Page 27 of Code Name: Hunter (Club Opus Noir #2)

VIVIAN

T he dirt track winds away from the cache, hugging the slope as pine boughs slap at our shoulders and twigs snap underfoot.

Each step dislodges loose stones that skitter downhill, the incline pulling at already -tired muscles.

The sharp scent of sap and damp stone clings to the cool air, shadows stretching long across the path.

A low night wind threads through the trees, carrying the faint creak of boughs overhead.

The air is cool enough to sting the tips of my ears, each breath a reminder of how far we are from safety.

Only the occasional spill of moonlight cuts through the canopy, lighting the uneven ground that demands all my focus.

Logan’s boots drag slightly, the weight of each step heavier than the last. Cold air bites into my lungs, each inhale tasting faintly of pine and damp soil.

The path is slick in places; the earth giving underfoot.

I adjust my pace to match his, slipping an arm around his waist when the incline grows steep, feeling the solid heat of him even through the layers.

Logan leans into me just slightly, his breathing measured but heavier than he wants to admit.

His jaw works in a tight grind, a muscle ticking at the hinge.

The rhythm of his steps stutters every few paces, and the heat radiating through his jacket feels unnatural.

After what feels like miles of bone--tired trekking, the path narrows before spitting us out into a clearing where a battered utility shed crouches beside a tarp--covered shape.

“Backup vehicle,” Logan says, voice rough. He’s too steady for someone with a bullet in him.

“I drive.” I’m already stripping the tarp off the matte gray pickup. “You bleed. I steer.”

He tries to argue with my name on his tongue. I cut him off with, “Get in.” He obeys silently fuming while I belt him in.

The diesel coughs to life, and I muscle the truck along a rutted path until it spits us onto an unmarked strip of asphalt.

Fifteen minutes later, we nose up to what looks like a solid stone wall.

Logan rasps out a code; the wall splits open, and cold air spills from the opening.

It feels like stepping into the hollowed-out bones of the mountain itself—hidden, fortified, and meant for secrets no one survives knowing.

The triage safehouse is carved into the mountainside, its exterior camouflaged to vanish into the cliff. Inside, it’s all concrete and stainless steel, lit in a clean, clinical glow. Shelves hold med kits, rations, water, and tools for surviving the worst.

“On the table,” I tell him, pointing to the clear stretch of steel under the bare bulb.

I strip down to my slip, knot my hair, and glove up.

The med kit thumps beside him, revealing sterile forceps, a suture kit, gauze, tape, syringes, alcohol ampoules, antiseptic wipes, and a scalpel.

I lay each tool out in a precise line—forceps, scalpel, gauze, suture kit—my fingers brushing over the scalpel’s cold metal.

I pause, drawing in a breath, steeling myself for what I’m about to do.

My hands are steady, but my pulse pounds hard enough I can feel it in my teeth.

“Talk to me,” he says.

“Hush. I’m busy saving your life.” I cut away the soaked bandage, exposing an angry red wound.

“Stay with me. I’ve got to get the bullet out.

” I snap an alcohol ampoule, the sharp scent cutting through the metallic tang of blood.

I steady my hands, reminding myself this isn’t Prague.

This is now, and this time I refuse to lose him.

The memory of what happened in Prague is a phantom—the chilly rain, the slick grip of his hand slipping from mine as I pulled away, the echo of an explosion swallowed by the dark.

He hisses when I press the gauze to his side, muscles clenching. What I see tightens my chest—fever -flushed skin, blood soaking gauze, and his eyes steady on mine.

“On three,” I say, then take it on “one.” The bullet pings into the tray.

He growls. “What the fuck happened to three? Can’t you count, woman?”

“Didn’t want you to pull away,” I answer, showing him the blood -slick round.

“Souvenir?”

“I prefer kitschy magnets, thank you.”

I flush the wound, thread the needle, and stitch the wound while thoughts of Prague crash over me again. “I’m sorry,” I tell him—for the pain, for Prague, for doubting him.

“You’re here,” he says, the words roughened with both relief and something deeper.

“That’s all that matters.” His fingers still mine, then deliberately interlace them with his, holding on as if to make sure I believe him.

I let my fingers curl back, not just holding him, but anchoring myself to the rough strength in his grip.

