I shifted in his arms, tucking myself against his side. His arm came around me immediately, pulling me close. I pressed my face against his neck, breathing him in. Alive, whole, mine.
The vehicle’s movement lulled me. Xavier’s pulse steady beneath my cheek. His hand stroking my hair in slow, rhythmic patterns. His other hand finding mine again, threading our fingers together and holding on.
For now, I was safe.
For now, we’d survived.
Tomorrow would bring new threats. New dangers.
But tonight, in Xavier’s arms, with his pulse beating steady beneath my cheek and his hand stroking my hair and his lips pressing occasional kisses to my forehead, I let myself believe we might actually make it through this.
We’d beaten Dresner once.
We could do it again.
Chapter 26
Xavier
Coffee tasted like ash, but I drank it anyway.
Black. Bitter. The kind of punishment disguised as routine, exactly what I needed after spending ten hours upstairs keeping vigil over Clare’s sleep, afraid if I closed my own eyes she’d vanish like everyone else who’d ever mattered.
The safe house kitchen was generic rental beige. Laminate counters. Outdated appliances. A window over the sink that overlooked snow-covered pines and nothing else for miles. Hellhound had chosen well.
Perfect place to disappear.
I sat at the scarred wooden table, palms wrapped around the mug for warmth. No tremor. Strange, that absence. My body kept expecting the shaking to start, kept bracing for symptoms that didn’t come anymore.
The implant was deactivated. The chemical overdose stopped. I wasn’t dying.
Should have felt like freedom. Felt more like waiting for the other shoe to drop.
Fifty-five kills sat heavy in my gut, heavier than the bitter brew. I’d spent the night cataloging every freckle on Clare’s sleeping face, trying not to think about the lives I’d ended while my mind was locked behind Dresner’s conditioning.
Didn’t work. The memories were integrated now, all of them. No more fragmentation, no more dissociative breaks between who I was and what I’d done.
Just me. Xavier Hale. Master Sergeant. Prisoner. Weapon. Killer.
The man Clare thought she loved.
What happened when she really saw me? When the adrenaline wore off and reality sank in, she’d fought to save a man who’d killed fifty-five people without hesitation or remorse?
I forced another swallow. Focused on the burn instead of the spiral.
Outside, dawn was breaking. Pale light slipped through frost-covered windows, turning the world silver and still. The storm had passed sometime during the night, leaving behind the kind of quiet that felt fragile. Like sound itself was afraid to break it.
An engine rumbled in the distance.
I reached for the weapon I’d positioned on the chair beside me.
Then I recognized the sound.
They were back.
I forced myself to relax. Took another drink. Let my palm fall away from the gun.
The door opened, bringing cold air and the smell of snow. Hellhound entered first, arms loaded with grocery bags. Havoc followed, carrying tech equipment and what resembled a pharmacy’s worth of medical supplies.
