Knuckles woke to the wrong kind of warmth—too close, too human, pressing steady against his ribs. It took a few breaths to place it, to climb back through the fog of half-sleep into a world that still hurt to remember. His first thought was that something had gone wrong, that someone had closed distance on him in the dark—but then the weight shifted, slow and small, a breath dragging across his shirt and letting go again. Harper.
The recognition landed with a dull ache. His arm was dead asleep beneath her shoulders, hand caught in the tangle of her blanket, the other still hooked across her waist where it must've fallen hours ago. Every joint protested when he tried to move. The cot groaned under both of them, canvas sagging deep enough to pull them toward the middle, and his back felt like someone had hammered it to the frame.
She was still against him, face turned into the side of his throat, the fine tremor in her breath the only proof she was really asleep. Her hair brushed his jaw, smelling faintly of old soap and smoke—the strange mix that had become their new normal. His shirt was stiff where her tears had dried, salt tightening the fabric over his chest. He hadn't even noticed when he'd gone under—one minute she'd been shaking, the next he'd followed her down, worn out by the sound of it.
The house held its breath with him: a faint furnace hum, a pipe ticking in the walls, wind scraping the eaves outside. Pale light leaked around the curtain seams, silvering cracked plaster and rusted cot legs.
His hand—numb, heavy—rested at the small of her back, the heel of his palm pressed to her spine like he was still making sure she hadn't disappeared. She was warm beneath the borrowed shirt, pulse a faint thrum he could feel through the fabric. He focused on that—on her being alive, breathing, here. Every other thought waited at the edges, mean and sharp, ready to tear it apart the second he let them in.
He exhaled slow, careful not to wake her. Morning crept through the cracks, soft and gray, painting the room in the color of hangovers and aftermath. He felt hollow, scraped clean by too many nights without sleep—but beneath the emptiness something meaner was starting to move, a pulse that wasn't just exhaustion. The kind that came when loss hardened into purpose.
He blinked once, twice, letting the light sting his eyes. His focus shifted—past her shoulder, to the window, to the faint movement of the curtain as the draft came through. Somewhere out there, the Syndicate still breathed. Somewhere, Brock was still in their hands.
Harper surfaced slow, pulled from a dream already slipping away. For a second she didn't know where she was—the air too still, the mattress too narrow, the heartbeat under her ear too unfamiliar. She'd fallen asleep to that rhythm before, but it had always belonged to someone else. For one weightless moment she almost let herself believe—then the scent hit her: detergent, smoke, metal. Not him.
Her eyes opened to gray light and the rough weave of a shirt front, the curve of a jaw dusted in stubble. Knuckles. Memory slammed back all at once—the fire, the drive, the safehouse. Her body went rigid before she could stop it.
He felt it, of course. "Hey," he murmured, voice low, raw from disuse. "You're alright."
She didn't answer right away. Her throat felt scraped out, tongue thick with the taste of sleep and ash. When she finally pushed back enough to look up, his eyes met hers—bloodshot and heavy but steady. There was no shame between them, just exhaustion, two people who'd run out of ways to hold themselves together alone.
The cot creaked when she shifted, pulling the blanket higher. The air had that washed-out morning chill that seeped through every crack in the old house. Somewhere down the hall, someone coughed. Water moved in the pipes. The day was starting whether they were ready or not.
She whispered, "Did you sleep?"
He gave a slow shrug, the kind that meant barely. "Long enough."
She nodded a little at his answer, eyes tracing the lines of the floorboards instead of his face. The boards looked swollen near the wall, water damage maybe, a faint curve where the varnish had bubbled up. Someone had dropped a cigarette once—there was a black scorch mark the shape of a coin. She stared at it like it mattered.
Knuckles breathed out through his nose, slow, then carefully worked his arm from under her. He moved like he was defusing something—inch by inch until her head found the pillow instead of his chest. The cot sighed as he shifted his weight, canvas tightening under him.
He pushed upright with a low grunt, spine cracking, the blanket dragging halfway off them both before he caught it. He tucked it back around her shoulders without thinking, fingers brushing the side of her neck.
"Thanks," she murmured, voice almost gone.
He just nodded, rubbing the sleep from his face. The sound of the city crept in through the window now—faint hum of tires, a dog barking somewhere, early traffic shaking the frost from the street. The world had gone on without them.
Harper drew the blanket tighter and glanced at the window. The glass was fogged near the edges, thin light breaking through in dull streaks. For a second she thought she saw motion outside—just the shadow of someone crossing the yard—but when she blinked it was gone.
A knock came then, low against the doorframe. Kier's voice, rough from sleep. "Coffee downstairs, if you want it. Calder says we can use the kitchen. Try not to break their mugs."
Knuckles huffed a sound that might've been a laugh. "We'll be down."
When the footsteps faded, he turned back. She was sitting up now, legs still tangled in the blanket, hair falling forward as she rubbed her hands over her face. The borrowed shirt hung loose on her, sleeves rolled unevenly past her wrists.
