Maybe that's what decides me. The fact that he says it like it's actually my call.
Or maybe I'm just too exhausted to run anymore.
I take a step toward him. Toward the dark doorway. Toward whatever comes next with this beautiful, dangerous man who found a line through the impossible and is currently the only thing standing between people who want me permanently silent and me.
"Yeah," I say, and follow him inside.
The door closes behind us with a sound like finality.
I can't shake the feeling that I've just made either the best or the last decision of my life.
Probably both.
SIX
Kade
KADE
The cabin'smain room feels smaller with her in it.
Wren's been in motion since I locked the door—touching things, picking them up, setting them down, like she needs to confirm the physical world still exists. Her hands move from the windowsill to the lamp cord to a coffee mug she doesn't drink from. Objects stay where you put them. Objects make sense.
Shock. I've seen it enough times to recognize the patterns.
"Talk to me." I set water bottles on the scarred coffee table. "What exactly did you find that brings hitmen to your door?"
She stops mid-pace, arms wrapped around herself despite the cabin's warmth. "You said Black Helix. How do you know that name?"
"I work for Guardian HRS, and we have files on most international criminal organizations. Black Helix specializes in dark web operations—drugs, weapons, and human trafficking.They run their entire network through encrypted channels." I watch her face go pale. "Why?"
"The app." She drops onto the couch like her strings were cut. "The fucking app. I should have known it was too good to be true."
"What app?"
She pulls her laptop from the bag, hands shaking as she powers it up. "Three weeks ago, I got a freelance request through my usual channels. Anonymous client—nothing unusual. I work in crypto and privacy tech. Anonymity is standard. They wanted a security audit on a new encrypted messaging platform. The money was... significant."
"How significant?"
"Fifty thousand for two weeks' work." The laugh that comes out is all glass edges. "Should have been my first red flag, but I've been barely scraping by since I went freelance. Rent in San Francisco is insane, and I needed the money."
She turns the laptop toward me, showing code that might as well be hieroglyphics. Her finger traces patterns. She explains like she's teaching a child—not condescending, just precise.
"See this? It's a backdoor. Not obvious—actually brilliant in its subtlety. The encryption is real, military-grade, and unbreakable from the outside. But there's a ghost protocol built into the authentication sequence. Every message, every user, every transaction gets copied to a shadow server before encryption."
"They're monitoring their own network."
"More than that." She pulls up another screen, logs scrolling past. "They're capturing everything. Not just messages—location data, device fingerprints, behavioral patterns. It's the most sophisticated surveillance system I've ever seen, and it's completely invisible to the end users."
I study the data, pieces clicking. "Black Helix built this to monitor their own people. Make sure no one's skimming, talking to cops, or going rogue."
"And I documented all of it." She closes the laptop, hands trembling. "Wrote a detailed report about the vulnerability, how to exploit it, and even how to patch it if they wanted to go legitimate. I sent it to the client contact last night."
"The night you went to the bar."
"I was celebrating. Job done, rent paid, maybe even a vacation." Her laugh cracks on the last word. "Instead, I signed my own death warrant."
"You couldn't have known?—"
