The tears come anyway, sliding down my cheeks before I can stop them. I wipe them away with the back of my hand, embarrassed and grateful in equal measure.
"Come on," Will says. "I'll take you home."
We walk back through The Forge in silence, past the private rooms and up the stairs and through the main floor with its elegant equipment and careful lighting. Everything looks different now. Less like a museum and more like a promise.
We step out the back door of the Ironside into the night air, cool and damp, carrying the smell of the ocean from two miles west.
"I'll walk you home," Will says. It's not a question.
We take the same quiet streets we walked the night we talked on the dock, our footsteps the only sound in the sleeping town. He keeps that careful distance, still not touching me even though I can feel how much he wants to.
At Cole's porch, I turn to face him.
"Thank you," I say. "For letting me see what it's supposed to look like."
"Always."
He waits until I'm inside, until the lock clicks, before I hear his footsteps retreat down the walk.
I lean against the door in the dark, letting my heart slow.
I crossed a line tonight. Not with Will—with myself. I let myself want something without waiting for permission.
I'm not ready to act on it. I don't know if I'll ever be ready, or if the damage Craig did will keep me frozen forever, too scared to reach for something real because I couldn't tell the difference before.
But for the first time since I left Seattle, I want to try. I want to believe that maybe I don't have to bleed for it.
Will said he'd wait. And I'm starting to believe him.
The house is dark. Cole's bedroom door is closed, a line of light visible underneath. He's awake. Probably wondering where I've been, why I stayed out so late on a Monday night.
I owe him answers. Will made it clear that if this goes anywhere, Cole needs to know.
But not tonight. Tonight I need to sit with what happened, to let it settle in my bones.
I climb the stairs to the guest room, close the door, and lean against it.
My phone buzzes on the nightstand. A text from an unknown number, the area code unfamiliar.
I pick it up, read the message.
I know where you are. Did you really think you could hide from me?
My hands go cold. The room shrinks.
Craig. He found a new number. He found a way through.
9
WILL
The background check on Craig Burns comes back on Tuesday morning, and I have to leave the office before I put my fist through the wall.
I've been keeping my distance, keeping my eye on Gemma, pretending I don't notice the shadows under her eyes, waiting for her to process everything that happened between us. She's been quiet, thoughtful, working through something internal that I'm not privy to. I've given her space because that's what she needs, even when every instinct screams at me to pull her close and keep her there.
The text from Craig changed something. She showed it to Cole the next morning, and Cole brought it to me, and we've been running background checks and making calls ever since. Tate has contacts from his Navy days who can dig deeper than any civilian database. What they found makes the rage burn so hot I can barely see straight.
I sit in my truck in the Ironside parking lot, reading through the report for the third time, forcing myself to absorb every detail.