He stopped at the threshold, voice low. "Take a minute if you need it. I'll make sure they don't crowd you."
She nodded without looking up. "Thanks."
He left, boots soft against the wood, the door shutting with a tired click behind him.
Harper stayed where she was. The house settled around her—pipes sighing, someone laughing faintly downstairs, the faint scrape of cutlery on enamel. It all felt foreign, like a world she'd been exiled from.
She pushed a hand through her hair, found dried salt near her temple. The window hummed faintly with the cold outside, and when she breathed, her breath fogged just a little in the chill air.
Outside, an engine coughed to life. The sound vibrated through the floorboards and faded down the street, swallowed by the gray of morning. She sat listening until it was gone.
Then she swung her legs off the cot, feet finding the cold floor, and braced her elbows on her knees. The air smelled of coffee and detergent, of strangers trying to play at normal. She stayed like that for a while, gathering the kind of strength that wasn't really strength at all—just the will to stand.
She would. In a minute.
─•────
Brock woke in pieces. Sound first—the thin insect whine of a ballast somewhere above him, the slow tick of settling pipes, his own breath dragging shallow like a saw catching in wet wood. Then weight—something heavy stacked inside his ribs, each inhale prying at cracked edges. Light bled through his eyelids, the sterile white that made colors feel like lies. He didn't open his eyes yet. He mapped the pain.
Wrists: zip-ties bit to bone, the tape cinched around his thumbs turned to a hard rubber ridge that pinned tendons and killed leverage. Ankles: bound tight, skin raw where plastic had chewed through. Shoulder: a hot nail under the blade. Jaw: glass-tooth throb, tongue tasting old iron. Skull: the deep tide of a bad hit—nausea rolling up, backing off, rolling up again. Every place a boot had found him had its own pulse.
He rolled his head a fraction on concrete, cheek rasping grit, tried a slow breath to test the ribs. Pain flared, held, didn't sharpen into the kind that means puncture. He filed that away. The air carried the flat mineral of cinderblock and the sour ghost of bleach that never quite beat the stains. Same room. Same echo. He could trace the room in his head—the door, the drain, the corners where sound went to die.
He eased his fingers, found nothing to work with. Tape locked his thumbs together so tight the joints felt fused. He could maybe grind the wrist ties against the corner of the drain lip, but the angle would take time and strength he didn't have—and even if he got free, the door wouldn't care. The room was a jar with a lid; all he could do was rattle.
He opened his eyes to the bright and waited out the stab of it. The ceiling swam into focus—hairline cracks like river maps, a bug carcass caught in the acrylic lens over the light. He was on his side, cheek pressed to concrete, the edge of a bruise grinding every time he breathed.
He rolled an inch, then another, muscles trembling from the effort. The zip ties bit deeper when he tried to use his hands; he ended up dragging himself with his shoulders until his spine met the wall. Concrete was cold through his shirt, wicking heat like it owned it. He stayed there a while, breath counting the distance between heartbeats, then let his head rest back against the wall, eyes fixed on the seam where floor met baseboard, and listened for footsteps he couldn't predict.
He didn't know where the others were. The last thing he remembered was Knuckles in the doorway, then cold air, then the sound of tires on gravel that shouldn't have been there. Everything after that was noise and dark and hands. He'd come to in motion—now here. No sign of the cabin, no clue if anyone else had made it out or if they'd gone down trying.
He tipped his head back against the wall, breath fogging faint in the cold. The room hummed with silence, the kind that came before questions. He closed his eyes again, not to rest, just to stop looking at the light.
He lost track of time the way pain always made you lose it—each breath stretching long enough to feel like its own hour. The light never shifted. The air had the weight of underground places, too still to be clean. Eventually, sound slipped in under the silence: a hollow echo through the corridor, boots on concrete, steady and synchronized. Not a guard's lazy shuffle—purposeful, close.
He straightened as best he could, spine finding the wall, pulse drumming behind his ribs. The steps grew louder, then stopped just outside the door. The hydraulic latch gave a soft hiss, the lock disengaged with a solid mechanical thunk, and the door swung open on a spill of colder air.
Roth came in first.
He looked cleaner than the place deserved—dark coat tailored tight to the shoulders, gloves that hadn't touched dirt in years. The fluorescent light flattened his features, made his eyes look like shards of glass in a pale face that didn't sweat or age. His hair was combed back sharp, not a strand out of line. The only concession to the environment was the pistol holstered against his thigh, black as the rest of him. He didn't carry himself like a man expecting a fight. He carried himself like one who'd already won.
Dane followed. Broader, younger, not as careful. His sleeves were rolled to the elbows, forearms mapped with scars, knuckles scabbed from work that didn't need explaining. He moved with a different kind of confidence—loose, amused, the kind of man who enjoyed being close to blood. The grin that flashed under the lights wasn't friendly; it was the reflex of someone who liked seeing a thing brought low.