When he’s wrapped and stable, I help him down from the table slowly, bracing his weight against my shoulder. He mutters something about being fine, but the stiffness in his step betrays him.

I fish through the med kit again, this time coming up with a small bottle of antibiotics and some painkillers.

“Two of each now, more in twelve hours,” I tell him, pressing the pills into his palm, giving him a swallow of water from a bottle.

He takes them without argument. I guide him across the safehouse to the narrow cot tucked in the corner, lowering him onto it as gently as I can.

He’s out in seconds. I crouch beside him, brushing hair from his forehead, my chest tight with the weight of everything we’ve risked getting here. “I’ll wake you at daybreak,” I promise quietly, more to myself than to him.

My gaze shifts to the computer on the bench. I power it up, praying it still works. The wait drags until the Cerberus login screen finally appears. I enter the codes I’d watched Logan use, memorizing them for this moment.

The dossier flares to life, sharp as a weapon.

My finger hovers over the delete key, temptation pounding in my ears.

One keystroke could erase it all, the original hard copy having been burned once we had it downloaded into the Cerberus system.

Could end the hunt, stop the bloodshed, maybe even buy us peace.

I freeze. The cost is too steep. Would it mean losing Logan? Those files could topple the cabal, save lives by exposing every secret. Yet part of me longs for it to vanish, for the burden to disappear with a single choice.

My hand shakes, caught between self-preservation and the mission. Delete it, and the mission dies. Keep it, and Logan might. Always the same choice—my heart or the ghosts we’re chasing.

The cursor pulses over the command. In my mind, the dossier dissolves. Names, faces, operations; all of them erased from history. Some would die unseen. Others might finally be free. My body remembers the slick heat of Logan’s blood, the crushing weight of holding him upright.

“Don’t.” His voice is quiet steel, but there’s a flicker of raw exhaustion in his eyes that cuts deeper than the tone. “Don’t give them what they want, Vivian. Not now, not after everything we’ve bled for this.”

“What if they only want me dead? What if they want us both dead?” The questions escape before I can stop them, heavy with the weight of every fear I’ve tried to bury. My voice is low, almost fragile, as if saying it aloud might make it true.

His voice drops into something darker, more certain, a vow edged in steel. “Then they die wanting.”

I cross to him, sinking onto the edge of the cot before curling my fingers around his hand, grounding myself in the warmth and weight of his touch.

The words are a blade, cutting clean through the tangle of fear in my chest. “I’m tired of running,” I admit, the confession pulled from somewhere raw, deeper than exhaustion, heavy with all the years and miles behind us.

"I've been doing this for four years, Logan. Four long years."

“You’re not alone anymore,” he promises.

I lock the drive away without deleting it. I slide under the blanket and thread my fingers through his. He shifts, even half-asleep, and pulls me firmly against his chest, his arm wrapping around me like he has no intention of letting go.

The steady beat of his heart thuds against my cheek, anchoring me. “Then they die wanting,” I repeat as a whisper into the warm, solid space between us, letting myself rest—for now.

When morning comes, the temptation to delete the dossier still claws at me, but I keep it buried under my ribs and off my tongue. Logan sits up slowly, catching my eye. "You’ve got that look again," he murmurs.

"What look?" I deflect, focusing on unwrapping his bandage.

"The one that says you want to do something reckless." His tone is dry, but there’s an edge to it.

I ignore that and examine the wound. "You’re healing, but we need to stay on top of it." I press two more antibiotics into his palm.

He eyes the pills as if they’re poison. "Bossy."

"Alive," I correct. "Swallow."

“That’s what every guy says when he wants a woman to choke down his cum.” He laughs at his own joke, then sighs with exaggerated drama before tossing them back with a grunt of reluctant compliance.

"Jerk," I mutter, but there’s no heat behind it. My mouth curves despite myself, the corner lifting before I can stop it.

His lips twitch. "And yet you keep me around."

"For now," I shoot back, though the truth is the thought of not having him here makes my chest ache. “Next time, I may just let you die.” I tease him.

We move through the safehouse with quiet purpose, loading ammo into packs and stuffing food and water into the pickup. As I slam the tailgate shut, he catches my gaze for a beat, as if weighing whether to ask what’s really on my mind. I deflect with a terse, “We need to move. I'm driving.”

