The implication sits heavy in the air as he leaves, his men following without a word.
Silence settles again. Thicker now. Heavier.
I look down at Mateo’s body, at the finality of it, and something in my chest finally loosens.
Relief.
Deep.
Complete.
Christian steps beside me.
“Go home to your wife,” he says quietly.
I glance at him.
“If I’m taking over, I should stay.”
He exhales slowly, something almost tired in it.
“Soon,” he says. “You won’t get a choice.”
He looks around the room, then back at me.
“So take the moment while you can.”
There’s weight in that. More than he’s saying.
“Let me clean this up,” he adds. “I’ll hand you something stable to build on.”
I hold his gaze for a second longer, then nod.
Because I understand what he’s doing.
Again.
I turn and walk out.
The drive back feels longer than it should.
The adrenaline is fading now, the burn in my arm sharper, more insistent, but it barely registers against everything else sitting in my chest.
The memory of the safehouse.
The bodies.
The men we lost.
The sound of gunfire still echoing somewhere in the back of my head.
And over all of it, her.
The way she looked at me before I left. The way she said please. The way she felt in my arms. The promise I made to her.
My grip tightens on the wheel as I push the car faster through the empty streets.
Because all of that, all of the death, all of the violence, all of the things I just walked through, it doesn’t make me want distance.