The two of them filled the room without speaking. Roth stopped a few paces away, hands clasped behind his back. Dane drifted nearer, the soles of his boots grinding dust across the floor. Brock didn't lift his eyes all the way, but he could feel their attention like heat—measuring what was left of him, deciding how much more to take.
Roth's voice, when it came, was calm enough to be almost gentle. "Lawson."
He kept his head low long enough to make them think he might stay quiet, then lifted it just enough that they caught the bruised slant of a grin. "You boys rehearse that entrance, or do you just practice looking bored?"
Dane chuckled, low and mean. Roth didn't.
"Still got a mouth on you," Dane said, circling closer until his boots scraped near Brock's hand. "Surprising, considering how easy you were to bag."
Brock's lip split when he smiled. "Three of you for one half-asleep bastard. Guess I'm flattered."
That earned him another grin from Dane, all teeth and amusement. "We were planning to take all six of you alive," he said, gesturing toward the walls, toward the room itself. "But you know how it is. Only one of these, and it gets cramped quick. And we're not exactly known for our hospitality."
The words landed slow, like stones dropped into still water. Brock's stare lifted fully now, searching their faces for what they weren't saying. Roth's eyes caught his—flat, precise.
"It's unfortunate," Roth said mildly. His tone carried the faint regret of a man discussing broken equipment, not bodies. "Knuckles and the rest—solid men. Efficient. Loyal. The kind you hate to lose." He paused just long enough for the silence to feel intentional. "But things move fast out there. You can take some comfort in knowing it was clean. Quick. No suffering."
He looked almost sincere when he said it. Brock looked at Roth, trying to read him, to see if the bastard truly believed any of it was kindness.
Roth went on, voice steady. "You've been in this business long enough to understand mercy when you see it. We don't make people linger. There's no poetry in pain, only noise." His gaze drifted around the cell, then back to Brock. "They went down without theatrics. No one dragged it out."
Something flickered in Brock's expression, gone before it could harden into anything. A small movement at the corner of his mouth, the muscle along his jaw tightening like a wire. His breath hitched once, shallow, then steadied again, too even to be natural.
Roth tilted his head slightly, studying the tremor that ran through Brock's jaw. "You should be grateful," he said softly, as if he meant it. "Most don't get the dignity of an end that clean."
Dane moved then, restless energy coiling in his shoulders. He shifted a step closer, boot scraping grit across the concrete. "See?" he said, tone light, almost conversational. "We're not monsters, Lawson. Your boys got the quick end. One breath, maybe two. Done. No pain, no panic. You'd have been proud."
He let it hang there, as if the line was meant to comfort. Then his smile changed, slow and lazy, like he was remembering something private.
"But the girl," he said after a pause, voice dropping into the quiet like a weight. "Harper, right? Your girl. The reason for this whole thing falling apart."
Brock's jaw locked, muscle jumping once beneath the bruises.
Dane watched it happen, eyes bright with satisfaction. "She didn't get the quick end," he went on, almost gently. "The boys took their time. Had some fun with her. Said she squealed like a bitch in heat when they took turns." He tilted his head, as if replaying it. "Screamed your name right before they slit her pretty little throat."
The words slid across the room, soft as oil.
Roth didn't interrupt. He only observed, hands still clasped behind his back, gaze fixed on Brock's face.
Dane leaned in another half-step. "You can take comfort in that, too," he murmured. "At least her last thoughts as she bled out alone on that floor were of you."
The air thickened until it hurt to breathe. Brock's stare fixed on the concrete between his boots, seeing nothing, hearing only the echo of her name. His pulse slowed, steadied, the tremor gone from his hands. Whatever had been human in his expression drained out, replaced by a quiet that wasn't calm at all.
Dane crouched until he was level with Brock's face, grin thin and pleased. He rapped the heel of his hand against Brock's cheek a couple of times—not hard enough to leave a mark, just enough to make the skin sting—mocking, intimate in a way meant to humiliate. "Don't worry," he said, soft and almost sweet. "Your turn'll be quick. You've already had a taste of suffering, right? We'll give you the courtesy of ending it clean."
He straightened, boots making a dry sound on the concrete. The smile didn't leave his mouth as he walked a slow arc, eyeing Brock like he was admiring a specimen. "But painless as it may be," Dane continued, voice sliding back into business, "the city'll know. You'll be a lesson. Everyone out there who thinks they can go rogue, who thinks they can thumb their nose at the Syndicate—we'll hang your name where they can see it. Doesn't matter who you were. Commander, loner, whatever—no one comes back from that and keeps a life."
Brock didn't look up. The words slithered in and pooled somewhere cold behind his ribs, and something inside him went very quiet and very precise. His hands, bound and useless, lay still on the concrete; something in his chest shifted from raw ache to a slow, coiling intent. He tasted bile and iron and thought of a hundred small details—Knuckles' grip on a steering wheel, Kier's laugh, Harper's hand on his ribs—and one by one they lined up behind the calm that dropped over him like a lid.
