Page 16 of Fractured Loyalties (Tainted Souls #2)

I wake before the sun, like always. Her breath is soft and steady in front of me, the rhythm faint but certain. I’m behind her, both of us curled toward the same direction, my body not quite touching hers, but close. So close I can feel her warmth even through the space between us.

She reached for me at some point, in the early hours.

Not with desperation. Not with need.

Just with calm.

Her hand, light on my forearm. Her skin against mine. No demands. No fear.

I almost pulled away. Three separate times, I told myself to leave the room, the bed, her heat, the entire fucking coastline if I had to.

I almost told myself it was too much, too soon—that the quiet between us could snap if I stayed.

But I didn’t.

I stayed because just before she fell asleep, she said nothing. And I heard everything.

Because when she rested her hand there and I covered it, it felt like neither of us was asking for more.

Just less fear.

And that felt like more than I deserve.

Now, the edge of morning tries to press through the curtains. The ocean grumbles below us, a slow and shifting tide.

I lie there too long.

Then I ease out of bed.

I ease out of the bed without waking her. She exhales, turns slightly, curling into the space I just left. My shirt slips off her shoulder as she moves, exposing a line of skin that burns into my memory before I make myself look away.

My steps down the hall are silent. The kettle is already halfway full. I click it on without thinking. My hands move like they’re tracing muscle memory—check the locks, glance at the monitors, verify the outside sensors.

Routine. Structure. Anchor points. The shape of my morning hasn’t changed in five years.

Except now the scent in the hallway isn’t just cedar and steel and old leather. It’s her. Something warm and clean and wrong in a way I can’t name.

The kettle shrieks. I shut it off.

I try to drink the tea, but it tastes like a lie. I pour it out.

There’s a file on my desk waiting for me—printouts from Lydia, preliminary cross-checks on Caleb’s newest burner number. I open it, but the words don’t register.

Because I keep seeing the curve of her back. The way she said not yet. Like she wasn’t afraid of me, just of rushing something real.

I run both hands through my hair and sit.

It’s going to be a long morning.

And the worst part is—for the first time in a long time—I don’t want it to end.

I hear her before I see her. Bare feet on polished wood, the faint rustle of fabric brushing skin. She doesn’t call out. Doesn’t ask where I am.

Mara appears in the doorway like a ghost who knows she belongs here. One of my old black hoodies hangs off her frame, sleeves pushed up, her collarbone sharp and exposed. Her hair is sleep-creased, and she blinks like the light is too honest.

She doesn’t smile, but her face softens when she sees me.

“Didn’t think you’d still be here,” she says, voice quiet.

“This is one of the houses I live in.”

“You know what I mean.”

I nod once. She pads into the kitchen. Opens the cabinet without asking, finds a clean mug, pours what’s left of the tea I didn’t finish making.

“You made this for me?”

I glance over. “I tried.”

She sips it. Grimaces. “You make terrible tea.”

“That’s not news.”

We fall into silence that isn’t heavy. Just full.

Then she leans against the counter and watches me. “You didn’t sleep.”

“I did. Sort of.”

“You were awake when I touched you.”

“Yes.”

“Why didn’t you move?”

I look at her for a long time. “Because I didn’t want to change the weight of the room.”

Her brow furrows slightly, but she doesn’t look away.

“I’ve lived in rooms where silence meant danger. You don’t flinch in silence,” she says.

“I flinch in noise.”

That makes her smile. Barely.

“Do you always get up this early?”

“Yes.”

“To check the locks?”

“To remind myself what I can control.”

She nods like she understands. Like she’s built her own rituals on softer mornings.

She sets the mug down and walks toward me. I don’t move. Her fingers graze the edge of the desk, the papers I still haven’t touched.

“Work?” she asks.

“Noise,” I say. “Disguised as purpose.”

She hums. “You’re good at that.”

“Pretending to be fine?”

“No,” she says. “Holding the edges of a thing without squeezing it to death.”

I watch her. The way she looks at me, like she’s not measuring me against anything else. Like she just sees me. And it does something sharp behind my ribs.

