The war room was dim, only one strip light humming overhead. Brock sat hunched at the table, elbows planted, fingers dug into his brow like he could press the night back out through his skull. The coffee in front of him had gone cold, a thin film sheening the surface. His eyes were rimmed red, shadows sunk deep beneath them, his shoulders carrying the kind of tired that settled into bone and stayed.
The door swung open on a low creak. Nolan came in fresh, hair still damp, shirt clean, the bite of soap hanging faint around him. Two cups rode his hands. He set one in front of Brock, kept the other, and dropped into the chair across the table from him.
"You look like shit," he muttered, straight-faced.
A sound slipped out of Brock that never made it to a real laugh. He wrapped both hands around the cup, as if the heat might find its way back into him. "Barely slept."
Nolan took a drink, watching him over the rim. "How's she doing?"
Brock's thumb dragged along the seam of the cup, slow, back and forth. "Slept most of the night. I woke her when I was supposed to. Checks were rough at first, but she got quicker each time. Better by morning." He swallowed once, eyes dropping to the table. "Got her into the shower. She—" he let the breath out through his teeth. "She panicked. Hard. But I got her calmed, back down. She's steady now."
Nolan leaned back, lips pressing thin. "Christ." He gave a small shake of his head. "Not surprised, but still… fuck."
Brock stared into the steam, then lifted his eyes. "She said a name. Skiv. Think that's who he was."
Nolan gave a short nod before answering. "I grabbed his wallet on the way out. It lines up. Cole ran the intel this morning—data we pulled puts him on the Black Maw roster about two weeks after we burned the Viper den." He took another swallow of coffee. "She didn't freeze in the fight. She saw a ghost."
Brock sat back, the chair creaking. His shoulders pulled tight, a line forming between his brows. "Makes sense." He let a breath sit in his chest before he added, quieter, "Doesn't make it easier."
The door opened again, firmer this time. Vex came in as precise as ever, jacket squared, eyes taking in both men before he even shut it behind him. He didn't sit at first, just crossed to the table and set a folder down flat.
"Walk me through last night." His gaze flicked from Brock to Nolan, landing on the latter.
Nolan straightened, coffee set aside, tone clipped. "Started routine. We got in clean—no alarms, no eyes. Voss went up into the vent like planned. Brock and I cleared the hall. Server room had one hostile—she was already overhead, and we couldn't warn her down in time." He leaned forward, elbows to the table. "She dropped into the room, froze a second. He took her quick."
Vex's face didn't move. "And then?"
"Door was magnet-locked. Took a minute to kill the circuit, but we forced it. By the time we got inside, she'd already turned the fight around and had him down. She was in bad shape, barely conscious, but alive." Nolan's eyes narrowed. "We got her out clean. She's sore, rattled, but Graves has her stable. She'll be fine."
Vex's eyes narrowed. "Why did she hesitate?"
Nolan didn't flinch. He pulled a driver's license out of his pocket and slid it across the table. "Because it wasn't just some Maw grunt. I pulled this off him before we left, and then we pulled his records. Cole traced it this morning. His name was Skiv. Turns out he used to be a Crimson Viper. He showed up on the Maw's roster about two weeks after we burned the Viper den." His voice stayed flat. "She saw a ghost. That's why she froze."
Vex nodded once, slow. His eyes slid to Brock. "I thought we tagged all the Vipers."
His fingers tapped once against the tabletop, then stilled. "One slipped through." He leaned back, voice low but firm. "She dropped into that room and saw someone she knew. Not a face from a file. Someone who'd trained with her, eaten with her, had her back. Door was locked, no one on her shoulder, just the two of them."
He held Vex's gaze. "She had options in there. They were both Vipers once. They knew each other. If she'd wanted to walk with him, or turn that room, that was her window, especially with us locked on the other side. She didn't take it. She stayed with us and finished the job."
Vex studied him a moment, gaze steady, measuring. Then he nodded and turned back to Nolan. "The data?"
Nolan lifted a small drive between two fingers. "Got it all. Rosters, shipment logs, movement schedules. Enough to gut half their network. Cole and Price are still sorting, but it's clean. Enough to choke them down."
A flicker of satisfaction touched Vex's face. He took the drive, turned it once in his hand, then pocketed it like it already belonged there. His eyes cut back to Brock.
"First of two jobs down for Voss," he said. "Despite her hesitation, I will count this as a success." His tone stayed even, but there was no mistaking the verdict. "In a few weeks, we will be moving the stolen weapons shipment out of the city. I expect resistance. That will be her last job, assisting with the escort. I'll call it then."
The words settled like weight. Weeks. That was the span Vex had just handed her.
Brock's mouth set, but he gave a single nod. His fingers closed around the edge of the table, holding there. Across from him, Nolan's eyes met his for a breath, understanding passing in the silence, before they both looked back to Vex.
"In the meantime," Vex went on, "get her healed. Get her stronger. Back into training. I want her ready when the call comes."
