“Yes.” She kept her voice steady. “Balcony safety. Very important.”
He turned, and something flickered in his eyes—doubt, maybe, or the beginning of a question he wasn’t ready to ask. But he let it go.
“I checked on your bag. Still missing.”
“Oh.” She managed to keep her voice neutral. “Thanks.”
She turned away, moving toward the bed. She’d already built the wall of pillows down the center.
He sat down on his side of the bed, the mattress dipping under his weight. “Last stop tomorrow. Sydney.”
“It only took five days.”
“Felt longer.” He was quiet for a moment. “I’m sorry if we don’t find your Bible.”
Jayden sat down on her side, her back to him, looking at the wall. Why had she told him about that? She’d gotten in too far, telling him about Skylar, the Bible. What had she been thinking?
“It’s okay,” she said quietly. “It’s not really about the Bible.”
“No?”
She turned to face him. He was sitting against the headboard, watching her with those eyes gone dark that saw too much.
“It’s about . . . just knowing that . . .”
Dakota was quiet for a long moment. When he spoke, his voice was rough. “That someone is there. That you’re not alone.”
She swallowed. Nodded. And hated how her eyes suddenly burned. “I don’t know why we were put together on this journey,” Jayden said. “And even if we never find my bag . . .” She reached across the pillow wall, her hand finding his. “Thank you. For being here.”
He turned his hand over, lacing his fingers through hers.
And then she was moving—turning and climbing over the Great Wall, closing the distance between them until she was face-to-face with him.
He went still for half a heartbeat. Then his hand came up to cup her face. “Jay?—”
And then he kissed her. Or maybe she kissed him. Yeah, that was it—her, diving in, arms around his neck, kissing him, hard and not careful, not sweet or easy, but the kind of kiss that came from the real place inside her. Not Jayden the sweet tourist, but Lynx, and maybe all the other aliases that lived in her.
And in truth, the girl at the heart of it all, the one who had yet to be named. But that girl . . . that girl wanted to be seen.
So yeah, it wasn’t tentative. It wasn’t careful. And she didn’t care.
His mouth was warm and perfect, his arms around her protective and, yes, safe, and Jayden felt something tear loose beneath her ribs, something she’d kept locked away for so long she’d forgotten it existed.
He made a low sound and pulled her in, one hand splayed wide against her back like he could hold all of her at once, and she rose into it, kissing him like she could pour every unspoken thing into it. Every truth she hadn’t told him. Every name she’d worn. Every night she’d lain awake on the other side of a pillow wall, pretending she didn’t want exactly this.
For one breathless moment there was no mission, no assassin, no morning waiting to take it all apart. Just his heartbeat against her palm and the dizzying, terrifying freedom of being kissed like she was someone worth staying for.
She wanted this. Wanted him. Not as a cover. Not as a mission. Not as the mark she’d been assigned or the partner she’d been handed or the man she was supposed to be using.
Just Dakota. The way he laughed at his own bad jokes. The way he’d let her build a wall of pillows rather than break his word. The way he looked at her like she was already enough—not whoever the next op needed her to be. Just her.
She wanted the version of her life where she got to keep this. Where there was no morning, no mission, no truth waiting to detonate everything. Where she could wake up beside this man and not have to decide which woman to be.
“Jay—wait.” He pulled back just enough to rest his forehead against hers, both of them breathing hard. His thumb traced her cheekbone, slow, like he was memorizing it. And when she opened her eyes, what she found in his face simply undid her.
He wasn’t guarded. Wasn’t careful. He was looking at her like she was the only thing in the room, in the country, in his whole world. Like he wanted her.
So, why the wait—? She swallowed.