For a beat the room was nothing but the low humming of the light and the sound of Dane's boots as he returned to Roth's side. Roth regarded Brock for a long moment, head tilted slightly, expression unreadable. "That will do," he said at last, voice even, almost bored. "We're finished here."
Dane made a small show of looking disappointed, then nodded and stepped back. The two of them moved to the door, the hinge sighing as it closed, leaving Brock with the noise of the room settling around him—locks clicking, boots receding, the thin scrape of a chair.
The quiet that followed was not peace. It was the measured silence of something that had been catalogued and put away for later use. Brock let it sit. He breathed slow, counting the beats until the ache settled somewhere he couldn't reach.
─•────
The kitchen sat at the back of the house, wide and old, its bones still wearing the shape of another century. High ceilings webbed with cracks, tall windows furred at the edges with condensation, a long scar of morning light crawling across the checkered tile. The walls had been painted a dull cream that couldn't hide the years beneath; in some spots the plaster had bubbled and flaked to reveal older colors—green, ochre, a layer of wallpaper that had once carried vines. A heavy oak table anchored the center of the room, mismatched chairs pulled close around it. Steam rose from a dented kettle on the stove, the smell of burnt toast and cheap coffee thick in the air.
Harper stopped at the threshold, arms folded across her middle. Conversation drifted low across the room—Knuckles and Gage talking logistics near the stove, voices muted under the rattle of cups; Kier slouched at the end of the table, tapping a spoon against his mug in slow, arrhythmic time. Mason stood near the sink with Morrow, sleeves rolled, both of them silent, eyes fixed on nothing. Onyx sat apart on the counter, elbow braced on his knee, mug balanced between his hands. The air smelled of coffee, cold metal, and men who hadn't slept.
Gage glanced up first, his expression unreadable but not unkind. "Morning," he said, quiet enough that it didn't require an answer.
Harper's fingers dug a little tighter into her ribs. The light through the windows made everything look softer than it was, but nothing about the room felt safe—just borrowed.
"Morning," she managed, voice soft, barely more than breath. It caught in the air like dust.
Gage gave a small nod, as if that was all that needed saying. The moment stretched, thin and uncertain, until the sound of the chair legs at the table scraping broke it.
Onyx moved first. He set his mug aside and reached for another, the motion deliberate so it wouldn't startle her. He filled it from the pot, then brought it halfway across the room before stopping, letting her see the offer instead of pressing it into her hands. "It's still warm," he said quietly. His tone carried the gentleness of someone used to handling the injured.
Kier straightened from his lean against the table, chair legs scraping back just enough to make space beside him. "Sit if you want," he murmured. Not an order—an opening.
Mason turned from the sink, drying his hands on a rag that looked older than the house. His gaze found her and stayed there—steady, tired, kind. He didn't smile, but his mouth softened at the edges, that almost-expression he got when words felt useless. A slow nod followed, meant to say we've got you, even if the world didn't.
The kitchen fell quiet again except for the low hum of the furnace and the faint rattle of wind against the glass. Harper stayed in the doorway, one hand on the frame, as if she wasn't sure the floor would hold her. The space between her and them felt measured, fragile.
Knuckles turned from the stove then, wiping his hand on a towel before setting the pot back down. "You should eat something," he said, low, careful. Not a command. A reminder.
She nodded, a motion small enough to miss if you weren't looking, and crossed the few steps to the table. The chair beside Kier scraped back a little as she pulled it in. She sat carefully, arms still wrapped around herself until she realized how much space that left between her and the others.
Behind her, Morrow moved. He didn't say anything, just scraped a plate together from what was left on the counter—two fried eggs gone cool at the edges, a wedge of bread, a few slices of apple someone must've cut earlier. When he set it down in front of her, the fork rattled against the china.
She flinched before she could stop herself. The movement froze him mid-lean; then she blinked up at him, realizing, shaking her head faintly. "Thank you," she said, voice threadbare but steady. A small, fragile smile followed, more apology than gratitude.
Morrow's mouth twitched into something gentle. "You're welcome," he murmured, stepping back toward the counter.
Harper looked down at the plate, then to the mug near her hand. The steam was thin and bitter-smelling; the coffee was black, no sugar, no cream. She opened her mouth as if to ask, then stopped. It didn't matter. She lifted it carefully, took a sip that turned her stomach, and swallowed anyway. Warm was still better than empty.
Harper picked up the fork because it felt expected. The eggs were cold, edges stiff where the yolk had set, but she broke into them anyway, pushing the bite around until she could make herself swallow. The bread went down dry. The apple slice followed, sweet enough to sting. Every mouthful felt like pretending—something her body knew how to do even when her mind didn't. Across the table, no one watched her, but she could feel their awareness anyway, each man pretending not to notice her trying.
