Page 116 of The Final Cut

My heart is steady. That is training. The anger beneath it is something else.

Reva shifts Homer in her arms. The cat complains, then immediately shoves his face into her elbow as if he had not been seconds from death and deeply offended by the experience.

“Is it over?” she asks.

“This part.”

Shiloh’s jaw tightens. “Well, that’s a comfort.”

“Accurate.”

Deacon looks at Delia. “Did she know about this location before?”

“No.” Her answer is immediate, then less certain. “I don’t think so.”

“You don’t think so?” Reva asks.

Delia’s eyes cut to her. “I was not briefed on every one of Isabel’s secrets, Reva.”

The sharpness flares, then gutters out almost as quickly.

Reva takes a breath through her nose. “Right. Sorry.”

That apology costs her. I see Delia recognize it.

Deacon steps closer to the window, careful to stay off the direct line. “This was not a strike.”

“No,” I say. “Recon with live-fire testing.”

Shiloh’s mouth goes flat. “That is a fun phrase.”

“They wanted to confirm who was here, what the glass could take, how fast we responded, and whether we would expose exits.”

“And did we?” Reva asks.

I look at her.

Wet hair from the morning now dry around her shoulders. Cat in her arms. Eyes too wide and too bright, anger under the fear. Delia beside her, bandaged and pale, the same shape in a different kind of damage.

“No,” I say. “You stayed where I put you.”

Something flickers in her face—pride, maybe. Relief. A need for praise she would rather swallow glass than admit in front of Delia.

I give it anyway because she earned it.

“You did good.”

Her fingers tighten in Homer’s fur. “I didn’t do anything.”

“You moved low, stayed off the glass, got Delia with you, and kept the cat from becoming orange paste.”

Homer growls at me.

“Heroic,” Shiloh says softly.

Reva looks down at the cat. “You hear that? Try gratitude.”

Delia reaches over and touches two fingers to Homer’s head before seeming to remember herself. The motion is quick, almost hidden, but Reva sees it. So do I.