She tilts her head. “Will you show me what’s in the file?”

I hesitate.

Not because I’m hiding. But because letting her see that part of me—work, strategy, calculation—it’s not soft. It’s real. And it’s ugly.

But I nod. “Okay.”

I open the file and tap the touchpad. The screen lights up, and Mara leans in, her arms crossed, the fabric of my hoodie shifting with the motion.

The screen is full of her.

Photos. Location timestamps. Clinic schedules. Side profiles from street cams. One of her under a flickering streetlight, face turned away, shoulders hunched against the wind.

She doesn’t speak. Just clicks one.

“That’s the night after the staff meeting,” she says.

“You were late leaving. You took a different route home.”

“I was avoiding Alec. I didn’t want to talk about Caleb.”

“You didn’t see the car across the street.”

Her throat works. “Caleb?”

I nod once.

She moves to the next. Another day. A blur of movement caught in the reflection of a café window. She clicks a few more.

“You watched me through these,” she says. “Not all in real time. Some you pulled after the fact. Right?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

I close the folder. Her head snaps toward me, but I don’t explain yet. I just stand. Walk slowly toward the glass doors leading to the deck.

She doesn’t follow.

“I wanted to know the shape of you,” I say. “Not just what you said. Or did. But how you moved. How you folded in on yourself when you walked alone. How you never once looked over your shoulder, even when you should have.”

She steps closer. Still behind me. Close enough for me to feel it.

“I wanted to be the man who knew the difference between your fear and your fatigue. Who could look at a grainy still and say, no—she’s not tired. She’s bracing.”

She speaks quietly. “And you needed pictures for that?”

“I needed everything.”

The silence that follows isn’t judgment. It’s weight.

Then she says, “You’ve memorized more of me than I’ve ever looked at myself.”

I turn to face her.

Her eyes meet mine, not flinching.

“I don’t know if that makes me feel exposed,” she says, “or understood.”

“Both.”

And I don’t ask for forgiveness.

Because I wouldn’t give it back.

She doesn’t look away.

So I don’t either.

Her arms are still crossed, but something about her stance softens. She leans a shoulder against the glass, eyes flicking down like she’s trying to place herself inside the versions I’ve captured.

“How long?” she asks.

I know what she means.

“For almost six months now. Since the day I saw you sitting alone on that bench.”

She blinks once. “That long?”

“I didn’t plan it that way.”

“But you didn’t stop either.”

“No.”

She uncrosses her arms. “You ever think maybe watching me was a way to keep me at a distance?”

“Every day.”

She walks toward me, her fingers trailing along the edge of the desk again. She stops a breath away.

“What do you see now?” she asks.

My answer is immediate. “Someone who should be burning. But still chooses to stay lit.”

Her mouth pulls at the corner, not quite a smile. “You always talk like you’re bleeding poetry.”

“I don’t bleed. I leak control.”

Mara stares at me for a second too long. Then her phone vibrates in the hoodie pocket. She flinches like she forgot it existed.

She pulls it out. The screen flashes: Celeste.

I watch her face tighten. Her lips press together.

“You should answer,” I say.

She nods slowly. Doesn’t move.

Then she answers with a clipped, “Hey.”

A pause. I can hear Celeste’s voice faintly through the line, fast and tight.

“No, I’m okay. I just stayed with a friend.” Another pause. “Yeah. I’ll be back at the clinic before noon.” She hangs up and exhales through her nose. “She was worried.”

“She should be.”

Mara gives me a look that isn’t quite amused. “You’re not jealous of her, are you?”

“No,” I say simply. “She hasn’t seen the file.”

Her breath catches at that.

Then she says, “If she did, she’d probably kill you.”

“She’d try.”

And she laughs, just once. But it’s real.

The sound leaves a mark. I can feel it like a fingerprint pressed to the inside of my chest.

She looks down, then back up. “Can you drop me off at the clinic?”

“I was going to insist on it.”

