I tell him about the chart, the timestamp that shouldn’t exist, and the entry logged under my credentials while I was in surgery. I tell him about the man near the nurses’ station, how he lingered without belonging, and how he vanished the moment I tried to place him. I describe the sensation I couldn’t shake, not fear exactly, but the same internal alert that precedes a crash before the monitor catches up.
He doesn’t interrupt. He doesn’t soften his expression or reassure me prematurely. He listens the way he does everything else, with full attention and focus that makes the space between us feel sealed off from the rest of the world.
When I finish, he doesn’t speak right away. His eyes hold mine, reading past the words into what I haven’t said.
“The chart access,” he says finally, “that’s not coincidence.”
His hands curl into fists.
“And the man you saw. Describe him again.”
I do. Height, posture, and the way he waited patiently.
Kiren nods once, already assembling something in his mind. “I’ll have my people audit the hospital systems. Quietly. No flags. And I’ll have extra eyes on the perimeter when you’re there, inside and out.”
The certainty in his tone eases my worry.
“You’re not imagining this,” he continues. “And you’re not overreacting.”
Only then do I tell him about my mother’s voicemail. About Ethan’s birthday dinner. About how small and impossibly normal it sounds compared to everything else. And how I have to go.
When he finally speaks, there’s no hesitation.
“I’ll come with you.”
It’s not a question, it’s a decision.
I suck in a breath in surprise, relief, and other emotions all tangling together. “Kiren?—”
“I won’t leave you to go alone.”
I look past him toward the window where the city lights glow in the darkness. Toward the life I've been trying to protect without fully understanding the cost of that protection.
“I'm not stepping back into my old world,” I tell him quietly. “I'm bringing you into it.”
“I understand,” Kiren replies.
The realization moves through me in a quiet, full-body way. This is the choice I’m making. Bringing him into my family, into the world where I’m just Rowan the doctor, Rowan the daughter, Rowan the sister. Not the woman entangled with a man whose life is built on violence and power.
The two versions of myself are colliding, merging, becoming inseparable. I meet his eyes, finding them already watching me, reading the decision as it forms.
His hand lifts, his fingers brushing against my cheek with a gentleness that contradicts everything else about him. “I’ll stand in it with you.”
I close my eyes at his touch, letting myself lean into it for just a moment. Letting myself accept what I've known for weeks but haven't admitted.
This is it. This is where my careful compartmentalization ends. Where the walls I built between different parts of my life come down. And despite everything that could go wrong, the danger, complication, and inevitable chaos, I don't want to take it back.
The night rests against the windows. The city moves below. Inside this apartment, in this moment, I choose to stop running from the collision that's been coming since the first time I saw him.
I open my eyes.
Kiren is still watching me, his expression holding questions he won't ask, and decisions he's already made.
I don't look away.
12
KIREN
