Wasn't meant to be.
She sends back a skull emoji, because apparently that's our thing now—communicating through death symbols while planning meetings that could actually kill us.
Tomorrow at noon, I'm meeting Lena Cruz at Sal's Diner. In public. In daylight. Where anyone could see us. Where her brother's people could report back. Where my brothers might recognize her from the warehouse medical runs.
It's probably the stupidest thing I've ever agreed to.
I can't fucking wait.
Chapter nineteen
Digital to Reality
Lena
He was everything I imagined and more dangerous in person.
Sal's Diner, noon, and I'm standing in the doorway like I'm about to perform surgery with a butter knife—technically possible but inadvisable on every level. Zane's in the corner booth, wearing a black henley that's trying its best to contain biceps that have definitely thrown people through walls. He's pretending to read a menu while actually tracking every exit, every patron, every possible threat. Including me.
Torch is parked outside in his Kawasaki, about as subtle as a cardiac event. He's texting Miguel updates, probably something like"She's here. Meeting someone. Male. Dangerous-looking."If only he knew the half of it.
I walk toward Zane's booth, and our eyes meet. The recognition is instant, electric, a full-body systems failure that I'm trying to disguise as casual interest. We both know. We know we know. We're about to pretend we don't know, which is the kind of recursive lying that makes my prefrontal cortex want to file a complaint with HR.
"Hi," I say, sliding into the booth across from him. My voice doesn't shake. Miracle number one.
"Hi," he responds, and his voice in person, without hypothermia or phone static, is a weapon of mass destruction aimed directly at my reproductive system.
"You're the guy from the diner yesterday," I say, loud enough for neighboring tables to hear. "The one who watched me—"
"Save someone's life, yeah." His eyes are doing things to my heart rate that would require medical intervention if I wasn't already a medical professional. "That was incredible."
"Just doing my job."
"Your job is at UNM Hospital. What you did yesterday was above and beyond."
We're having two conversations. The one people can hear—nurse meets admirer, cautious but interested. And the real one, happening in the space between words, in the way his fingers twitch toward mine on the table, in the way I'm cataloging every new detail I couldn't see in the freezer: the gold flecks inhis brown eyes, the way his jaw clenches when he's controlling himself, how his chest rises slightly faster when I lean forward.
"Can I buy you coffee?" he asks. Normal. Casual. Not like he's held my naked hypothermic body for three hours.
"Sure."
The waitress comes over—Dolores, according to her name tag, approximately 167 years old, definitely judging us both. She takes our order: two coffees, black, because apparently, we're both too committed to our tough personas to admit we might want sugar.
"So," I say when she leaves, "what do you do?"
"Security," he answers, which is like calling a nuclear bomb a firecracker. "You?"
"Nurse. Trauma."
"Must see some shit."
"Must cause some shit."
His lip twitches. Almost a smile. "Sometimes."
My phone buzzes.
Miguel:Who is he?
