“But it’s all I’ve got for you.” His eyes narrow.
I’m close enough to feel his warm breath on my face. But an ocean exists between us. One of unspoken things neither of us can bridge.
I don’t have the words. My hands rest on his bare shoulders. “Your story lines up with what the record was pointing to… the gaps in it.”
He nods once. “He said the needs of the many outweighed ours.”
The corners of my mouth tip down, and Rhys’s eyes fill with regret. “So the ends justified the means.”
Rhys says nothing. He doesn’t have to.
Chapter
Thirteen
SLOANE
Iturn away, ending the conversation. Because he’s already told me too much. Like a coward, I’m afraid he’ll tell me more.
Phoenix worked for someone else. A three-letter agency? Maybe as a spook?
And he was willing to compromise his own brothers-in-arms. That I can’t grasp.
The cabin quiets, the storm muted to distant dripping from the eaves and the tired sigh of wind against the walls. Evening light glimmers through the window, impossibly gentle after the violence outside.
Rhys sits beneath it, a man carved out of all the parts of the day that didn’t survive.
Shoulders taut. Bandaged arm. Scars under my fingertips. And those eyes. Watching me as if he’s already gone somewhere I can’t follow.
I step back first. Or maybe he does. Maybe we both do. Either way, the space between us changes. Goes colder. Wider.
Rhys lowers his gaze, jaw taut, and reaches for the shirt I left draped over the chair.
“You shouldn’t have done it,” he grunts.
I blink. “Bandaged your arm?”
“Come here.” The words land too hard.
I fold my arms, suddenly aware of the damp cling of my clothes. Mud dries on my jeans, and my legs ache from the climb back up the slope.
“I didn’t have much choice.”
His mouth tightens. “You always have a choice.”
“That’s rich coming from you.”
His gaze cuts to mine. There it is again. That darkness. That shut door.
He stands slowly, careful with his injured arm, then buttons his shirt one-handed with the same stubborn discipline he seems to apply to breathing. Each motion is precise and controlled. Infuriating.
“You need to dry off,” he says.
“And you need to stop changing the subject.”
“I’m not.”
My brow knits. “Yes, you are.”