The hinges groaned behind her. Calder filled the doorway like the house had been built to fit him there—broad-shouldered, still wearing his coat, hair damp from the morning. His eyes swept the room once, cataloguing faces, posture, the space between them. "Good," he said, voice steady but carrying. "Glad to see everyone's awake. And in one piece."
He crossed to the stove, movements precise, economical. The scrape of metal on enamel filled the pause as he lifted the lid from the pan and slid what was left of the eggs onto a plate. He didn't sit. Just leaned a hip against the counter, fork in hand, watching them over the rim of the plate like a man gauging the temperature of the room before speaking.
Knuckles broke the quiet first, his voice low and measured. "We appreciate you taking us in," he said, glancing toward Calder. "Didn't have to do that."
Calder waved the thanks away with a flick of his hand, already chewing his first bite. "Don't start with that," he said, tone light but clipped. "You'd have done the same if we'd been the ones burned out of a place." He looked up then, eyes passing over each of them—their tired faces, the bruises, the thin space Harper left between herself and the others. "We agreed to look out for each other. This is exactly that."
He set his plate down on the counter's edge and leaned there, fork in hand, watching them. "It's not charity. It's the deal."
Knuckles gave a slow nod, the kind that meant he understood. The kind that also meant we owe you.
Calder's gaze swept the table again, the fork idling in his hand as he spoke. "I know you didn't plan on falling in with us," he said. "That was never the deal. You had your own setup, your own people. But it looks like the Syndicate's decided to make everyone's choices a little smaller."
No one answered. The radiator ticked, a hollow sound in the pause.
"I'm not expecting anything from you," he went on, voice steady. "You don't have to pull weight, don't have to take runs, don't even have to fix what's broke in this place. Just—get your feet under you again." He gestured vaguely toward the door, the street beyond it. "You've earned that much."
He took another bite, chewing while he let the words settle. "If, when that happens, you decide to move on—fine. No hard feelings. But there's space here for as long as you need it. You're safe under this roof."
The word safe hung there a second too long, like everyone in the room knew it didn't mean what it used to.
Onyx spoke without looking up from his mug, his voice low, scraped thin by smoke and lack of sleep. "Far as the Syndicate's concerned," he said, "we're ash. They torched that place clean. They think we all went with it."
The room shifted—chairs creaked, someone's breath caught halfway through a sip.
He lifted his eyes then, meeting Calder's across the table. "And they sure as hell wouldn't guess we're sitting around a kitchen table with the Iron Vultures. If they did…" He let the thought trail off, a faint, humorless smirk cutting through the exhaustion. "Guess that's one advantage we've got left."
Calder's mouth twitched—something that might've been a smile if there'd been anything left to smile about. "Then let's keep it that way," he said. "For now, the less anyone suspects, the better for all of us."
Knuckles leaned forward, forearms braced on his knees, the mug between his hands sending thin trails of steam past his knuckles. "You know just as well as we do," he said, voice low but sure, "once you're in this life, it's damn near impossible to walk away from it. You don't know anything else."
He glanced around the table—Mason, Kier, Onyx, Harper—then back to Calder. "Give us a little time to get our heads straight, but we're not about to sit here like freeloaders. You pulled us out when no one else would've, dragged us out of that forest when it was already burning down around us."
He paused, the weight of what that meant hanging between them. "Least we can do is pull our weight. Help out. Fit in. Whatever you need."
Calder studied him for a moment, something faintly approving in the line of his mouth. "Fair enough," he said.
The room settled on that—quiet, almost accepting. But the silence that followed felt wrong to Harper, too clean around the edges. They were talking about rebuilding, fitting in, starting over—and no one had said his name. Brock's. It pressed behind her ribs like a bruise.
She kept her eyes on the coffee, fingers locked tight around the mug to keep them still. She understood why they couldn't say it. Saying it would make it sound final, like he was already gone. None of them wanted to believe that—not really—but ignoring it felt worse. The absence of his name was its own kind of lie.
Start over. The words rang hollow. There was no starting over while he was still out there. He wasn't dead. He couldn't be. She'd know if he was—she'd feel it, like something tearing loose inside her. The Syndicate had him; that much they all knew. The rest was what they didn't have the stomach to say aloud—that he was alive somewhere, and that the silence in this room was helping no one.
She looked up once, scanning the table. Knuckles, Mason, Onyx, Kier—all of them avoiding the space his name should've filled. Maybe they thought they were protecting her, or themselves. But to her, it felt like they were already practicing life without him. And that, more than anything, made her want to scream.