His gaze settled on Brock a beat longer. "That applies to you too. You look like hell. Take the day off the line. Sleep, shower, reset. I want both of you sharp when the escort rolls."
Brock's fingers tightened once on the table, then eased. "Yes, sir."
Nolan gave a short nod of his own. "We'll have her ready."
The room held quiet for a moment—the faint hum of the light overhead, the soft scrape as Vex stepped back from the table. He gave one last look at each of them, a small acknowledgment more than a farewell, then turned and left the way he came, the door clicking shut behind him.
** ** **
Brock eased his bedroom door open with his shoulder and let the hinge close on its own hush. Afternoon light slanted through the blinds, cutting a pale stripe across the floorboards and the slope of the bed. Harper had shifted since he left her. The pillows had slouched low, the cold pack slid off, hanging half against the quilt. Her body had folded small, knees drawn, hands tucked to her throat like even sleep hadn't convinced her it was safe. The quilts covered uneven—one foot buried, the other dangling bare at the seam of the mattress.
He crossed the floor quiet, scanning her without thought—lips still pink, breath moving even, bruises darkening but not swelling out of shape. He sat on the edge of the mattress, let his weight slope the bed slow so she wouldn't jolt, and set his hand gentle on her shoulder.
Her lashes flickered. Her eyes cracked a slit, unfocused, then a hard flinch ran through her—shoulders jerking tight, chin twitching like she meant to guard her throat. For a moment it was as if she didn't know him.
"Hey," he whispered, low and steady. "It's just me. You're alright."
Her gaze climbed to his, wary, pupils wide in the stripe of light. Then recognition hit, her mouth trembling before it stilled. Something in his face had gone tight when she startled, but as she eased notch by notch under his hand, that tension bled out, brow smoothing, mouth loosening.
"Talk to me," he said, careful. "How's your throat?"
Her fingers brushed the bruise at her neck. "It hurts," she managed, voice shredded but clear enough.
He gave a small nod. "Alright. Any dizziness?"
Her eyes slid side to side, testing. "No."
"Good," he said, softer this time. His palm stayed warm on her shoulder. "Breathing feel alright?"
She drew in a breath, winced, let it out. "It's okay."
"That'll get better with time." His shoulders dropped a fraction. He lifted the pillows back into place so her head stayed clear, pulled the blanket up over her ribs where it had slipped, smoothing it down slow, his hand lingering. His eyes never left her face.
Silence pressed, broken only by the hum of the building and light slicing in through the blinds. He let it stretch until the weight demanded words.
"You did good last night," he said. His voice carried weight but no edge. "You went in alone. He put you down hard. You still turned it and came out alive. That doesn't happen if you lose your head."
Her mouth shook. "No." The word scraped out of her. Her head gave a tight shake. "I—hesitated. Almost—" the word stuck; she swallowed jagged. "Almost got killed. Almost fucked the job." The apology tore up raw, scraped bloody. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry I can't seem to get any of this right, I just—"
"Stop," he cut in, before she could dig the hole deeper. He shifted closer on the mattress, crowding the distance so she had to see him, couldn't tuck it away. "No." His tone locked it. "I heard the name you said. Skiv, right?"
Her eyes lifted—wet, edges raw, fighting like hell against the tears. She gave one small nod and pushed herself up, like the weight wouldn't let her stay flat.
Something in his face tightened, then set. "I'm sorry," he murmured, and it carried. "I'm sorry it was him. That he was there. That he made you fight for your life when every part of you knew him." He held her gaze. "You never should've had to make that call. But he chose where he stood. Once he put his hands on you, it stopped being about what he used to be. You did the only thing that kept you breathing."
His hand on her shoulder firmed, just a fraction. "That's not fucking the job. That's finishing it."
Her face crumpled. Whatever she'd been holding behind her teeth finally broke. The first sound out of her wasn't even a word, just a torn-off breath that hitched and folded in on itself. She jerked like she could swallow it back, head shaking hard, hands clawing up over her mouth as if she could shove it all down where it lived.
It didn't work.
The next sob ripped through her palms, raw and ugly, scraping its way out of her chest. Her shoulders bucked with it. Another followed, then another, each one worse, tearing its own path. The noise was too big for the room, too big for her. It sounded like it hurt.
Brock felt it land in his chest like impact. His gut twisted tight. Every instinct screamed at him to close around her, to clamp it all down until she couldn't shake like that, but Graves' voice cut through the panic in his head—ribs, throat, head—so he held himself still for one stunned second, fingers flexing uselessly against the quilt.
"Hey," he tried, the word rough, nothing like the calm he meant. "Harper." It didn't touch her. She was somewhere else now, somewhere with metal and smoke and faces he couldn't see.
Her whole frame convulsed, a sob tearing out that sounded like it scraped skin from inside her ribs. She folded in on herself, elbows to her knees, hands over her face so hard her knuckles went white. The tendons in her forearms jumped with strain. The sounds coming out between her fingers weren't shaped enough to be language.
That was when he moved.
