Maybe that’s what all this is. Me, her, Chris. Some strange, gravitational pull none of us knows how to fight. A spiral that started before we realized we were even moving.
She believed in it. I think I still do. But belief doesn’t give you a roadmap. Just a reason to keep walking when everything around you is falling apart.
4
Chris
The conference room at Langley is cold.
Not just temperature-wise—though someone keeps the AC running like it’s protecting classified intel from sweating—but in that sterile, too-quiet way that makes everything feel one step removed from real life. Like no one in this room ever fucks up so badly they bleed for five years trying to fix it.
I sit at the far end of the table, second seat, flanked by two career agency types who haven’t said a word to me since I came in. That’s fine. I’m not here to make friends.
The wall screen flickers once, then splits into panels.
Top-left: DEA-Los Angeles. Concrete-and-glass conference room. Five people seated at the table, badges and body armor peeking from under jackets. Top-right: Mason Black, calling in from what looks like the bridge of a private yacht with early morning light bleeding orange and gold across the Pacific behind him. His shirt’s unbuttoned at the throat. Aviators on. Arms crossed. Every inch the reformed cartel ghost turned domestic family man. And directly across from me on the bottom center, DEA-Denver, and the person I didn’t let myself look for.
Wyatt.
His jaw is clean-shaven. Collar sharp. Posture military-perfect. Nothing to give away the memory of the hours spent tangled together with Nina in a hotel bed less than 48 hours ago.
Except his eyes. They’re not cold or blank—they’re careful.
I tell myself not to read into it. And then I do it anyway, because that’s what I do. I pick apart expressions like they’re codes that might save someone’s life.
Or ruin mine.
Someone coughs. The meeting begins.
I sit still through it all: briefs on Serbian movements, asset reclassifications, the post-Amador power vacuum. Two objectives on the wall: reinstall a cooperative asset within the new regime, and stabilize the intel pipeline from Flores and Amador. Someone passes out a paper with photos. One of them is Tatiana Petrov, and the caption beneath it makes my teeth clench.
Asset—Cooperative. Psychological Evaluation Pending.
She was the final thread in the Corluka takedown. A woman who escaped her father’s world by throwing knives over her shoulder, hoping one of them would land in someone worse than him. And one did.
Her intel fractured the Serb hierarchy from the inside out. Without her, we wouldn’t have tracked Bogdan Corluka’s logistics, burned his supply routes, or triggered a chain of events that rivaled the one that left Jovan Corluka and Gustavo Delgado flayed and left for display like failed gods.
My op. My debut performance. My chance to prove I wasn’t broken, just calibrated for something colder.
I should feel pride. I don’t. Tatiana’s intel came at a cost.
I watched her flinch when someone handed her water. Saw how she slept: shoes on, back to the wall.
Now they want to send her through the grinder again. Only this time, they’re calling it cooperation.
I already know what’s coming. I just don’t know what form the knife will take. But someone’s going to bleed for this. Again.
Mason speaks first. Voice steady, just smug enough to remind everyone he doesn’t need this. They need him. He’s just here because he likes it. “The intel flow from Flores and Amador is holding steady, but they’re dragging their feet. We think it’s a pride thing. They don’t like admitting how much they know.”
“Which is exactly the problem,” says McIntyre, a deputy director on our side of the wall, and one of the many suits who talk louder the less they understand. “We’ve got two tracks and neither one has legs. Petrov needs a psychological evaluation before we can even discuss reinsertion, and the intel pipeline is dying because we can’t get organic access to Flores and Amador. We need someone in the room who isn’t holding a badge.” He shuffles a page. “We’ve already flagged a handful of existing contractors with proximity to both families. Denver, you want to walk us through the short list?”
I open my mouth, ready to suggest encrypted uploads, dead drops, anything that doesn’t involve sticking another civilian into the mess, but I don’t get the chance.
Wyatt’s already talking. Running through names, qualifications, proximity to both families. I catch one in particular and everything after it turns to static.
“Nina Palmer. Licensed psychologist, extensive experience with trauma-informed work. Current DEA contractor. She’s known to both Flores and Amador through social circles. That familiarity would give her natural proximity.”
The bottom drops out of my stomach.
