“Yes.”
“Why.”
I shift my gaze toward her again, then back to the room.
“Because pressure shows where things break,” I say.
“And if it breaks us,” he asks.
“It won’t,” I reply.
“You sound sure,” he says.
“I am,” I answer.
He studies me for a moment, then nods once, like he’s decided something internally.
“You’re changing,” he says.
“No,” I reply. “I’m adjusting.”
“That’s not the same thing,” he says.
“No,” I agree. “It isn’t.”
The room hums around us, systems running, voices low, movement not as smooth as it used to be, and I can feel the shift running through all of it, subtle but constant.
I look at the data again.
Then at her.
Then at everything in between.
And for the first time, I’m not just thinking about what works.
I’m thinking about what could.
CHAPTER 15
STACY
Idon’t go to him right away, and that’s the first mistake I don’t make.
Instead, I let the tension sit where it built, in the quiet spaces between movement, in the way people avoid looking directly at me but still track where I am, in the way the room breathes differently now that my name has weight attached to it. The air in the corridor feels cooler than it should, thin enough that every inhale sharpens instead of settles, and I keep walking until the noise of operations fades into something distant and manageable.
By the time I reach his quarters, I already know this isn’t about strategy anymore.
I step inside.
He’s there, exactly where I expected him to be, standing near the console with his back half-turned, the low glow of the display cutting across the lines of his shoulders. The room carries the faint scent of metal and something warmer beneath it, something that lingers instead of dispersing, and I feel it settle into me the moment the door closes behind me.
“You’re getting comfortable,” he says without turning.
“I am comfortable,” I reply.
That earns a shift, subtle but immediate, his attention sharpening before his body follows.
“That’s not safe when amongst Reapers,” he says.