He caught her wrists first, not grabbing, just easing them down so she could breathe. Her hands fought him for a second, fingers hooked, then gave, sliding into his grip. He drew her forward, slow and deliberate, letting her feel every inch so she didn't spook, until her forehead bumped his chest.
His muscles went stiff for a heartbeat. He hadn't done this in years. He couldn't remember if he ever had.
One arm went across her back, careful of her ribs, the other set at her shoulder to keep her throat clear. He held her in, not tight but solid, making himself a brace so the shaking landed on him instead of jarring her. Her sobs broke against his sternum, wet and brutal, each one dragging her whole body with it.
Her fingers found his shirt and latched on, twisting hard, bunching the fabric in both fists like she needed something to tear. Her nails bit through cotton and into his skin. He let them. The tremors running through her passed straight into his bones.
Tears soaked through his shirt in an uneven patch, hot and fast. Snot smeared, saliva dampened the fabric where her mouth crushed against him when she tried to smother the worst of it. She failed. The sounds still punched out of her anyway—gasps that caught high in her throat, broken cries she tried to choke back until they turned into coughs and dragged more pain through her neck.
He tightened his arm across her back, just enough to keep her from folding in on the sore places. His other hand shifted and hovered at the back of her head for a breath, fingers spread, not quite daring, then settled, threading into hair, steadying her there.
His jaw clenched and he made himself unlock it. Air in. Air out. He looked past her shoulder to the blinds, to the strip of light on the wall, anything to keep from staring down at how small she was curled against him. He had yanked people out of firefights, patched bullet holes with his own hands. This felt worse. There was nothing to stitch, nowhere to put pressure.
Names started spilling out between sobs, tangled and half-swallowed.
"Lena—" It broke on the vowel. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry."
"Dante—couldn't—I tried—"
"Wedge, Rico, I should've—" The rest dissolved into a raw noise that shook her down to the spine.
He didn't know who they all were, not the way she did, but he knew what they were: ghosts she'd never given room to breathe. Every time her shoulders hitched and another one tore out of her, something in his chest pulled tighter.
His first instinct was to tell her to stop, to breathe, to get control. He swallowed it. Control was what had kept this welded shut for weeks. Control had packed those names into a box and shoved it into the back of her mind until it rattled.
"Harper," he got out instead, low against her hair. His voice sounded strange in his own ears. "You're here. With me. I've got you." It felt clumsy in his mouth, but it was all he had.
She didn't answer, just dragged in another jagged breath and poured more of herself out into his shirt. Her arms shot higher, locking around his ribs, clutching like a man overboard. The force of it dragged him a fraction closer, almost off-balance, but he set his weight and held.
His breath stuttered once, chest catching where hers hit, and he forced it back into something steady. If she had nothing else, she could have that. He made his lungs slow down on purpose, each inhale measured, each exhale drawn out, giving her a rhythm to crash against. His hand at her back moved in small circles she probably didn't even feel, more for him than for her.
"You never got to say it for them, did you." The words slipped out before he could stop them, quiet and rough at the edges. "All of it at once like this. Lena. Dante. All of them. Skiv." He said the last name softer. The list tasted like ash. "Too many names to pack down alone."
Her reply came out as a strangled sound that might have been yes. Or no. Or just pain. Her body shook so hard his teeth clicked once.
He shut his eyes for a heartbeat and let the ache bite through his own chest—faces, files, the choices he'd made that had set her on every one of those paths. Then he shoved it back where it belonged and stayed where he was, a wall around something shattering that he'd helped break.
"You're allowed to hurt for them," he said, voice low against her hair. "All of them. You held it too long." His hand at her back pressed a fraction firmer. "Doesn't change what you lived through. Doesn't take that from you."
He drew a steadier breath, setting it for her to follow. "Right now I just need you here. Breathing. The rest…" His jaw worked once; he swallowed whatever wanted to come next. "We'll carry it."
She fell apart against him for a long time. He lost track of how many breaths he counted, how many times her lungs seized and he had to remind her with his own. Whenever her voice tried to climb into apology again he felt it in the way her chest hitched, in the half-formed "I'm sorry—" that cut off on his shirt, and he answered the same way every time, low and firm into her hair.
"No. You're here. That's enough."
Gradually the sobs tore themselves out to the end. The sounds thinned to broken hiccups, then to rough little pulls of air that still shook her ribs but no longer cracked open. Her fists loosened in his shirt, fingers uncurling by degrees, leaving damp creases behind. Her weight sagged, spent, against him, and she kept her face buried against his chest as if she could bury herself there to forget it all. He didn't move, didn't try to pry her loose. If hiding in him was all she had left, he could hold that too.
He stayed right there, still as stone and just as stubborn, even when his knees started to complain and his back knotted from the angle. He didn't shift, didn't look at the clock, didn't reach for his own ghosts. His hands stayed where they were—one at the back of her head, one across her back—holding her together until the trembling softened into occasional aftershocks and her breath, finally, finally, fell into something like a rhythm again.
Only then did he let his eyes close, just once, his chin resting light in her hair while he stood watch over whatever pieces she had left.