Kelly was cleared. Commended. Protected.
The system had done what it was supposed to do for once.
She’d watched the footage, what he had to do to survive, to save his leader, a man who was so much more. It wasn't his skill in taking down two armed men while cornered that haunted her. It was the flicker of raw fear on his face as he watched his world burn from a steel box in the sky. Then came the pivot, the desperate, brilliant improvisation with the cogs, the heart-in-throat gantry swing, the slide down the machinery. All of it was pure Kelly.
As she watched him slam into Carver, her anger at the agents' treachery flared hot, but it was immediately eclipsed. The last of her fear didn't just dissolve. It was incinerated by a profound, awestruck clarity. He was never out of the fight. Not because he was a SEAL, but because he was Kelly, and that, she realized, was so much more dangerous.
But the footage didn't end with Carver's last breath. It cut to the aftermath, and that was the part that truly shredded her. She had to watch as Kelly frantically tried to save Iceman, his hands slick with blood, pressing down on the wound with a desperate, raw strength that was almost terrifying. He was a killer one moment and a desperate medic the next, his voice a ragged, pleading growl in the silence as he begged the man on the floor to stay with him.
When she’d first seen this, a cold dread had coiled in her gut. The way he’d looked in that moment. Alone. Like loving him might put her in that line of fire too. Was this the reason he’d left her standing on the tarmac? But how could she accept that? How could she stand by and watch the fire that made him so vibrant, so alive, be smothered by the ash of his own survival? It felt like a choice. Accept the man who came back from this or lose the man who went into it entirely. The thought of either option was a betrayal of the Kelly she already loved.
Still, the absence in her chest didn’t ease. If anything, it widened, making space for truths she’d been avoiding. This wasn’t just about him being gone. It was about everything his absence was stripping bare.
She leaned back in her chair, staring at the dark window, her reflection faint against the glass.
The adrenaline was fading, and she simply left everything and went home.
As she drove, her thoughts were on what remained was the question she could no longer outrun.
If the crisis was over, if the job was done, what, exactly, was she still holding on to?
Why did the answer feel like it was already waiting for her, patient and inevitable?
The cabin was too quiet.
Blair moved through it on habit alone, warming leftovers she barely tasted, rinsing a plate she didn’t remember using. The routines steadied her hands, if not her mind. She showered, letting the hot water beat against her shoulders until her skin flushed, until sensation returned in small, manageable pieces.
She dressed for bed without thinking. Pulled the covers back. Lay down.
Sleep came fast and shallow, the kind born of exhaustion rather than rest.
In her dream, he was there.
Kelly, solid and warm beside her, his breathing slow and even. She was curled into his body, her head tucked beneath his chin, one arm thrown over her waist like it belonged there with The quiet certainty of being held.
When she woke, the space beside her was empty.
The absence was immediate and physical, a hollow that pulled the breath from her lungs. She lay there for a long moment, staring at the ceiling, her body remembering something her mind refused to let go of.
Eventually, she pushed herself up.
The floor was cool under her bare feet as she padded into the kitchen. She poured a glass of wine and stood there, one hand braced on the counter, the other wrapped around the stem, watching the dark window reflect a woman she barely recognized.
Memory crept in, uninvited.
The way he’d stood between her and Darrow without hesitation. The calm certainty in his voice when he’d spoken her name like it mattered. The way he’d held himself back because he wanted her too much.
She carried the glass with her to the living room, stopping by the wall where it had all shifted.
She could still feel him there, the strength in his body, the tension in his hands when he’d fisted them at his sides, fighting himself. The way his restraint had been almost unbearable, not to her, but to him. The way she’d stepped into that space and told him the truth without flinching.
I want it all. Everything you are. I’m built for you.
She closed her eyes, her forehead resting lightly against the wall, the wine forgotten in her hand.
She’d felt him break then, not shatter, but open. Like something locked away had finally been given permission to exist. Like being wanted without condition had undone him more than any wound. That all the intensity he feared had no basis with her.
Tears welled, hot and silent, sliding down her cheeks without a sound.
