"I did it. I killed her because they told me to, and because by then I was so broken that I didn't know how to say no. I cut her throat while she looked at me with eyes that still trusted me, that still believed I was going to save her, and I watched her bleed out on the floor of my cell."
The confession hangs there. The worst thing I've ever done, laid bare between us.
"They hosed out the cell the next morning. Brought me breakfast like nothing had happened. And I ate it. I sat in the spot where she died and I ate every bite, because if I didn't, they'd hurt me too. That's what they made me into. That's what Helena Cross designed."
I wait for him to pull away. To see me differently, now that he knows the full scope of what I am.
Instead, he leans forward and cups my face in both hands.
"You were a child." His voice is fierce. "A child who had been tortured and conditioned and given an impossible choice. What you did was survival. What they did was evil. Those are not the same thing."
"I killed her."
"They killed her. They used your hands to do it, but the murder belongs to them. To Helena Cross. To everyone who built that system and looked the other way while children were destroyed." His thumbs stroke across my cheekbones. "You are not a monster, Jinx."
"How do you know that?"
"Because you saved me." His forehead presses against mine. "In that pit, when you could have killed me, when killing me was the easy choice, you walked away. You chose mercy over murder even though they'd spent years beating mercy out of you. That's not a weapon. That's a man."
My eyes burn. My throat closes. The walls I built when I was eight years old, the walls that have kept me standing through everything, start to crumble.
"I don't know if I can let them fall." The words come out broken. "The walls. The armor. It's been so long that I don't remember what's underneath."
"Then we find out together." He pulls back enough to look at me. "I'm not asking you to fix yourself overnight. I'm not asking you to be someone you're not. I'm asking for a chance. Let me in, just a little. Let me help you carry some of this."
"Why?" The question tears out of me. "Why would you want that? I'm fucked up, Asher. I'm broken in ways that can't be fixed. Why would you choose this when you could have someonenormal, someone who doesn't dream about torture and wake up reaching for weapons?"
"Because normal is boring." A ghost of a smile crosses his face. "And because I'm just as broken as you are. The pits did the same thing to me that the Foundry did to you. Different methods, same result. Two kids turned into killers who don't know how to live any other way."
"So we're both fucked up."
"Completely. But maybe..." He hesitates. "Maybe two broken pieces can make something whole. Maybe we can figure out how to be human together, since neither of us knows how to do it alone."
It's not a promise. Not a guarantee. It's an offer. A hand extended across the darkness between us.
I take it.
"Yeah," I say. "I want that."
His smile is like sunrise. Bright and warm and full of promise.
"Then rest. Heal. We've got time."
"The mission—"
"Failed. The kids were moved before we got there. Jagger's already working on new intel." He settles back in the chair, still holding my hand. "But that's a problem for later. Right now, your job is to not die. Think you can handle that?"
"I'll try."
"Yeah, you're gonna do, not try." He brings my hand to his lips again. "I didn't lose Dom just to lose you too."
The grief in his voice is raw. Real. A wound that will take longer to heal than the hole in my side.
"Tell me about him," I say.
Asher goes still. "What?"
"Dom. Tell me about him. Who he was. What he meant to you." I squeeze his hand. "I want to know the man you lost."
