Jax didn’t look up from the wood taking shape in his hands. “Do what?”
Ghost hesitated, then crossed his arms over his chest. The movement bought him time, allowed him to arrange the words in his head. To make them sound clinical rather than desperate.
“Let them in,” he said finally. “Nessie. The kid.” He paused, the words difficult to form. “How’d you stop expecting it to blow up in your face?”
Now Jax looked over at him. His eyes held none of the judgment Ghost had braced for, only a weary understanding. He didn’t smile, but his voice softened. “You think I stopped?”
Ghost frowned, his brow furrowing. The answer wasn’t what he’d expected. Jax had seemed so certain with Nessie, so steady with Oliver. As if he knew exactly what he was doing, as if he’d conquered whatever darkness had once driven him.
Jax turned back to his whittling, the blade moving in smooth, practiced strokes. “Every day I wake up waiting for the other shoe to drop. For Nessie to look at me and realize I’m not who she thought. For Oliver to get scared and pull away.” He shrugged, his shoulders rising and falling in a resigned gesture. “But I love them anyway. Even if it hurts.”
Ghost considered this. It wasn’t the answer he wanted—wasn’t a formula, a series of steps he could follow to banish the fear that sat like a stone in his gut whenever he thought about letting Naomi closer.
“That doesn’t sound sustainable,” Ghost said, the words clipped.
Jax gave him a sidelong glance. “Maybe not. But what’s the alternative? Push them away? Hurt them first so they can’t hurt you?” He paused in his carving, turning to face Ghost fully. “Trust me, I tried that. It doesn’t work.”
Ghost knew what Jax meant. He’d read the man’s file, knew about his spiral, his crime, the years he’d spent locked away. The price he’d paid for letting the darkness win.
“Nessie knows what I did,” Jax continued, his voice even. “She knows exactly who I was. And somehow, she still chooses to see who I am now.” He resumed whittling, wood shavings falling like snow at his feet. “I don’t deserve it. But I’m done fighting it.”
“And if it ends badly?”
“Then it ends badly.” Jax met his gaze steadily. “But every morning I get to wake up next to her is worth whatever comes after.”
Ghost looked away, his jaw tight. It sounded like madness to him—willingly walking into potential destruction, eyes wide open. The risk assessment didn’t compute. The cost-benefit analysis failed.
“I’m not like you.”
“Thank God for that,” Jax replied. “The world doesn’t need two of me.”
Ghost stared at the agility yard. He didn’t have a response for Jax, at least not one that would make sense if he said it out loud. Jax was right about one thing—Ghost wasn’t like him. Ghost was something else entirely, something carved from darker stone.
River had given up on teaching Goose to fetch and was now lying flat on his back in the mud, the golden retriever’s head resting on his stomach. The dog’s tail thumped lazily against the ground, his entire body radiating contentment despite his complete failure at the most basic retriever skill.
Ghost watched them, something uneasy shifting beneath his ribs. River didn’t care that his dog couldn’t perform. He wasn’t measuring Goose’s worth by his utility, wasn’t tallying skills against deficits. He simply... accepted. Loved. Without condition.
The concept felt foreign, dangerous. Ghost had spent his entire life measuring his own value by what he could do, by how useful he could make himself. To the military. To his handlers. To the operation. Performance was safety. Utility was survival.
And now here was River—chaotic, self-destructive River—showing him another way without even trying.
“She knows what I did,” Ghost said, the words slipping out before he could catch them. “But she doesn’t know who I am.”
Jax set down the piece of wood, his movements unhurried. “Have you given her the chance to find out?”
Ghost’s jaw tightened. No. He hadn’t. He’d kept Naomi at arm’s length even when he’d pulled her from that clearing, even when he’d held her through the nightmares that followed. Physical proximity without emotional access. It was safer that way. Safer for her. Maybe for him, too.
“Some things aren’t meant to be shared,” he said finally.
Jax nodded, not in agreement but in understanding. “That’s what I told myself, too. Turns out, I was wrong.”
Ghost didn’t respond. He watched the wood shavings scattered at Jax’s feet, pale curls against dark earth. Something taking shape through patience and careful removal of what wasn’t needed.
“You know what’s funny?” Jax said, folding his knife and tucking both it and the carved piece into his pocket. “When I first got here, I thought you were some kind of machine. No emotions, no attachments, nothing but ice and efficiency.” He paused, watching X and Kavik’s continued howling with a slight shake of his head. “Took me a while to see that wasn’t true.”
“Maybe you were right the first time,” Ghost said, his voice flat.
Jax snorted. “Sure. That’s why you’re standing here asking me how I let Nessie in. Because you’re a machine with no feelings.”
