And I'm so tired of carrying this alone.
"Get out," I say.
He goes still.
"Get out before I do something we'll both regret."
"Astra—"
"Tomorrow. Operations plan. Professional distance." My voice is cracking. I hate that he can probably feel it. "But tonight—get out. Because if you stay, I'm going to hurt you. And I'm not sure I'll stop."
He looks at me for three seconds that stretch like hours.
Then he nods. Turns. Walks to the door.
It opens.
He pauses in the frame.
"Twenty-four hours," he says. "You'll have the assessment."
"Good."
He leaves.
The door closes.
I'm alone with the photograph and the empty box and the ghost of his scent in my quarters.
My hands are shaking.
I make it to the bathroom before I break.
The shower runs cold. I don't change the temperature. Let it punish. Let it remind me that feeling anything for Dexter Torrence is choosing pain, choosing the wound reopening, choosing to bleed.
But the water doesn't wash away what I felt when he saidI loved you then.
Doesn't change that part of me, the part I've tried to kill for six years, wanted to close the distance and find out if his mouth still tastes the same.
I dry off. Dress. Stare at myself in the mirror.
The scar on my back is visible. The burn that covers myshoulder blade, twisted tissue in the shape of what they did to me while he completed the mission.
I trace it. The way I do when I need to remember.
This is what trust costs.
This is what happens when you let someone in.
My console chimes. Message incoming.
I check.
It's from Dexter. Timestamp: three minutes ago.
The tactical assessment. Complete. Detailed. Twenty-three hours early.
And at the bottom, a single line:
