Night fell like a slow knife over Verrin.
The docks were quiet except for the sound of water slapping against concrete and the occasional horn from passing ships. Inside the safehouse, Ava sat cross-legged on the floor with an open laptop, a tangle of encrypted files glowing blue across the screen. Liam stood near the window, staring at nothing, jaw set tight enough to crack stone. Milo sat on the arm of the couch, eating noodles out of a stolen take-out box and pretending not to notice the silence.
He noticed everything.
"His face was on that footage," Liam finally said, voice low. "He's alive."
Ava's eyes didn't leave the screen. "And working for Revenant."
"Don't say that," Liam snapped.
She looked up at him then. The hurt was still fresh in his voice, but the rage behind it was worse. "I'm not saying it because I want to. I'm saying it because that's what the evidence shows."
Milo slurped loudly on purpose. "Okay, not to ruin the drama, but you two are like one sentence away from throwing chairs."
Liam shot him a look. Milo raised both hands. "Hey, don't kill the comic relief."
Ava pushed the laptop aside. She stood and stepped closer to Liam, her voice quieter now. "Liam, listen to me. If Mal is alive, then we can still reach him."
"And if he chose them?"
"Then we make him regret it."
His breath came out rough, like the words cut something open. She didn't touch him yet. She waited. Liam wasn't the kind of man you reached for too soon. He had to choose to let the walls fall first.
Finally, he whispered, "He was supposed to be gone, Ava. I buried him in my head."
She moved closer, close enough that his heartbeat pressed against her shoulder. "Then we dig him out. Together."
Milo cleared his throat. "Not to be the guy who ruins heartfelt moments, but Revenant's network is moving. I got a ping from that tracker I planted on Detective Serious Face."
Ava turned sharply. "Kai?"
"Yeah," Milo said, spinning the small device between his fingers. "He's heading toward Southline District. Guess what's down there?"
Liam's eyes narrowed. "Tell me."
Milo smirked. "The old train vaults. And guess what else? Revenant used to run a blacksite there."
Ava's pulse quickened. "Then that's where we'll find our next lead."
The plan started to take shape in the dark. Ava would infiltrate the vault with Milo's improvised tech rig. Liam would handle the perimeter. It wasn't perfect, but nothing in Verrin ever was.
But before strategy could harden into action, Liam caught her wrist. It wasn't the same touch as before; this one held everything he didn't have words for. Grief. Rage. Need.
"Don't," she whispered.
He didn't let go. "I need to feel something that isn't this."
She met his eyes. And then the silence cracked. Leading her into a room to relax.
Their mouths collided before either of them thought it through. His hands slid under her shirt, fingers finding the lines of her back as she pressed against him, desperate to drown everything they couldn't fix. Her breath trembled against his neck as he backed her against the wall, his heartbeat hammering in time with hers.
She pulled his shirt over his head, nails grazing the scar on his shoulder. He caught her face in his hands and kissed her again, deeper, harder, like a man who needed to anchor himself to something real. She hooked her leg around his hip, dragging him closer until there was no space left between them.
The storm outside rattled the window. His breath caught when her fingers traced the scars across his ribs. He pushed her against the wall, their bodies fitting together like something inevitable. Her soft moan filled the room as he kissed the hollow of her throat.
When he entered her, it wasn't slow. It was urgent, raw, the kind of hunger that comes when tomorrow isn't promised. She held onto him like she could keep the world from burning by sheer will. He moved with her, each thrust louder than the rain, each gasp something neither of them could take back.
The thrusting only kept getting quicker until she started screaming uncontrollably while she orgasmed. She didn't stop there, after Cuming, she quickly pushed him back, went on her knees, and started sucking his dick, her motion was slow and intentional, continuously sucking him until he cum in her mouth. This was a necessary pleasure time for both of them.
They stayed pressed together after, their breathing slowly falling into rhythm. Her forehead rested against his chest. His hand traced small circles on her back.
Milo's voice broke the quiet from the room entrance. "So should I just, uh, clap or something?"
Ava threw a pillow at him without looking up. It hit him square in the face.
Liam laughed for the first time in days. It was rough and short, but real.
Milo cleared his throat. "Okay, hot people, serious part. Tracker says Kai's still moving. He's meeting someone. And if my map is right, we're running out of time."
Liam's hand found Ava's again. This time, it wasn't about heat. It was about war.
"Then let's hunt," he said.
The vault sat beneath the city like a forgotten lung, still breathing in secrets.
