Page 156 of Operation: Defiance

The moment the clasp comes undone, I retreat to the chair. Raine folds the bra and sets it on top of the small dresser in the corner, then climbs into bed, still wearing her leggings and socks.

The music from the living room shifts into something slower. Deeper. I’ll be lucky if I manage five pages of my book before I nod off—even with the chair digging into my back.

“Asher?” She hasn’t picked up her book. Hasn’t settled back against the pillow. As tired as she is, her gaze is still sharp. “You’re hurting.”

The words don’t land as an accusation. Or a question. Merely a fact, delivered with the clarity of someone who’s spent a lifetime reading people.

“I’m fine.”

“You’re compensating,” she counters quietly. “Your left shoulder. And when you stand, you brace your hand on your thigh first. That’s pain.”

Raine has every right to be swallowed by her own recovery, her own trauma, but she sees me so precisely, it’s staggering.

“Risk of the job,” I say. “Nothing I can’t handle.”

She lifts her chin a fraction. “Three nights in that chair isn’t a smart tactical decision.”

She’s telling me she’s ready to be alone. Shit. I don’t like the idea of leaving her—even if I’m only in the next room. Parts of her are still fragile, even as others are coming back stronger than steel. But if she needs to be alone, I won’t argue. “I’ll take the couch. Door open, though. So you can hear the music.”

“No.”

No?

“It’s a king bed. You can sleep in it. Separate sides. Pillow between us.”

“Raine—“

“I won’t panic. It’s my choice, not something I have to accept from someone else. I’ll feel safer—I’ll be safer if you’re not in pain.” Her voice stays calm. Almost gentle. But underneath the softness is fiercely protective care. “I’ll be okay. Because it’s you. And because I want this.”

The hard edges I’ve held onto for most of my adult life start to crack.

“Okay. But if you change your mind⁠—“

“I won’t.” She releases a slow exhale, and her shoulders settle another degree as she picks up her book.

I brace—fuck, she was right—as I stand, retrieve another pillow from the closet, and set it in the center of the mattress. A boundary I won’t cross. One I might need more than she does. Because the trust she’s giving me binds me tighter than any oath I’ve ever taken. And I’d walk through fire to keep earning it.

Three pages in, Raine’s eyelids start to droop. She sets the book on the nightstand, turns carefully onto her left side, and tugs the blankets up to her neck.

A tiny line deepens between her brows. “You never told me the last name you’re using.”

Closing my own book, I meet her gaze. “My last name is Cole. Asher Cole.”

She chews on that for a moment, almost like she’s tasting the shape of it, then goes very still. “That’s…not an alias.”

“No. It isn’t. I used the name Mason Locke when I checked in at the black site. That’s the name they have. It doesn’t trace back to me in any meaningful way.”

The truth of what I gave her churns in her eyes. Something real. Something I don’t share with just anyone.

“You told me your real name. From the start. Before you’d seen my face or knew…anything about me.” The shock in her voice almost does me in.

“I did. Because you deserved it. And there’s no version of this—of us—where I hide from you.”

Her eyes shine—not with tears, exactly, but with the soft realization that whatever this is, we’re in it together.

Chapter Thirty-Three

Raine