The bullet struck Leander's vest and broke two ribs.

He tried to stand.

I pushed him back down.

"Check," he said.

"I am checking."

"No blood."

"You were shot."

"Occupational hazard."

"Your occupation is spreadsheets."

Eli freed his hands with the broken chair leg. Mara groaned on the floor.

Water rushed somewhere below us.

"Four minutes," Luca said. "The archive controls are on sublevel six."

Leander caught my sleeve. "Go."

Every bad lesson I had ever learned demanded that I stay. Guard the wounded. Kill the threat. Accept the loss.

Leander pushed the silver key into my hand.

"Finish it."

I looked at Eli. "Can you get him upstairs?"

The boy nodded.

"Mara?"

He looked at the woman who had helped build us.

"She can walk."

Mara smiled through pain. "You won't leave me."

I stood.

"Watch me."

I ran.

The stairs spiraled into colder air. Water poured beneath the door at sublevel six.

The silver key opened it.

Rows of servers filled the chamber. Screens showed names, ages, locations, prices. Children reduced to inventory.

At the central console, a progress bar climbed.

PURGE: 62%.

Luca appeared on one monitor.

"Plug your earpiece into the blue port."

"It doesn't have a plug."

"The wire beneath your watch."

I looked at my empty wrist.

I had given it to Leander.

"Alternative?"

"Manual transfer. Black drive in the console. Pull it after I say."

Water reached my ankles.

The progress bar hit seventy.

I found the drive.

"Not yet," Luca said.

Lights died one row at a time.

Seventy-eight.

Water reached my knees.

"Luca."

"Wait."

Eighty-six.

The chamber doors began to close.

"Now!"

I pulled the drive.

The screens went black.

The doors stopped with a gap no wider than my shoulders.

I forced myself through.

Water slammed into the stairwell.

I climbed as the lower levels vanished.

At sublevel three, the stair door jammed.

At sublevel two, the emergency lights failed.

At sublevel one, I heard the elevator cables snap.

I reached the loading floor as the concrete buckled.

Celeste dragged me through the outer doors.

We hit the pavement.

Behind us, the terminal collapsed into its flooded foundation.

Leander sat against the armored van while a medic cut open his shirt.

He saw me.

His entire body changed.

I crossed the yard.

He stood despite the medic's protest and wrapped both arms around me.

This time, neither of us pretended it was an inspection.

"You came back," he said into my hair.

"You left the light on."

Eli sat inside the van with a blanket around his shoulders. Mara had escaped during the evacuation, but the black drive held every name she had tried to erase.

Within forty-eight hours, federal agents raided seven Acheron sites. Celeste released the Cross records to prosecutors and the press.

Cross Holdings stock collapsed.

Leander lost his board seat before breakfast.

He read the termination notice in bed while I changed the bandage over his ribs.

"Regrets?" I asked.

"The severance package is insulting."

"I know a man with excellent benefits."

"Does he require references?"

"Only flexibility."

He caught my wrist and kissed the inside of it.

The gesture silenced me faster than a gun.

"The companion contract," he said. "It ends today."

I set down the gauze.

"You're firing me?"

"I'm removing the only reason you might question why you're here."

"The money was a strong reason."

"Rowan."

He placed the contract on the bedside table beside a metal tray.

Then he lit one corner.

Flame consumed clause twelve, clause seventeen, the severance terms, and the handwritten promise about the door.

I watched the paper turn black.

"Permanent how?" I asked.

"No contract. No performance. No photograph. You and me."

"Health insurance?"

"Yes."

"Paid vacation?"

"Yes."

"Exclusive access to your bed?"

His composure slipped.

"Immediately."

I smiled.

"Then you have a deal."

He kissed me carefully, ribs and all.

Mrs. Alvarez entered with soup, saw everything, and set the tray down with unnecessary force.

"Not while he is injured."

"We were negotiating," I said.

"Negotiate quietly."

Leander's laugh shook against my mouth.

For the first time in years, the sound of a locked door did not follow me into sleep.

The week after the terminal collapse, reporters camped outside the hospital.

Leander's room filled with flowers from politicians who denied knowing him and fruit baskets from criminals who knew better.

Luca ate both.

Celeste arrived with legal documents and no patience.

"Adrian is cooperating," she said. "The board removed you. Federal attorneys want three interviews and a miracle."

Leander adjusted the blanket over his ribs. "Give them two."

"You no longer control the schedule."

"Then why are you here?"

Celeste smiled. "Habit."

She placed a second folder on my lap.

The cover read HALE SECURITY INITIATIVE.

"What is this?"

"Restitution," Leander said.

I looked at him.

He had funded a trust for the rescued children, independent of Cross Holdings. Eli's name appeared first on the advisory board.

Mine appeared second.

"You made me a director."

"You can decline."

"There are meetings."

"Probably."

"I kill people who invite me to meetings."

Celeste checked her watch. "That may improve attendance."

When she left, I moved to the window.

News vans crowded the street below.

"You planned this before the terminal," I said.

"I hoped there would be assets left to fund it."

"And if you went to prison?"

"Celeste had instructions."

"You plan your own destruction with disturbing professionalism."

Leander held out his hand.

I crossed the room and took it.

"I planned for you to have work worth staying for," he said.

"You don't get to decide what keeps me."

"No."

He pulled gently until I sat beside him.

"What will?"

I looked at the bruises across his chest, the hospital bracelet, and the peppermint hidden in the drawer where nurses would not confiscate it.

"Ask me when you can stand without swearing."

"That may take months."

"Then practice."

He leaned his head against mine.

Outside, cameras waited for a monster and a king.

Inside, we shared terrible coffee and said nothing for a long time.