Except this felt different. Personal. The demand wasn’t for money, information, or access. The demand was that I end this specific relationship. That I send them away.
Why?
The images could destroy their careers. MI6 didn’t officially forbid relationships between operatives, but there were limits to institutional tolerance. Pictures of two agents in a BDSM club with a third party—another operative, no less—would end their advancement. Their security clearances would be revoked. Their employment terminated. Viper would have no choice but to cut them loose, no matter how valuable they were. And Typhon certainly wouldn’t pick either of them up for the unit.
The evidence could also destroy the Thorned Thistle. Everything we’d built over five years—the trust, the discretion, the sanctuary we’d created for people like us—would be gone in an instant. Every member could be exposed. All secrets laid bare. Careers ruined. Marriages ended. Lives shattered.
They could also destroy me. A viscount caught on camera in acts that would make the tabloids salivate for months. My family name dragged through the mud. My position with SIS compromised, my usefulness as an operative ended. I didn’t care about that. I’d survivedworse. I’d survived loss and grief and years of self-imposed isolation. Exposure was nothing in comparison.
What I couldn’t survive was to be the reason Oliver and Ophelia were burned.
In an age of deepfakes and AI-generated images, photographs alone proved nothing. If the worst happened, they could claim fabrication. The technology existed to create images indistinguishable from reality—and that same technology provided cover for denying reality when it was captured on film. It wasn’t a perfect defense. The accusation alone would cause damage. But it was something. A thread to pull later, when the immediate threat was mitigated.
Nothing changed that I’d brought this on them. By wanting them. By letting them in. By convincing myself I could have this, that I deserved happiness, that my darkness wouldn’t poison everything it touched.
I’d been a fool.
I had to get them out. Tonight. Now.
If I told them the truth, they’d want to stay. I knew them well enough to be certain of that. Oliver would dig in his heels, would insist on facing the threat together, would refuse to leave my side. Ophelia would analyzeand strategize, would want to identify the sender, would argue that running solved nothing.
They’d be right.
Running solved nothing. But it did buy time.
The only way to protect them now was to make them leave. Tonight. Without explanations, without arguments, without giving them time to refuse.
I had to make them hate me enough to go.
I reached for my mobile and rang Callen’s number.
He answered on the second ring. “Kiernan. It’s late.” His voice was rough with sleep, but alert. We’d both been trained to wake quickly.
“I need a helicopter. Now. To take Oliver and Ophelia to the Glasgow safe house.”
Silence stretched across the line. I could picture him sitting up in bed, all traces of sleep vanishing as his mind transitioned into operational mode.
“What’s going on?”
“I can’t explain. Not yet. Trust that they need to leave tonight.”
“Kiernan—”
“Please.”
We’d been friends since we were kids, yet I could count on one hand the number of times I’d used that word withhim. I gave orders, made requests, and issued commands. I didn’t beg.
Callen heard it. Whatever he’d been about to say died in his throat.
“Twenty minutes,” he said. “I’ll transport them myself.”
“Thank you.”
I ended the call before he could ask anything else.
Twenty minutes.Twenty minutes to prepare myself to destroy everything I’d built with them.
I gathered the photos, stacked them neatly, with the edges aligned and faces down, then slid them into the manila envelope along with the note. I locked it in the bottom drawer of my desk and poured myself a whiskey that I drank in two swallows.
