Kai’s POV


    The safehouse was silent. Too silent.


    Kai leaned against the worn wooden desk, arms crossed, watching the faint glow of a streetlamp filter through the cracked blinds. The room smelled like old whiskey and gunpowder. It suited him.


    Lena was across from him, sitting on the arm of a leather chair, her coat draped over her shoulders again like armor.


    Neither of them spoke.


    His phone buzzed.


    He flipped it open, bringing it to his ear.


    “We found something.”


    Kai’s grip tightened around the phone.


    “The shooter wasn’t some rogue gun for hire. It was a job—someone paid to take her out.” Jesse hesitated. “A lot of money was put on this, Kai. Someone wants her dead badly.”


    Kai’s gaze flicked to Lena.


    Not asking, not interrupting—just waiting.


    His stomach twisted.


    “The payment came through a shell account—bounced through half a dozen dead-end routes,” Jesse continued. “Whoever did this knows how to cover their tracks.”


    His mind was already working, mapping out the possibilities, the enemies, the threats.


    But none of that mattered right now.


    someone still wanted her gone.


    “You want us to keep digging?”


    “No.” Kai’s voice was quiet, dangerous. “I’ll handle it.”


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    He ended the call.


    The silence stretched between them.


    “I assume that was your men.”


    Kai didn’t respond.


    She leaned back slightly, rolling her shoulder as if she wasn’t still bleeding beneath that coat.


    The way she tilted her chin slightly upward, the way she kept her breathing measured—controlled. Like she hadn’t just heard someone had put a price on her life.


    That should have concerned her.


    It didn’t.


    Because she already knew.


    His jaw clenched. “Who are you running from, Lena?”


    “I told you—I’m not running.”


    “Bullshit.”


    She arched a brow.


    Kai pushed off the desk, stepping forward. Slowly. Deliberately.


    She held her ground, but he caught it—the flicker of something in her eyes. Not fear.


    Something worse.


    The ghost of old wounds she wouldn’t let heal.


    “You’re not surprised someone hired that shooter,” he said, his voice low, measured. “Which means you knew they were coming.”


    Lena exhaled sharply, shaking her head. “You don’t get to do this.”


    “Do what?”


    she snapped. “Act like you still get a say in my life.”


    The words hit harder than they should have.


    He knew her games. Knew when she was trying to steer the conversation away from something real.


    “Lena.”


    She didn’t move. Didn’t blink. But her fingers curled around the edge of her coat,


    “Who the hell still wants you dead?” His voice dropped lower, quieter.


    Lena inhaled.


    Then she did what she always did.


    She lied.


    “I don’t know.”


    Bullshit.


    He could hear it in her voice, see it in the way she wouldn’t quite meet his eyes.


    Five years ago, he would have let her have that lie.


    Not anymore.


    His patience snapped.


    He closed the distance between them in one slow, deliberate step. Close enough that she had to tilt her chin to keep her gaze level with his.


    “You were shot,” he said. “Left for dead. You survived. And then what, Lena? You just decided to disappear?”


    Her jaw tensed.


    “You knew someone would come for you eventually, didn’t you?”


    Silence.


    Her throat worked, her breathing uneven for just a second.


    “Who?” he pressed. “Marius?”


    Her lips parted, just slightly.


    There it was.


    A reaction.


    A crack in the mask.


    Lena pulled back, shaking her head. “It doesn’t matter.”


    Kai’s grip shot out before he could stop himself, fingers wrapping gently—but unyieldingly—around her wrist.


    “Don’t do that,” he murmured.


    Her pulse thrummed against his fingertips.


    Fast. Unsteady.


    She wasn’t as unaffected as she pretended to be.


    “Don’t lie to me,” he said.


    Something flickered in her eyes. Something sharp, something vulnerable, something that looked like—no.


    She shut it down before he could name it.


    Her expression went cold. “Let go of me, Kai.”


    He did.


    he was done asking.


    Kai stepped back, grabbing his jacket from the desk.


    Lena frowned. “What are you doing?”


    He didn’t look at her as he shrugged it on.


    “Making sure you don’t get yourself killed.”


    Lena’s eyes narrowed. “What the hell does that mean?”


    “It means you’re not going anywhere.”


    A muscle in her jaw flexed.


    “It is now.”


    He met her stare evenly.


    She was  He’d rather she be furious than dead.


    “You don’t get to decide what I do,” she said, voice sharp.


    “Then stop making decisions that get you shot.”


    Silence.


    Her fingers twitched like she wanted to grab something—


    Too bad.


    Kai turned toward the door.


    “You’re staying,” he said over his shoulder. “Whether you like it or not.”


    Then he walked out, pulling the door shut behind him.


    And for the first time in five years—


    Lena was trapped.