“Eight stitches and still negotiating. Impressive. Stupid, but impressive.”
"He asked if you were still here," she added softly.
"The manifest says I am."
"That’s not what he was asking."
She disappeared back into the lobby before I could object to being seen that clearly.
The list waited where I’d left it. My name sat at the top of the 6:30 A.M. departure.
I had sold prettier versions of this for years. Duty wore excellent shoes when it wanted to hide fear.
The library door groaned.
I didn’t look up immediately. Cold air came in with him, carrying woodsmoke, clean skin, and the sting of antiseptic.When I finally lifted my gaze, Nick stood just inside the doorway, at the edge of the lamplight.
He had changed. The uniform was gone, replaced by a clean charcoal shirt that wasn’t quite crisp. His hair was damp, pushed back from a face carved out of exhaustion. A strip of medical tape crossed his left forearm, and his eyes were bloodshot, too blue against a face that had run out of color.
Without his gear, without the room making space for him, he looked worse.
Human.
A far more inconvenient version of him.
Then the object in his hand registered. Not my laptop. Not my charger. Not the neat, practical things a man like him should have thought mattered.
My fantasy novel.
Its cracked spine rested against his palm like evidence that he’d been paying attention.
“The Crimson Crown,” he read, his voice rough around the title. “I assumed this outranked the charger.”
Fantastic. Even my escapism had been secured and returned.
“Bold of you to assume I wouldn’t choose the charger.”
His eyes stayed on mine. “You wouldn’t.”
That was the problem with Nick Mercer. He didn’t guess. He assessed.
"Of course you’re still working," he said. His voice was rough, scraped thin by the day.
“You look like hell.”
“Occupational hazard.”
“So is pretending that bandage is decorative, apparently.”
He didn’t smile, but the corner of his mouth twitched and gave up.
"Mbeki?" I asked.
"Livid. The doctor told him no patrol for forty-eight hours. I think he’s currently trying to bribe a junior ranger for a radio."
"And the... situation?"
“It was an old contractor login,” Nick said. “Someone used it. They can’t anymore.”