"I'm not arguing with you," he says with a tired half--smile, gripping the doorframe for balance before easing himself slowly into the cab. "Not worth the energy."

I smirk as I get into the driver's seat. "Good boy."

The drive to the port at Bastia stretches in a long, tense silence, the low growl of the engine our only soundtrack, every mile thick with the unspoken. Street lamps and the occasional curve of coastline flash by.

Once on the ferry to Piombino, with a stop in Portoferraio, the air shifts to the salty tang of the open water.

We trade only a few clipped words, more comfortable in quiet; the wind makes the deck pitch, and each time it does, his steadying hand settles on my knee.

His touch is firm, deliberate—protective.

Every shadow on the deck feels like a set of eyes.

Nowhere to run if someone decides to make a move.

The irony isn’t lost on me that he’s the one keeping me anchored when he’s the one with a gaping hole in his side, bleeding for both of us.

Over ten hours later, when the Cerberus safehouse outside Rome finally rises into view, the weight in my chest hasn’t eased.

It appears at first like an abandoned hillside villa, its stone walls weathered and draped in ivy, roof tiles dulled to the same clay hue as the surrounding earth.

A narrow gravel drive curves up to a reinforced wooden door set deep in a shaded archway.

Security cameras hide in the eaves, their lenses barely visible. Beyond the threshold, I know we’ll find the interior stripped of any pretense of comfort—concrete floors, steel-framed doors, low ceilings that make the space feel both secure and claustrophobic.

I remove a handgun from the glove box and move through the safehouse in a practiced sweep, clearing it room by room before letting him inside.

My feet echo on the bare concrete as I check corners, sweep my gaze across shadowed recesses, and mentally mark the location of every exit.

I map where I’d force an intruder to bottleneck, where the kill zones are, and how long it would take to get Logan clear.

I clock the sight lines from windows and the angles of approach from the drive, cataloging anything we might need if trouble finds us here.

If Wolfe followed us here, I want to know every inch of ground we can use against him.

Logan has joined me and is propped in the doorway. His posture says he wants to argue he’s fine, but I can see the exhaustion in the set of his shoulders. “Bed. Now,” I tell him, steering him toward the back room.

He doesn’t fight me, and when he sinks onto the mattress, I stand there for a moment longer than I should, watching the man who’s bled for me, wondering if I can keep both him and this damned dossier safe much longer.

Once Logan is asleep, I find some clothing in the closet for both of us to change into.

They're not very fashionable, but they're better than what's left of his suit and my skin-tight dress. After a quick shower, I key in the secure comms channel for Opus Noir. Fitz’s voice crackles through, roughened by static and that unmistakable Scottish brogue.

“Report,” he demands.

“We’re in the Rome safehouse. Logan’s down—stable for now, but it was close.

He took a bullet, I pulled it out, stitched him up, and patched what I could,” I tell him, my voice brisk but steady.

I give Fitz the rundown in precise beats of last night—where it happened, how we got out, what we saw—stripping out nothing essential, knowing he’ll hear the grit in my tone even without the details I’m holding back.

There’s a beat of silence before Fitz exhales sharply. “Bloody hell. Keep him safe, lass. Both of you keep your heads down. I’ve got operatives in the area, but you’re still in the wind until we close this net.”

“You think they’ll follow us all the way here?”

“I think they’ll go as far as they have to for that dossier or your head. Which means you don’t get to relax, not for a heartbeat.”

I nod slowly, even though he can’t see it, the motion more a bracing of myself than agreement. “Understood,” I murmur, letting the word carry the weight of both acknowledgment and the unspoken resolve tightening in my chest.

“Good. I’ll be in touch when I’ve got movement on our end. And Vivian...”

“Yeah?”

“Don’t do anything daft.”

For a moment, I almost tell Fitz about how close I came to deleting the dossier. But the words stick in my throat. Instead, a humorless smile tugs at my lips, though it doesn’t quite reach my eyes.

“No promises,” I tell him, fingers hovering just above the keyboard as my gaze locks on the dossier looking back at me, the weight of its secrets pressing heavier with each breath.

The delete button is my siren. Its pull is a whisper I can almost hear, promising peace at a price I’m not sure I can pay.