─•────
The living room had settled into a kind of uneasy comfort—the kind that came from exhaustion more than peace. The TV threw a low, amber glow across the room, colors bleeding over worn furniture and smoke-stained molding. Someone had found a baseball game—late season, tied up in the ninth—and left the volume just high enough to fill the quiet. Kier sat sprawled sideways in an armchair, boots kicked off, tossing popcorn at Onyx, who watched the screen with monk-like focus. Mason had claimed the corner of the couch, one arm hooked over the backrest, eyes tracking each pitch like it mattered. Knuckles and Morrow shared the loveseat, a beer bottle between them, trading small bets under their breath. Rook leaned against the far wall, arms folded, chewing on a toothpick as the inning dragged on.
Harper sat at the end of the couch, legs pulled under her, trying to look like part of the room. The warmth from the TV and the hum of voices filled the space, but it didn't reach her. The sound of the commentator, the sudden bursts of laughter, the small rivalries—it all felt like a world she'd once known but couldn't quite step back into.
When a play went wrong—a line drive turned double out—Kier groaned, Onyx muttered something under his breath, and Knuckles barked a hoarse laugh that made the others follow suit. The noise spiked, familiar and harmless, but it cut through her like static.
She forced a small smile that didn't last. "I think I'm gonna go lay down," she said, her voice quiet but enough to catch Knuckles' glance.
He nodded, the kind of nod that didn't ask questions. "Get some rest," he said simply.
Harper rose, smoothing her hands down the front of her borrowed clothes. The floorboards creaked under her steps as she moved past the couch, the sound of the game—cheers, laughter, the scrape of bottles—trailing her into the hall until the door swung shut behind her. The noise cut off clean, leaving the heavy quiet of the house in its place, thick with the smell of old wood and whatever cleaning powder Calder's people had used to cover the years.
The staircase rose broad and grand through the center of the foyer, the kind of thing left over from another life—carved railings, runner worn thin in the middle, steps that creaked like they remembered better shoes. She climbed slow, hand trailing along the banister, eyes following the faint line of light spilling from the landing above.
At the top, the corridor stretched long and dim, lined with closed doors and framed pictures that had probably come with the house. She turned toward her room—half-expecting the stillness to hold—and flinched when the bathroom door swung open.
Steam rolled out first, curling through the cold air, followed by a woman tying her hair back, dark strands clinging damp to her neck. Vera.
They startled at the same time—Harper freezing mid-step, Vera stopping short in the doorway, hand still on the knob. For a heartbeat neither spoke.
"Sorry," Harper murmured, instinctively retreating a step, shoulders hitching up. "Didn't mean to—"
"Harper, right?" Vera's voice cut gently through the apology, calm but sure, like she'd already decided not to let her slip away.
"Yeah," Harper said, voice barely above the hush of the hall. "Harper."
Vera's eyes moved over her in one slow pass—bare feet, borrowed sweatpants cinched at the waist with a drawstring too long, an oversized shirt hanging off one shoulder. Her mouth twitched, not unkindly. "That the best Calder could scrounge up for you?"
Harper blinked and glanced down, taking herself in as if seeing it for the first time—the faded logo across the shirt chest, the fraying cuff brushing her knuckles, the faint smell of detergent that couldn't quite mask smoke. "It's—" she started, voice catching.
"Come with me," Vera said before she could finish, already turning down the hall. It wasn't a command so much as an expectation, the kind people followed before they thought about why. Harper hesitated only a second, then stepped after her, drawn by the quiet confidence in the woman's stride and the faint trace of warmth spilling from the open door ahead.
Harper followed her down the hall, past the dim bulbs and the threadbare runner, into a room lit by soft, amber light. The warmth hit her first—the faint smell of cedar and soap, of something lived-in but cared for.
A wide bed took up most of the space, the blanket tucked with quiet precision, pillows aligned, a folded sweater resting on the corner. The walls were pale, the floor clean, the kind of tidy that came from routine, not show. A jacket hung over the back of a chair, boots lined neatly beside it.
Hale sat on the edge of the bed, shoulders hunched, thumb scrolling lazy arcs over his phone screen. He looked up when they came in, eyes flicking from Vera to Harper and back again, one brow raising slightly in question.
"Go on downstairs," Vera said, setting a hand on the doorframe as she leaned in. "The boys are still glued to that game."
He grinned faintly, pocketing the phone as he stood. "You kicking me out?"
"Temporarily."
He stepped close, pressed a hand to the side of her neck, and kissed her—quick, familiar, soft enough that it didn't feel like performance. Then he was gone, brushing past Harper with a polite nod on his way out, the smell of smoke and aftershave lingering behind him.
The door clicked shut, and the sound hit Harper harder than it should have. That small, ordinary intimacy landed like a stone in her chest. She hadn't realized how much she missed the quiet mechanics of affection until she saw it mirrored in someone else. For a heartbeat she just stared at the space Hale had left, the air still holding their warmth, and wished she didn't feel its absence like a wound.
Vera caught the shift in Harper's face, the flicker she tried to bury. Her gaze softened. She nodded toward the edge of the bed. "Sit," she said, quiet, not an order.
