I wanted to scream at her. I wanted to put my fist through the door. Instead, I took Oliver’s arm and pulled him toward the plastic chairs, because standing here, staring at nothing, wasn’t going to save Kiernan’s life.
Callen found us twenty minutes later.
He took one look at our faces and went straight for the doors.
A nurse stepped in front of him, but he didn’t slow down. It took two orderlies to hold him back, and even then, he nearly got through.
When they finally stopped him, he didn’t fight. Didn’t speak. He stood there, chest heaving, staring at the doors like he could will them open.
Oliver touched his arm, and Callen flinched like he’d forgotten we existed.
We led him to the chairs, but he wouldn’t sit. He stood at the window with his back to us, shoulders rigid, hands clenched at his sides.
At some point, Oliver’s fingers laced through mine.
Eventually, Callen sat down.
And we waited.
The clockon the wall read zero three hundred hours. I’d been watching it, counting the seconds between each tick as if the rhythm might anchor me to the present. Oliver sat on my left, close enough that our shoulders touched. Callen was on my right, elbows braced on his knees, head bowed, utterly still.
He hadn’t spoken since we’d arrived. The man who always had a dry comment, a sardonic observation, a deflection wrapped in wit, sat in silence, staring at the floor between his feet. His hands were clasped so tightly his knuckles had gone white.
Callen and Kiernan had grown up on neighboring estates. They’d served in MI6 together, joined Unit 23 together, founded the Thorned Thistle together. Kiernan was the closest thing Callen had to a brother. And now, that brother was behind those double doors, either dying or fighting to live, and none of us could do a single thing about it.
I wanted to speak, to offer comfort. But what words existed for this? I’m sure he’ll be fine? I didn’t believe it. He’s strong? Strength didn’t stop bullets.
So I sat in silence too, and we waited.
For eight years, I’d trained for every conceivable threat. I could disarm an attacker, pick a lock, and disappear into a crowd of thousands. I could assess a room in three seconds flat and identify every exit, every weapon, every person who might be a danger. I was good at my job. I was very, very good at it.
None of that mattered here. The threat wasn’t a person I could fight. It was the damage already done, the minutes that might have stolen too much from him.
The helplessness was worse than fear. Fear I could work with. Helplessness sat in my chest like a stone.
As the minutes dragged past, my training took over without permission—six chairs along the left wall, four along the right, a window that faced the car park, two doors, a water dispenser in the corner. Threat assessment happened whether I wanted it to or not. The habit was so ingrained that my brain kept running calculations even when the only threat was time itself.
Oliver’s knee pressed harder against mine. His breathing had gone shallow, and when I glanced at him, his face was chalk-white beneath the fluorescent lights.
“He can’t die,” he whispered. “Phee, he can’t?—”
“He won’t.” I didn’t know if it was a promise or a plea or the only words I could think to say.
Callen didn’t react. Didn’t move. Didn’t look up. The stillness was worse than anything he could have said.
I thought about the basement. The zip ties cutting into my wrists. The gag stuffed in my mouth. The absolute uselessness of all my training when I couldn’t move or speak or do anything but watch.
I’d sat there while James ranted and Kiernan negotiated and Oliver bled from where James had struck him. I’d sat there while Kiernan stepped in front of that gun.
He’d made a choice. In that split second, he’d decided his life was worth less than Oliver’s. He’d decided we would be fine without him. He hadn’t asked. He hadn’t hesitated. He’d acted.
The anger had been building since then, sharp and hot beneath my ribs. I loved him for it. I hated him for it. If he died tonight, he would die believing he’d done the right thing—and Oliver and I would spend the rest of our lives knowing that his protection had destroyed us.
I wanted to grab him by the shoulders and shake him. I wanted to press my mouth to his and feel him breathe. I wanted to rage at him until he understood that we didn’t need a shield. We needed him alive and whole and here.
Six months ago, I hadn’t known this man existed. Oliver and I had spent that time circling each other with unspoken attraction, too bound by regulations to act on what we felt. Then Kiernan had opened the doors of Greymarch, and everything had changed.
He’d seen us. Really seen us. He’d recognized desires we hadn’t known how to name and given us permission to explore them. He’d commanded and directed andpushed us past every boundary we thought we had, and somewhere in the middle of all that intensity, I’d fallen for him. For both of them. For this impossible thing the three of us were building together.
