Page 188 of Operation: Defiance

I hate how thin my voice sounds. Needing someone…wanting someone…I’m not prepared for it. But this is what he does. What he’s always done. I can’t expect him to give it up.

“No,” he says, his voice firm. “The request was off. The phrasing, the timing, the urgency. I can’t prove it was fake, but I have my suspicions. Whoever sent it wasn’t looking for Eddie. They were looking for me.”

All the warmth the stew brought fades in a single breath. “GSD connected Eddie to Mason Locke.”

“Maybe. I’ve made other enemies in my life. It could have come from one of them. But the timing is suspicious. So I burned Eddie. He’s gone. Government records, bank accounts, credit, work history…that’s what I was doing this morning.”

“But…if he was one of your original covers… Asher, you can’t get that back again.”

He shrugs. “No. But keeping him could have led GSD right to us. I won’t take that risk. I’m here now, Raine. Operationally…and more. Wherever this goes—with us—that’s where I want to be.”

Something inside me shifts, and the cold knot in my stomach loosens. He’s choosing this. Choosing me. I wish I was brave enough to tell him what that means to me.

Chapter Forty-Five

Asher

After the dishes are done, I return to the couch and boot up the laptop. Burning Eddie was a choice I’d make again in a heartbeat. I won’t put Raine in any more danger than she’s already in.

But if GSD really did track Eddie through Mason, they could be onto any of my other aliases. Including the one whose shell company owns the lease on this apartment.

At the table, Raine is copying codes and system messages from this morning’s files into a notebook. The layout is clean. Lines, arrows, notes, all perfectly aligned in rows and columns. A pattern only she could build.

I run a final check on Eddie. No results. Good. Everything I buried stayed that way. No surprises. There’s one more thing I have to do before I check on Tessa.

It takes me almost an hour. By the time I’m done, anyone who even breathes near the shell companies tied to this apartment or the one in Bellevue will light up half a dozen tripwires before whoever’s asking knows what they’ve found.

I log out of everything and bring up a map of downtown Seattle. She’ll be safe here until I get back from checking on Tessa and picking up Raine’s fresh ID from the dead drop. But that doesn’t mean I can leave without worry.

She notices the second I push up from the couch, placing her pen directly above the notebook, shoulders tight, and swiveling in the chair. “You’re…going to check on Tessa?”

“Yes. I need to make a grocery run too.”

Her thumb drifts to her index finger. But the moment they touch, she stifles a wince.

Sinking down next to her, I cover her left hand with mine. “Raine? What are you looking for?”

“I told you. Patterns in these escalations⁠—”

“No. There.” Nodding toward her hand, I shift until her thumb and index finger are free. “You keep reaching for something. I’ve seen you do it every day—multiple times— but I didn’t want to push.”

After a sharp inhale, she drops her gaze and almost…deflates. “I had a ring. It wasn’t anything…expensive. Or particularly meaningful. I bought it a few years ago. Just a band with a bunch of tiny lab-grown diamonds all around it.” She sighs, her shoulders curving inward. “I told you I have issues with textures…”

“Beef and pork. Seams. Synthetic fabrics. Some sounds. Silence.”

With each one I name, her eyes widen a little more. “You’ve been keeping track.”

“I live here.”

That earns me something that might almost be a laugh. “Fair enough.”

“So…the ring? You don’t have to explain. I just…want to know you.” It’s the simplest version of the truth. But not the uncensored one. I do want to know her, but I also want to undo all the damage Coherent Path did to her.

“The diamonds were tiny. Not much more than chips. But the way they were set…the texture was uneven. Like…pebbles. I should have hated it.” Her voice splinters around the edges, and she balls her left hand into a fist. “But it was predictable. Calming. Every time I touched it, I knew exactly what I’d feel.”

“And now you don’t.”

“They took everything.” That last word is a harsh whisper, and she swallows a soft sound, not quite a sob, but close. “My clothes. They cut them off me rather than remove the restraints. And the ring… To them, it was just something else to strip away.” After a long moment, Raine lifts her chin, her voice steadying. “My body hasn’t…adjusted yet. It will.”