Harper obeyed without thinking, perching near the corner, hands clasped tight in her lap. The mattress dipped when Vera sat beside her, close enough that Harper could feel the faint heat from her shoulder.
"Sorry," Vera said after a moment, gesturing toward the door Hale had gone through. "He just—" she exhaled, searching for a word that wouldn't sound like an excuse, then let it die.
Harper forced a small smile that didn't hold. "It's okay."
Vera studied her for a long moment—long enough that Harper could feel the weight of it, like being seen too clearly. When Vera spoke again, her voice had lost any trace of small talk. "The one they took," she said carefully. "The—"
"Brock," Harper supplied, the name catching like a bruise in her throat.
Vera nodded once. "Brock," she echoed, then looked at her fully. "I saw your body language out in the quarry. He's yours, isn't he?"
Harper's lips parted, but the words didn't come. Her chest felt too tight for them. After a moment, she managed a small nod—barely movement at all, but enough.
Vera didn't look away. The silence between them stretched, not awkward—just heavy, full of things Harper didn't have the words for. Then Vera's hand lifted, slow and deliberate, and came to rest between Harper's shoulder blades. Her palm was warm through the thin fabric, steady in a way that felt almost foreign.
"I'm sorry," she said quietly. No pity in it, no softness she couldn't stand—just fact, the kind that acknowledged the hurt without trying to fix it. Her thumb moved once, a small, grounding motion. "No one deserves that."
Harper's breath trembled once before she found her voice. "He's alive," she said, the words rough from being held too long. "I just don't know for how long." Her fingers worried at the edge of her nail, small motions that betrayed what her face didn't. The silence stretched until it felt fragile. Then, quieter still, she asked, "Have you ever lost someone you love?"
Vera's brow pulled tight, the lines around her mouth deepening. "Don't talk like that," she said first—instinct, firm but not unkind. But when Harper didn't look up, didn't move, Vera's shoulders eased. She let out a slow breath.
"Yeah," she said finally. "Three years ago. His name was Marcus. Job went sideways, and he didn't make it out." She glanced toward the far wall as she spoke, eyes going distant. "I didn't think I'd crawl out of that hole either. Took a long time. Longer than I want to admit."
Her gaze returned to Harper, steady again. "But I did. You always keep them with you—no matter how much time passes. They don't stop being yours."
Harper nodded, the motion small and slow. Words rose, then dissolved before they could leave her mouth. She knew what Vera meant—too well.
She still talked to Dante sometimes. Not really, not in any way the world would understand—but in dreams, she'd find herself back on the cracked step of the old Viper Den, the neon sign half-dead above them, his elbows on his knees and that same crooked smile waiting for her. She'd tell him everything that had happened since he died. That she was okay. That she was safe now, mostly. Eating, sleeping, breathing. He'd listen like he always had—head tilted, patient, understanding the things she couldn't say out loud. He never judged. He just nodded when she told him about the choices she'd had to make. About the Syndicate. About Skiv. Even about Brock. He understood everything, and supported her through it all.
She cherished those dreams, those talks. They were the only place where guilt didn't chew through her.
But she didn't want to have them with Brock. She didn't want him to be a ghost she met in burned-out places, both of them half-real, trapped in the ruins of what was left. She wanted him here—in the flesh, angry and alive, breathing beside her. She wanted the sound of his laugh, the weight of his voice, the solid proof that she hadn't imagined any of it.
The thought of talking to him the way she talked to Dante made her stomach twist. She didn't think she could do it again—build another life in her head just to keep someone alive inside it. Dante had taken months to fade into something she could visit without breaking, and even now sometimes she still did. She didn't have that kind of strength left for Brock. Loving him as a memory would finish her.
Vera watched her sink into that silence, the kind that folded inward instead of reaching out. After a beat, she pushed herself up from the bed, smoothing her palms over her thighs as if shaking off the weight of the moment.
"Alright," she said, crossing to the dresser. The drawers slid open with a soft wooden sigh, the smell of fabric and cedar lifting into the room. "Now let's find you something suitable to wear." She glanced back over her shoulder, one brow lifting. "What size are you, 00?"
Harper blinked, startled by the shift in tone. "Zero," she corrected quietly.
Vera winced, tugging open another drawer. "Right. Well, you're stuck with size three." She gestured down at herself with a faint, self-aware smile. "But it'll be better than whatever you've got on now."
The corner of Harper's mouth twitched—the first ghost of something that wasn't pain. "That's not a high bar," she murmured.
Vera huffed a small laugh, already pulling a folded shirt free and tossing it toward the bed. "Then we'll start low and work our way up."
She pulled out a soft gray thermal, shook it once, then held it up for inspection. "This one's got actual shape to it. Might not swallow you whole." She tossed it to Harper, who caught it reflexively, fingers sinking into the worn cotton.
