Mendez's voice crackles through my earpiece. "Agent Mathieson, we've lost visual on all targets. Permission to expand search perimeter?"
I press the button to unmute. "Maintain current position," I reply, mind racing with implications. "I need to... assess something." Then I mute my team again.
I study Fen's face for any sign of deception. The early morning light catches on his features, highlighting the angles of his cheekbones and jaw, the impossible shine of gold in his eyes. "You're sure about this?"
"As sure as I am that you look beautiful even when you're glaring at me." His mouth curves into a smile that makes my stomach flip like I'm sixteen again. "Which is to say, completely."
Heat rises to my cheeks. "I'm not glaring."
"You are." He reaches out, his finger hovering just above the furrow between my brows. "Right here." The almost-touch sends waves of anticipation cascading through me, as if my body is leaning into contact that hasn't yet happened.
"Shut up," I mutter, refusing to acknowledge how his almost-touch makes my skin come alive even more, every nerve ending standing at attention like soldiers awaiting orders. "I'm trying to think."
"A dangerous pastime."
"Not as dangerous as flirting with a GUIDE agent." The words slip out before I can stop them.
His smile widens. "So you admit we're flirting?"
"I—" Damn it. "That's not what I meant."
"Isn't it?" He shifts imperceptibly closer, his thigh now pressed against mine, generating heat that seeps through layers of tactical gear straight to my skin. "Your heart rate increases when I'm near. Your pupils dilate. Your skin flushes." His voice drops to a whisper, intimate as a lover's confession. "I can hear it, see it, and smell your interest."
"That's..." Disturbing? Invasive? Embarrassingly accurate? "...irrelevant." I struggle to maintain my professional composure, though every cell in my body seems to be gravitating toward him like iron filings to a magnet.
His eyes never leave mine, gold rimmed with something darker, hungrier. "I think it's very relevant."
I look away first, uncomfortable with how easily he reads my physiological responses, how effortlessly he slips past defenses I've spent years building. "These hellhounds," I say, steering back to safer ground. "If they're hunting souls, why have there been no deaths reported here?"
"Yet," Fen corrects. "No deaths yet. But they wouldn't be here without purpose." His expression darkens. "Like moths to flame, they're drawn to something wicked brewing beneath the surface. Something hidden."
Below us, Sutter trips over debris, cursing loudly as he sprawls across the cracked concrete. Mendez rushes to help him up, their movements awkward and uncoordinated. Against invisible, supernatural predators, they don't stand a chance.
"If what you're saying is true," I say slowly, "then we're wasting time and resources on the wrong target."
"Precisely." Fen's approval shouldn't please me, but it does, a warm glow in my chest that has nothing to do with the sunrise now painting the eastern sky in shades of gold and crimson.
I make a decision and press the button to unmute again. "Agents," I call into my comm. "Return to rendezvous point."
"But ma'am," Sutter protests, "we haven't contained any of the targets."
"That's because you can't," I reply, already forming my plan. "Report back for debriefing. I'll explain there."
I mute them again and turn to Fen, who watches me with interest, those golden eyes seeming to catch fire in the growing daylight. "You need to go."
His eyebrow rises in challenge. "Just when the conversation was getting interesting?"
"My agents will be here in five minutes, and I'd rather not explain your presence." Or why I'm consorting with exactly the kind of being I'm sworn to hunt.
He stands in one fluid motion, making it look effortless, like gravity is merely a suggestion rather than a law. "Fair enough. But we're not finished with this conversation."
"Clearly." I rise as well, maintaining a deliberate distance between us, though the electrical hum beneath my skin seems to pulse in protest at the separation. "If what you're saying about these hellhounds is true, I need to convince Hayes to let me stake out this complex properly. Find out what's really happening here."
Concern flashes across his features, genuine worry that makes something in my chest tighten. "Alone?"
"It's the only way I'll get approval," I say. "Hayes already thinks I'm distracted, unfocused. If I come with a solid lead about suspicious activity here beyond 'rabid dogs,' he might give me the assignment, but he won't waste other resources on it. This is my chance to redeem myself, to climb back from the professional abyss I've been cast into. Besides, I work better alone."
What I don’t say is that without other agents watching my every move, I won't have to pretend and hide the abilities that make me both valuable to GUIDE and a target if they ever discovered the truth.
