"Sera." Ford's voice comes from the deck above. Calm. Controlled. "Stay below."
"What's happening?"
"Mace and Priest engaged hostiles on the perimeter. Cal's providing support. Sounds like they're handling it." A pause, then the creak of footsteps moving toward the stern. "Stay down until I give you the all clear."
I grip the shotgun tighter and count my heartbeats.
The two days since our argument have been torture. Ford sleeping on deck. Me sleeping below. The careful distance between us every time we're in the same space. Professional. Polite. The exact opposite of what we were before I let fear convince me that walking away was the right choice.
I was wrong.
The realization crystallized somewhere in the long hours of the second night, while I lay alone in the narrow bed that still smelled like him. I was wrong, and scared, and looking for reasons to protect myself from something that might hurt.
But the thing about love is that it hurts anyway. Whether you embrace it or run from it. Whether you hold on or let go. The pain is coming regardless. The only question is whether you face it alone or with someone beside you.
The gunfire stops.
Silence stretches out, broken only by the lap of water against the hull and the distant call of a night heron.
Then Ford's voice, rougher now: "All clear. Mace is bringing someone aboard."
I emerge from the cabin into the gray light of false dawn. Ford stands at the port rail, his attention fixed on an approaching inflatable where Mace and Priest are escorting a fourth figure. A man, hands bound behind his back, head covered with a black hood.
"Prisoner?" I move to stand beside Ford, close enough that our shoulders almost touch.
"Survivor. Priest took him alive when the others went down." Ford glances at me, and I see the exhaustion carved into the lines of his face. Two nights of minimal sleep. Two nights of standing watch while I pretended I didn't need him. "Cal's going to question him."
"Here?"
"On the Salt and Steel boat. More room, better containment." His jaw tightens. "We need to know who sent them. Whether there are more coming."
The inflatable reaches Second Watch's side. Cal secures it while Mace hauls the prisoner aboard, dumping him onto the deck with professional efficiency. Priest follows, his pale eyes scanning the perimeter even now.
"Three-man team," Mace reports. "Same tactical signature as the first group. They were setting up a surveillance position on the eastern approach."
"Surveillance, not assault?"
"Looks like they were gathering intelligence for a larger operation." Priest removes the hood from the prisoner, revealing a man in his thirties with military-short hair and a broken nose that's streaming blood. "This one's going to tell us everything."
The prisoner spits blood onto the deck. "I'm not telling you shit."
Priest crouches beside him, and something in his expression makes the man flinch. "I've spent twenty years extracting information from people who didn't want to give it. Some of them were trained to resist interrogation by state actors. You're a contractor with a W-2 and a life insurance policy." His voice drops. "We both know how this ends."
They transfer the prisoner to the Salt and Steel boat, leaving Ford and me alone on Second Watch for the first time in two days. The silence between us feels different now. Charged. Full of things neither of us has said.
"Ford." I touch his arm, feel him stiffen beneath my fingers. "I need to talk to you."
"Now?"
"Now. Before they get answers and everything changes again."
He turns to face me, his gray eyes guarded in a way they weren't before I pushed him away. "I'm listening."
"I was wrong." The words come out faster than I intend. "Two nights ago, when I asked for space. When I told you this thing between us needed to pause. I was scared and overwhelmed and I said things that weren't true."
"Which things?"
"The part about not knowing if what we have is real. The part about proximity and circumstances and temporary boats." I take a breath, steadying myself. "I know it's real, Ford. I've known it since you showed me your maps and talked about coastlines that change over time. I've known it since you looked at me like I was a person instead of a problem."
