"After, we see what's left standing." He pulled me against him, and I let him, memorizing this new feeling of safety within arms that could kill. "One terror at a time."
I thought about Gabriel, about what he'd think of this deviation from programming. Found, for the first time, that I didn't care. Nathan was right—I got to choose now.
Even if I barely remembered how.
9
Control
Tuesday arrived wearing gray dawn light and the taste of copper in my mouth. I'd been awake for hours, sitting cross-legged on my bed in the pale pink nightgown Gabriel had chosen three years ago, watching Nathan sleep on my couch through the doorway. His presence had rewritten my apartment's silence into something less hollow.
My hands wouldn't stop shaking.
Not from fear—I'd eliminated fear from my emotional vocabulary long ago, or so I told myself. This was something else. Anticipation mixed with an unnamed thing that made my chest feel too tight for my ribs.
"You're thinking too loud," Nathan said without opening his eyes.
"I don't think loudly. I think efficiently." But I uncrossed my legs, bare feet finding the cold floor. "We have four hours before we need to position ourselves."
"I know." He sat up, sheet pooling at his waist, revealing the scars I'd catalogued but not touched. "Come here."
"That's not—we should review the plan again."
"Bunny." Just my name, but the way he said it made me stop mid-protest. "Come here. Please."
The 'please' undid me. Gabriel never said please. Commands came wrapped in silk smiles or sharp disappointments, but never requests. I padded across the room, nightgown whispering against my thighs, and stopped just out of reach.
"Closer," he said softly.
I took another step. The morning light caught the green of his eyes, turning them into something that belonged in forests, not apartments where girls planned murders.
"Can I touch you?"
The question short-circuited something in my brain. "I—what?"
"Can I touch you?" He repeated it patiently, hands resting on his knees. "You can say no."
"Nobody asks." The words came out small. "They just... take. Or command. Or position."
"I'm asking."
I nodded, not trusting my voice. His hand rose slowly, telegraphing the movement, before fingers brushed my wrist. Just that, just the lightest touch where my pulse hammered against thin skin.
"Tell me about your boundaries," he said.
"I don't have any. I was trained to—"
"No." Still gentle, but firm. "Not what you were trained for. What do you want? What don't you want?"
"I want..." My throat closed around words I'd never been allowed to form. "I don't know how to want things for myself.Only what serves the mission. What pleases the handler. What maintains the asset."
His thumb stroked over my pulse point. "Then we'll start simple. Do you want me to keep touching your wrist?"
Such a basic question. Such an impossible kindness.
"Yes," I whispered.
"Good. Do you want to sit?"