I see the brief flare of something in her eyes—defiance maybe—but it doesn’t last.

Ten minutes later, she’s dressed, her hair pulled into a quick knot, her mouth glossed but unsmiling.

My hoodie has been traded for a long black cardigan, another of my clothes that I left for her in the room.

It doesn’t hide the small bruise at the base of her neck. She doesn’t cover it. I say nothing.

The car ride is quiet, but not cold. She turns toward the window, and I let her keep the silence.

“You going to walk me in?” she asks when we pull up.

“No.”

She lifts a brow.

“I’ll give you the dignity of distance. But I’ll be watching.”

She smirks. “Of course you will.”

She opens the door and steps out, the wind tossing strands of her hair sideways. Her stride is confident. Efficient. I don’t realize I’m gripping the steering wheel until she reaches the door, turns once, and looks directly at the car. Not waving. Just…aware.

Inside, she’s swallowed by the building.

I decide to wait a while before heading to the office—I've been away too long, but right now, I need to make sure everything is steady here before I leave her behind.

I park further down the block and kill the engine. From this angle, I can see the front entrance and activities inside around the front desk.

A text from Lydia pings across my screen: New burner trace on Caleb. You’ll want to see this.

I reply: Not now.

Then I wait.

Twenty-three minutes later, Mara reappears at the front desk.

A nurse says something, and Mara’s smile is practiced.

Celeste emerges from the side hall, leans in too close, and touches Mara’s arm.

Her eyes scan her face the way trained counselors do when they’re trying not to sound clinical.

Mara pulls back slightly, but keeps her expression even.

Then she disappears down the hallway toward her office.

That’s when my jaw tightens.

Because I see it—a man outside, loitering a few doors down from the clinic, feigning interest in a flower box that hasn’t seen real care in months. Hands in his pockets. Ballcap low. Clean shoes. The posture’s all wrong for this neighborhood.

I take a photo and zoom. No obvious weapon. No phone. Just stillness.

He isn’t watching the door.

He’s watching the window above it.

Mara’s window.

I start the engine. I’m not going anywhere. But the engine needs to know I’m ready.

I stay in the car, eyes on him. He doesn’t move. Doesn’t flinch. People pass by, and he barely pretends to notice. Whoever he is, he’s not a local.

I run a cross-check through facial recognition software—grainy at this distance, but good enough to flag movement profiles. Nothing concrete. No ID. Just a ghost with legs.

So I get out.

The air has shifted. The kind of shift I feel in my spine before a storm. I walk slowly. Deliberate. I don’t go straight to him. I loop around, keep distance, circle like I’m just another stranger passing through.

He sees me. I know he does. I also know the exact moment he realizes I’ve clocked him.

He turns casually, starts down the block like he’s just decided he forgot something.

I fall in.

Not too close. Not too far.

He keeps his hands in his pockets. Doesn’t look back. But his pace stutters twice—he’s checking reflections.

At the mouth of an alley, he turns in. Not hurried. Just enough to bait me.

I follow.

He waits in the narrow space between two buildings, graffiti slick on wet brick. Still calm.

I stop three paces out.

“Why that window?” I ask.

He shrugs. “It’s the only one with the light off.”

Bullshit.

He’s young. Maybe mid-twenties. Thin, wiry. Face too clean for someone loitering.

“You waiting on someone?”

He grins, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. “Maybe.”

Then he shifts. And I see it—the sleeve of his jacket riding up just enough to show the ink on his wrist.

A red triangle inside a circle. Rough. Fresh.

Caleb’s mark.

I move.

Fast. Controlled. My hand on his shoulder, spinning him to the wall.

He slams into it, breath knocked out, and I press just hard enough to remind him he’s not the one in control here.

“Where is he?” I ask.

He laughs. Dry. “Closer than you think.”

I tighten my grip.

He hisses, then grins again. “You’re not the only one who watches.”

That’s when I hear it.

A soft click behind me.

I release him, pivot hard—nothing there.

But now he’s gone.

The alley is empty. Only my pulse remains.

And the memory.