Southline District used to be where Verrin stored its trains. Now it was just another graveyard. Rotted metal. Burnt signs. Water pooling in long, silent trenches. The kind of place nobody entered unless they had something to hide.
Liam crouched behind a rusted stairwell, the cold metal biting through his gloves. Ava knelt beside him, night wind tangling her hair. Behind them, Milo was wearing a stolen security vest two sizes too big.
"I feel like a baked potato," Milo whispered.
"Then be a quiet potato," Liam muttered.
Ava stifled a laugh. The tension coiled in her chest loosened just enough to let air in.
Kai's tracker blinked steadily on the small screen Milo balanced on his knee. He was inside the vault already. Not moving. Waiting.
Ava adjusted her earpiece. "We go in quietly."
Milo whispered, "You say that like I know how."
She gave him a look that made him zip his mouth shut. Liam's mouth twitched like he wanted to smile but didn't.
They slipped through the east hatch. The air smelled like iron and old rain. The vault's massive underground chambers stretched out before them—columns of steel, a maze of catwalks, tunnels, and old control rooms. Revenant's kind of playground.
They found Kai near the main platform. He wasn't alone.
A woman in a charcoal coat stood in front of him, face half hidden beneath the shadows. Even from a distance, Ava recognized the stillness in her stance. Not a messenger. A handler.
Kai's gun was at his side. Not raised. Not lowered.
Milo crouched behind a support beam. "Well," he whispered, "that doesn't scream trustworthy."
Liam's voice was ice. "He's meeting them."
Ava's pulse thudded against her ribs. She'd spent months trusting Kai to be the one good line in a city full of broken ones. Now that line was cracking.
The woman stepped closer to Kai. Her voice carried low and clear. "They're getting too close."
Kai's shoulders stiffened. "I told you. I can keep them in sight."
"And when the time comes?"
A beat of silence. Then Kai said, "I'll choose."
Ava's stomach twisted.
Liam's hand closed around her wrist. "Not yet."
But Milo, bless his unfiltered soul, whispered a little too loudly. "Oh, that's bad."
The woman's head snapped in their direction. "We're not alone."
Kai drew his gun. Liam was already moving.
The vault exploded into movement.
Gunfire tore through the metal silence, each shot ricocheting off the walls like a scream. Ava ducked behind a pillar, heart hammering. Milo dove next to her, clutching his radio like it might magically shoot bullets.
Liam charged forward, fast and precise, moving like the fight was the only place his demons didn't follow. The handler fired back. Sparks bit into the steel.
Kai shouted, "Liam, stop!" but his voice was lost in the echo.
Ava spun out from cover and tackled the handler low, knocking her against a support beam. They struggled on the floor, Ava's elbow smashing into the woman's ribs, the handler twisting like a blade.
Liam pinned Kai against the wall, gun to his chest. "Whose side are you on?"
Kai's jaw tightened. "The one that gets us out alive."
"That's not an answer."
Milo crawled toward the dropped comm device, fingers flying across the cracked screen. "Heads up, geniuses," he shouted, "I think she called backup."
Red lights flickered through the tunnels. More boots. More shadows. Revenant wasn't sending messengers this time. They were sending hunters.
Liam decided before Ava could. He pulled her up, grabbed Milo by the collar, and pushed them toward the maintenance tunnels. Kai followed, because of course he did.
They ran through a maze of dripping corridors, the sound of footsteps behind them multiplying. The tunnels narrowed. One wrong turn and they'd be trapped.
Ava glanced back. Revenant's men moved like they already owned the place.
Milo panted. "I really, really hate cardio."
Liam barked, "Keep up."
"Hey, if I die here, I want it on record that I said I hated cardio," Milo muttered.
They burst into an old control chamber, slamming the steel door behind them. It wouldn't hold forever. Sparks from the gunfire outside lit the room like lightning.
Liam rounded on Kai. "Talk."
Kai's breath came in hard. "I'm not working for them."
"You're meeting them."
"I'm inside," Kai said, louder this time. "You think I'd survive this city if I wasn't? I feed them lies. I keep us one step ahead. But it's not perfect."
Ava's eyes searched his. She didn't know if she believed him. She didn't know if she could afford to.
"They wanted a trade," Kai added. "You. Both of you."
Milo made a face. "Well, that's offensive."
Liam's hand hovered over his gun again. Ava stepped between them, her voice low and steady. "We don't have time to argue. They're coming."
And as if on cue, the first blow hit the door.