Back. To Nina’s house. Where Wyatt’s probably making dinner, where Nina’s recovering on the couch with Nikita, where everything is domestic and warm and I can’t fucking breathe thinking about it, because it represents everything I have to lose.
CHRIS: Need to handle some details for the case. Tomorrow.
Three dots appear, pulse, disappear.
WYATT: Okay.
Just that. No pressure, no questions. Wyatt giving me space I didn’t ask for because he can read between the lines.
I close the laptop. Pour whiskey from the bottle I bought yesterday. Sit on the couch in the dark and try not to think about Thursday.
It doesn’t work.
Thursday I’ll walk into Vicente’s compound. Sit at his table. Eat food he’s prepared or had prepared. Make small talk with his family while pretending I’m just Chris Longo, Nina’s boyfriend, Callie’s brother, a man with no history in that house.
But Vicente knows. He knows exactly who I am, what I was, what I did while wearing Cal Logan’s face.
The night at The Coterie proved that. The way he’d looked at me, said my cover name like a caress and a threat. The recognition in his eyes when he mentioned Nina.
He’s playing with me. Has been since he walked into Nina’s office for that first session. He knows the sessions are recorded. Knows I’m listening. Every word calculated for my ears as much as Nina’s.
My laptop is open in front of me before I consciously decide to reach for it. A few clicks and I’m in the secure server, pulling up the session recordings. Nina’s voice fills my apartment, professional and warm.
“You move around each other very naturally now. There’s a rhythm between you. How did you find your way to this dynamic?”
I should stop. Close the file. This is just hurting myself for no tactical benefit.
But then Arturo speaks, and Vicente responds, and I’m frozen.
“We were both wrong. And we were both right. But after thirty years, it didn’t matter anymore.”
“Is it different this time?”
Vicente’s voice: “You tell me, Dr. Palmer. When someone comes back into your life after a long absence—someone you thought you’d lost—is it ever the same as before?”
My breath catches. The way he said it. The weight underneath. He’s not just talking about Arturo.
I replay it. Again. Listening for subtext, for threat, for whatever game he’s running.
Nina’s response is careful, therapeutic deflection. But there’s tension underneath. Recognition that Vicente just shifted the power dynamic.
Does she know? Has she figured out that her client is the man who broke me apart and rebuilt me into something I’m still trying to escape?
No. She can’t know. I made sure of that. Insisted she assess Vicente without my history contaminating her judgment. Kept that information locked down because?—
Because operational protocol demands it. Because compartmentalization protects the mission, protects her, protects all of us. Because I wanted to protect her professional objectivity.
Or because I couldn’t stand the thought of her knowing what I became with him.
The recording continues. I let it play, Vicente’s voice washing over me like cold water.
I wake on the couch fully dressed, laptop still open on the coffee table, whiskey glass tipped on its side. The recording has stopped—I must have closed it at some point, though I don’t remember.
My phone shows six texts from Wyatt, spread across yesterday evening and this morning. Increasingly concerned. The last one just says: Call me when you’re up.
Instead of calling, I shower. Dress in fresh clothes. Make coffee and drink it too hot, letting the bitterness cut through the fog. Then I open my laptop again and pull up the second session recording.
This is strategic, I tell myself. Preparation for Thursday. Desensitization therapy—exposure to the stimulus until it loses its power.
