Marisol asks if Eric is gone. Aurora says yes without elaborating, and Marisol doesn’t push. She tells Aurora she loves her, and Aurora says it back in a voice that barely holds together. When she hangs up, she sets the phone on the seat between us. “She was trying to reach you for almost an hour.” Aurora looks at me. “She called your headquarters and kept calling until someone escalated her.”
“I know. That’s how I found out.”
“She saved my life by being persistent. If she’d given up after two tries, you wouldn’t have known until you got home.” She presses her lips together. “I owe her more than I can repay.”
“We both do.”
She leans against my shoulder, and I put my arm around her. We drive the remaining three hours in near-silence, punctuated by the occasional operational call from Grigor updating Viktor on Karpov’s escape route. I absorb the updates without responding because my job right now is to keep Aurora’s head on my shoulder and my arm around her, not letting go until something physically requires me to.
The safe houseis a property in Marathon that Viktor secured six months ago under a shell company that even Karpov’s intelligence couldn’t trace. It’s modest, two bedrooms, a screened porch, and a dock on a canal that connects to the bay. Dr. Zarlova is waiting in the kitchen when we arrive, her medical bag open on the counter and her expression calm. I introduce them before she leads Aurora to a guest room.
She examines Aurora while I stand in the doorway. The bruising on her arm is deep but muscular, with no fracture. The wrist abrasions are superficial. The concussion is mild and improving. Dr. Zarlova orders rest and ice for the next forty-eight hours. Then she runs the portable ultrasound.
I hold my breath until I hear the two heartbeats, fast and overlapping like a conversation. Dr. Zarlova looks at me over the screen and nods once.
“Both babies are fine. No signs of distress, strong cardiac activity, and appropriate size for the gestational age.” She turns off the machine and faces Aurora. “Your body handled the stress remarkably well. Rest will do the rest.”
Aurora nods and lets her shoulders drop. The tension she’s been carrying since the corridor releases all at once. The babies are safe, and everything else is secondary.
Dr. Zarlova leaves the room with instructions for me that include monitoring for headache changes, nausea, and confusion. I close the bedroom door behind her and lean against it.
Aurora sits on the edge of the bed. She’s wearing a clean shirt I found in the closet and the same pants from the storage facility. Her hair is tangled and matted with dried sweat. She looks at me across the room, clearly absorbing everything.
The shaking starts. It begins in her hands and moves outward until her shoulders are trembling, making her teeth click. She wraps her arms around herself and holds on. The sound she makes goes deeper than crying, a full-body release that has been building since the van door slammed shut and has finally found the space to surface.
I cross the room and sit beside her, put both arms around her, and pull her against my chest. She grips my shirt with both fists and shakes against me in waves that I can feel through my ribcage. I don’t tell her she’s safe or it’s over. Karpov is still out there, so it isn’t over. I stay close and quiet, just being with her.
When the worst of it passes, she lifts her head from my chest to look at me with red-rimmed eyes and an expression that is raw and open.
“I don’t feel guilty about killing Eric.” She says it with a steadiness that surprises me, repeating what she said earlier but with firm conviction. She’s given it thought and truly means it.
“You stopped him.” I brush the hair from her face. “You survived everything before me, Echelon, and Eric. You’ll survive this too.”
She catches my hand and presses it against her cheek. When she opens her eyes, the flat emptiness from the corridor is gone. What’s looking back at me is sharper and aimed directly at me. “I need you.” She says it simply, and then she pulls me toward her by the collar of my tactical vest with enough force that I have to brace against the mattress.
I unstrap the vest and let it drop. She already has my shirt halfway over my head before the vest hits the floor. I strip off hers, easing it past the bruise on her arm, and she grabs the back of my neck to pull my mouth to hers before I can be gentle about anything else.
The kiss is hard and hungry. She bites my lower lip, and the sting of it sends heat straight down my spine. Her hands are on my belt, yanking it free. I push down her pants, and she kicks them off while I shed mine. We don’t pause or hesitate. Every second of contact is a confirmation that we’re both still here.
I press my palm flat against her stomach, and the firmness of it soothes me. She reads the pause and doesn’t let it last. “They’re fine. Dr. Zarlova confirmed.” She wraps her hand around my cock and strokes once, firm and slow. “Don’t be careful with me. Not tonight.”
I push inside her in one thrust, and the feeling of her pussy around me, slick and gripping me in a way that wrecks every defense I have left, tears a groan from my throat. Six hours ago I didn’t know if I’d ever touch her again. I grip her hip hard enough to leave marks and pull back just to drive in deeper. She arches off the mattress and digs her nails into my back, dragging them down. I’ll feel the scratches tomorrow.
I fuck her hard, and she meets every thrust by lifting her hips and pulling me in with her legs locked around my waist. Shegrabs the headboard with one hand and my shoulder with the other, and the sound she makes when I angle deep enough is raw and broken. I do it again. She cries out and drags her nails down my arm, and the pain sharpens everything until I can feel her pulse through her skin wherever we’re touching.
I reach between us and press my thumb against her clit while I thrust. She gasps and clenches around my cock so hard I swear against her neck and nearly lose my rhythm. I press harder, circling while I drive into her, and she clenches around me in waves that build faster than I can track.
“Adrian…” She says my name like it’s the only word she has left, and she grabs my face with both hands and holds me close enough that she’s breathing in broken gasps against my mouth.
She comes with a full-body shudder, pulling me deeper with her legs and biting my shoulder hard enough to draw blood. The pain and the grip of her body around my cock push me over. I come inside her with a sound I bury against her throat, and she holds me through it with both arms locked around my neck with her forehead pressed to my temple and neither of us breathing right.
I don’t pull out immediately. I stay inside her while our breathing slows, still braced above her and still shaking. She runs her fingers through my hair, and the gentleness of it after the ferocity is what finally breaks something loose in me. I press my face against her neck and hold on.
When I finally roll to the side, I pull her against me, and she presses her face into my chest. We lie in the dark with the canal water lapping against the dock outside the window. I keep one hand on her stomach. She falls asleep first, but I stay awake to listen to her breathe.
27
AURORA
