling—by her bed. His back to me.

My gaze shifted to her. Amelia.

My Heer .

She was small. Too small beneath the sea of tubes and wires. The bandage around her forehead made her look even more fragile. I knew the cut had needed stitches, but seeing it… seeing her like this—it did something to me.

She looked gaunt. Hollow. As if the fire had been pulled out of her and left in my hands, burning me instead.

I wanted to go to her. Touch her. Beg her to wake up. But my feet… they wouldn’t move. Like the floor had swallowed them whole.

Then I heard him. Dylan.

Muttering. Barely audible. But I caught it.

A terrified whisper—like a child repeating a prayer he didn’t believe would be answered.

“There’s no 900… without…” He choked. “P-please, Amelia.”

Fuck.

I knew about their thing. Their old Bridgewood badge numbers. Dylan’s ended with 900. Amelia, 901.

His chant continued. Soft. Broken.

“No 900… no 900…”

“Dyl—”

He flinched like I’d slapped him. Turned around, and those gray eyes—the same ones I loved in her—were wrecked. Hollowed out.

He didn’t say a word. Just brushed past me, stormed out like the air was poison.

Leaving me.

With the machines humming.

Alone—with my heart quietly dying right besides hers.

???

I looked around the lounge table.

Dylan wasn’t here.

And for the first time since D.C., I had managed to sit with the entire team or what was left of it. But even now, the absence was louder than the chatter.

Amelia.

Dylan.

Zane.

The missing chairs might as well have been outlined in blood. We were all pretending things were fine. I was pretending. And I was doing a piss-poor job of it.

“What’s the status on the data?” Zarek asked, voice low but cutting through the murmur of conversation.

It took a few seconds too long for his words to register.

The data.

The Sentrix.

The entire reason I had been in that godforsaken Situation Room in the first place.

“I haven’t…” My voice cracked. I cleared my throat and tried again. “I haven’t gotten to it yet.”

Zarek gave me a nod, like he understood. But then he said the one thing that gutted me open.

“I understand. But Cipher… with Zane gone…” His voice trailed for a second, just a beat. “You’re the only tech asset we—”

“Ghost!” Logan snapped but the words were out there now. Sharp words plated with a gentle tone.

Cipher.

Asset.

Right.

Something they used. Something that bled and broke and hacked and obeyed. A title. A function. A shell.

The chair beneath me might as well have vanished. Every breath felt heavy. Every syllable he’d spoken clanged in my chest like a cold bell.

‘You’re the only tech asset we have.’

Not the man who almost died trying to save her.

Not the brother who held her blood in his hands.

Just the one who’s supposed to crack codes and bypass firewalls. The only one left.

I felt a hand on my arm. Firm. Grounding.

Kaylan.

Her grip wasn’t soft—it was a goddamn tether. I hadn’t even realized I was shaking until she stopped it. My fists were clenched under the table, tight enough that I wouldn’t have felt it if I broke my own fingers.

I was dangerously close to hurling a chair at Ghost. Maybe it wasn’t his fault. But grief didn’t give a shit about logic. And right now, I wasn’t grieving—I was drowning.

I nodded once. Sharp. Mechanical.

“On it, Ghost,” I mumbled and walked out without another word.

Behind me, I heard Leora mutter something under her breath—low and laced with venom. Aimed at Ghost, not me.

I didn’t stay to hear it.

Instead, I dragged myself back to my room.

Ours. Technically.

Amelia had—for all intents and purposes—moved in before D.C. Her things were still there. Her scent, too—faint but enough to ruin me.

How the fuck was I supposed to breathe in here?

The moment the door shut behind me, the silence screamed. I rubbed my eyes with the heels of my palms, sinking down on the bed like every bone had gone hollow.

The quiet pressed in. I glanced to the side, to the spot where she had sat once—legs crossed while naming drone propellers.

Lotus.

Orchid.

Lily.

Dahlia.

My eyes widened.

DaLia .

Fuck.

I had shit to do. I couldn’t spiral. Not yet.

I forced myself upright and reached under the bed for my hidden laptop.

I should call for an emergency meeting soon and tell them about the hit that was out for all of us.

I was waiting for the OS to boot—sliding myself into a comfortable position on the bed—when I glanced at my screen for half a second. Only to do a fucking double-take.

For a moment, I thought I was seeing things. Blinked. Leaned closer.

And then the words appeared—ghostly white against the dreaded black.

‘Found you.’