“My mother thinks I’m dead?—”
“She needs to think that.” Diego is on his feet now too. Moving between me and the Faraday bag. “That’s what keeps her safe.”
“Safe?” The word comes out jagged. “My mother is planning my funeral right now. My sisters are calling each other, crying. My father is gone; he’s not there to hold them, and now they have to bury another?—”
My voice cracks.
Dad. Sergeant Patrick Brennan. Twenty-six years on the Boston PD. Heart attack three years ago while he was coaching Little League. Died doing something good. He’s not here to hold Mom together.
“I can’t even go to my own funeral.” The tears come hot and angry. I hate them. Hate crying in front of a stranger.
“Nobody goes to their own funeral.” His tone is wry, meant to be a joke, but it cuts too close and hurts.
“I can’t say goodbye. I can’t tell them I’m okay. I can’t?—”
“Cassie.” Diego’s voice cuts through the spiral. Softer than before. “Sit down.”
“I don’t want to sit down.”
“Sit. Down.”
My legs give out. I lower myself into the chair.
Diego disappears into the kitchen. Cabinet doors open. Water runs. He returns with a mug. Steam rises from it. He sets it in front of me without a word.
“What is this?”
“Tea.” He sits across from me. Doesn’t quite look at my face. “There was chamomile in the pantry. I’m not good at this—” a vague gesture at my tears, “—but tea is supposed to help.”
Despite everything—the fear, the grief, the impossible weight pressing down on my chest—something almost like a laugh escapes.
This trained operative, who steals cars and evades AI surveillance to get me out of DC, just made me tea.
“Thank you.”
He nods. Once. Then he just—sits. Doesn’t speak. Doesn’t try to fix anything. Just exists in the space with me while I fall apart.
The tea is terrible. Weak. Barely steeped. But warmth spreads from my palms where they wrap around the mug. After a while, the shaking stops.
“Does it get easier?” My voice sounds foreign. Scraped raw.
“No.”
“That’s not comforting.”
“You didn’t ask for comfort.” He meets my eyes. “You asked for truth.”
Fair point.
“My family.” I sip the bad tea. “Will they actually be safe? Really?”
“Phoenix has no reason to target them. You’re the threat.” His fingers drum once against the table. “Your family is irrelevant to its calculations, unless you make them relevant by reaching out. That’s why you can’t contact them.”
“For how long?”
“Until Phoenix is neutralized. Or until we find another way.”
“When is that?”