"Try that," Vera said, already digging deeper. "And these." A pair of black leggings came next, landing beside the thermal. "They'll be big, but there's a drawstring. You can cinch yourself into submission."
Harper lifted the thermal, turning it over in her hands. It was soft in a way that only came from being washed a hundred times, the kind of shirt that had earned its place in someone's rotation. "You sure?" she asked quietly. "I don't want to—"
"Take your favorite stuff?" Vera finished, pulling out a fleece-lined hoodie and eyeing it critically. "Please. Half this drawer is stuff I tell myself I'll wear 'eventually.'" She tossed the hoodie onto the growing pile. "You'd be doing me a favor. Guilt-free decluttering."
Harper's mouth pulled into something closer to a real smile. "That's not how guilt works."
"Isn't it?" Vera shot back, grinning. "Watch me feel zero regret." She yanked open another drawer. "Socks. You need about six pairs, minimum. Your feet looked like you'd been hiking barefoot through Siberia."
Harper glanced down at her toes—still faintly pink from the cold, tingling as feeling returned. "It felt like it," she admitted.
Vera tossed a balled pair of wool socks at her. "These are the good ones. Don't lose them or I'll hunt you down."
"Noted." Harper caught them, the weight of the gesture settling somewhere warm in her chest. She hadn't realized how much she'd needed this—not the clothes, but the ease of it. The lack of weight in Vera's words. The way she didn't tiptoe around Harper like she might shatter.
Vera pulled out a worn flannel next, navy and gray plaid, fraying slightly at the cuffs. She paused, smoothing her hand over it once before setting it on the bed. "This one was Marcus'," she said quietly. "It's too big on me, but I kept it anyway." She glanced at Harper. "Might actually fit you the way it's supposed to."
Harper's fingers hovered over the fabric, hesitant. "Vera, I can't—"
"You can," Vera said firmly. "He'd want someone to get use out of it. And honestly?" She sat on the edge of the bed, elbows on her knees. "It's been sitting in that drawer for three years. Maybe it's time it did something other than make me sad when I see it."
Harper picked it up carefully, like it might dissolve if she held it wrong. The flannel was soft, lived-in, carrying a faint smell of cedar and something else—maybe cologne, maybe just the memory of a person. "Thank you," she said, voice barely above a whisper.
Vera nodded once, then pushed to her feet, the moment passing as quickly as it had come. "Alright, shoes. What size?"
"Seven."
Vera's face fell. "Shit. I'm a nine." She tapped her chin, thinking. "Rook's got small feet for a guy. Maybe an eight? We can stuff the toes with socks."
Harper let out a surprised laugh—short, startled, but real. "You're going to steal Rook's shoes?"
"Borrow," Vera corrected, already heading for the door. "Aggressively borrow. He'll survive." She paused at the threshold, glancing back. "You good here for a minute?"
Harper nodded, arms full of clothes that smelled like safety and strangers-who-weren't-strangers-anymore. "Yeah. I'm good."
"Be right back. Don't go anywhere." Vera disappeared into the hall, her footsteps fading toward another room.
Harper sat alone in the quiet, the pile of clothes beside her, the flannel still in her hands. She brought it to her face without thinking and breathed in—cedar, cotton, the ghost of someone loved. It didn't hurt the way she thought it would. It just felt like being cared for.
She set it down carefully and reached for the thermal, pulling off the oversized shirt she'd been drowning in. The new one slid over her head, settling against her skin with a warmth that felt almost foreign. The leggings came next—loose at the waist, but the drawstring pulled them snug enough. She rolled the cuffs twice so they didn't drag.
When she looked down at herself, she almost looked normal. Not whole. Not okay. But closer than she'd been an hour ago.
The door creaked open and Vera reappeared, triumphant, holding a pair of scuffed sneakers. "Victory. Rook didn't even notice I was in his room." She dropped them by Harper's feet. "Try those."
Harper slipped them on. Too big, like predicted, but with two pairs of Vera's wool socks layered inside, they held. She stood, testing her weight, and nodded. "They work."
Vera stepped back, hands on her hips, surveying her work. "Not bad. You look almost human again."
Harper huffed a quiet laugh. "Almost."
"It's a start." Vera crossed her arms, expression softening. "How do you feel?"
Harper considered the question—really considered it. The clothes were warm. Her feet didn't ache anymore. The numbness that had settled into her bones in the snow had started to thaw, replaced by something she couldn't quite name yet. Not hope. Not relief. But not nothing, either.
"Less cold," she said finally.
Vera's mouth curved. "I'll take it." She jerked her head toward the door. "Come on. Let's get you some food. You're too skinny and it's starting to personally offend me."
Harper followed her into the hall, flannel folded over one arm, the ghost of a smile still lingering at the edges of her mouth. For the first time since the cabin burned, the future didn't feel like a wall she was walking toward blind.
It still hurt. Brock was still gone. But she could breathe a little easier now.
And maybe that was enough for tonight.