“Vengeance brunch,” she says. “I like it.”
“No more fieldwork until we know exactly what we’re up against,” I add.
“Knight.”
“Non-negotiable.”
She rolls her eyes, but there’s less heat in it than there would’ve been a week ago. “Fine,” she says. “We’ll lay low. But I’m not just going to sit here and do nothing.”
“I know.”
“I can dig from here,” she continues, already gearing up. “If Ozzy and Arrow feed me partial data, I can run local scripts, analyze patterns, scrub metadata. No internet required. Sneaker-net for vigilantes.”
I consider it.
With anyone else, I’d shut it down.
With her…
Her brain is a weapon. Keeping it holstered would be a waste.
“We’ll set up a controlled pipeline,” I concede. “Ozzy drops packets into the box, we fetch, we work offline, we send results back during the check-in window. No live browsing. No outbound traffic we don’t directly control.”
Her eyes light up. “Look at us, innovating crime-fighting workflows.”
“At least one of us is excited.”
“That’s because one of us still has faith in our combined ability to wreak havoc and survive.”
I meet her gaze. The warmth there hits me square in the chest. “You really believe that, don’t you?” I ask.
“That we’ll get through this?” she says. “Yeah. I do.”
“Why?”
She doesn’t hesitate. “Because I know you. And because you’re not alone anymore. It’s not just you and your code against the world. You’ve got Arrow. Gage. Ozzy. Dean. Me.”
She taps her chest with the fork. “We’re not letting you go down for this.”
It’s a dangerous thing she’s offering.
Belonging.
I’ve spent years keeping people at a safe distance. Letting their voices into my life, not their hands. Letting them sit on my couch, not in my heart.
And now here’s Lark, stomping through every boundary I built like they were made of wet cardboard.
I should be more afraid of that than I am.
Instead, I just feel… tired.
And weirdly relieved.
I finish my pancake, rinse the plates in the sink, and lean back against the counter.
She watches me. Her eyes dip to my mouth. My body remembers last night like it was carved into my bones.
The way she tasted.
