“Why wasn’t I told?”
“Because you weren’t part of this operation. Until now.”
Silence settles between us, thick and heavy.
“She’s in danger?” I ask.
“She’s surrounded by it every single day, and we have no one close enough to get to her, except you.”
Sophia. Riley. My brothers.
Everything collides at once.
Staring at the ceiling, I let it settle.
My eyes drop to my hands on the hospital sheet. I see the compass on my inner left forearm. It’s ghost ink, barely there, the kind of tattoo you get when you want a reminder only you can see.
Still there.
Still mine.
For now.
Everything else is about to change.
Sam leans forward from his chair, elbows on his knees, and his voice drops to something quieter.
“You stay dead. Go in under a new name. Get close to Clemente. Take him down from the inside.”
I let that sit for a moment. “And get Riley out,” I say.
“That’s part of it,” he says, and the qualifier lands like a warning.
“She doesn’t get left behind. That’s not negotiable, Sam. Not even a little.”
He studies me for a long moment.
Then nods. “We bring her out.”
I hold his gaze until I’m sure he means it.
Only then do I exhale.
“They think I’m dead?”
“Yes.”
“And I can’t tell them?”
“No.”
Sophia’s face hits me without warning, the way it always does. The thought of her hearing it, believing it, and breaking under the weight of something that isn’t even true is hard to take in.
“I need to see her,” I say. “Just once. From a distance. That’s all I’m asking.”
Sam is quiet for a long moment, then he exhales slowly. “From a distance. That’s all.”
I study him again, taking in the gray at his temples and the extra weight behind his eyes that wasn’t there before.
