I breathed in deep.

  Then knocked.

  “Come in.”

  His voice cut through the door like a blade. Short. Commanding. Not welcoming.

  I stepped inside.

  Eren sat behind a sleek desk, scrolling through my file like it bored him. He didn’t even look up at first. His sleeves were rolled to the elbows, revealing forearms dusted in scars and Dominion marks I didn’t want to look at too closely.

  When he finally spoke, his eyes didn’t even meet mine. “Early.”

  “Figured I’d make a strong first impression,” I replied, crossing the threshold with more confidence than I felt.

  He glanced up then, eyes sharp, jaw tight. “Spilling drinks wasn’t enough?”

  The sarcasm landed like a test. I didn’t flinch.

  “I didn’t expect you to remember that,” I said, stepping closer.

  His mouth curled—not into a smile, but something colder. “Hard to forget someone who makes such an impact.”

  I stood my ground as he set the file down and finally gave me his full attention. Those flame-shadow eyes pinned me in place, unreadable but heavy with something just shy of judgment.

  “I didn’t ask for a cadet,” he said, voice flat. “Especially not one with baggage.”

  I raised an eyebrow. “Guess that makes two of us.”

  Something flickered across his face. Not amusement. Not quite anger. Just heat—banked and controlled, but dangerous. “You’re here to shadow, observe, and not get in my way.”

  I folded my arms. “If you wanted someone quiet and compliant, I’m not sure why they picked me.”

  “They didn’t,” he said. “The system did. Doesn’t mean I’ll keep you.”

  It landed like a slap—blunt and deliberate.

  I bit the inside of my cheek and nodded slowly, keeping my voice even. “Are you planning to reassign me before or after you learn my name?”

  He leaned back slightly, watching me like I was a puzzle missing a piece. “You think attitude’s going to help you here?”

  “No,” I said, taking a step forward. “I think letting someone talk down to me like I’m still seventeen isn’t going to help me either.”

  There it was. The ripple. The one that passed through his expression when I said something that surprised him.

  He didn’t like being challenged.

  Too bad.

  Because I wasn’t the girl he remembered.

  And I wasn’t here to play nice.

  He shifted in his chair, the heat in his eyes replaced by something colder. More clinical. “We’re not here to be friends,” he said. “You show up on time. You follow orders. You don’t talk unless it adds value.”

  I didn’t blink. “Understood.”

  He continued, voice even, almost bored. Like this was just another checklist. “You’ll report directly to me. No detours. No oversharing. This isn’t a classroom. This isn’t a simulation. I’m not here to nurture potential—” His gaze flicked to mine. “—I’m here to get results.”

  I let the words settle. Let the sharpness of them land and slide off my skin. “Then I’ll give you results,” I said quietly.

  A pause.

  His jaw tightened. “I’ve seen cadets like you.”

  I held his gaze, even though my throat had gone tight again.

  “My son⁠—”

  He stopped.

  Just like that.

  A clean, brutal silence sliced through the air between us.

  My body reacted before I could stop it—a shift in my shoulders, a tightening of my breath, like something had grabbed me from the inside and squeezed.

  His eyes narrowed. “I know you were together.”

  His voice was low now. Rougher. Like something fragile and dangerous was sitting just under the surface.

  I didn’t speak.

  Not at first.

  Just met his gaze and held it like it might break me if I looked away.

  I didn’t nod. Didn’t deny.

  He leaned back in his chair, every movement measured, precise. The desk between us suddenly felt like a chasm. His fingers steepled in front of him, the flicker of something unreadable tightening in his jaw. “I’ll be putting in a request to have you reassigned,” he said. “Our history is too complicated.”

  The words hit like a punch wrapped in silk.

  For a second, my stomach dropped—fast and hard.

  But I didn’t let it show.

  I straightened my spine, anchored my breath, and said, calm as anything, “What if you didn’t?”

  He blinked. Just once. No visible reaction.

  But something in the room shifted.

  I took a step forward—slow, deliberate. Not pleading. Just… there. “What if you let me prove myself? No reassignment. No safety net. Just a chance.”

  His eyes met mine fully then. Not dismissive. Not cold.

  Just assessing.

  Like I was a calculation he hadn’t quite finished.

  The silence stretched, taut with everything we weren’t saying. Every shard of the past hovering like broken glass between us. My breath was steady, but my hands curled against my sides, fingers tight with restraint.

  Then—finally—he exhaled. Short. Frustrated.

  “Fine.” He leaned forward again, voice clipped. “One week. One case. You mess up once, you’re out.”

  I didn’t hesitate. “Deal.”

  Chapter

  Eight

  I settled into the chair across from Eren’s desk, fingers flying over the keyboard as Dominion logs and case reports filled the screen. Line after line of categorized data scrolled past—timestamps, flare patterns, field notes that weren’t mine. I’d spent the entire morning organizing case files like some kind of glorified admin. It was beneath me. We both knew it.

  But I didn’t complain.

  I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.

  Across the room, Eren sat like carved stone—still, sharp, unreadable. His eyes flicked between reports on his tablet, face unmoved, the flicker of Dominion-light from the screen casting harsh shadows across the angles of his jaw.

  The silence stretched between us, taut and deliberate.

  He hadn’t spoken since I walked in. No direction. No mentorship. Just tossed me a login code and got to work. It was clear he had no interest in training me. I was here to prove myself worthy of occupying space.

  Fine.

  I straightened my spine and kept typing, determined not to fidget even as frustration scratched at the edges of my calm. This wasn’t what I’d signed up for. I hadn’t clawed my way back from everything just to spend my first week sorting trauma into neat, color-coded categories.

  After another stretch of silence, I finally broke.

  “Am I going to be shadowing real cases anytime soon?” I asked, voice smooth, just shy of biting. “Or is this just a lesson in how to alphabetize trauma severity?”

  He didn’t look up. Not right away.

  But I saw it.

  The smallest twitch at the corner of his mouth.

  “Consider it training,” he said coolly. “Dominion Authority doesn’t need cadets with flair. It needs order. Precision.”

  A not-so-subtle reminder: This was his world, not mine.

  I bit the inside of my cheek. No reaction. No crack. Just a slow inhale as I kept typing.

  Was this how he planned to test me? Strip away the fieldwork and drown me in minutiae? Bury the girl with wings in spreadsheets and silence?

  I was about to fire back—something smart, something sharp⁠—

  Then the screen in front of him pinged.

  A single tone.

  But it cut through the quiet like a Dominion flare igniting the air.

  His head snapped up. Eyes narrowed. The flicker behind them wasn’t annoyance this time—it was focus. Recognition. Maybe even something close to curiosity.

  He tapped twice, pulling the alert into view.

  I stilled.

  Because something had changed.

  The room shifted—just slightly—but I felt it in my chest.

  Whatever that notification was… it wasn’t routine.

  And for the first time that morning, Eren Thorne looked interested.

  I rose without thinking, my chair scraping softly against the floor as I stepped toward him drawn in by the quiet ping that had changed everything.

  I stopped just behind him, close enough to read the alert flashing on his screen, close enough to catch the scent that clung to him—smoky and sharp, like charred cedar and cold steel. Clean, crisp. But underneath it, something warmer. Human.

  It didn’t help that he didn’t look up. That he just kept reading, letting the tension build in the space between us like kindling waiting for a spark.

  Civilian found deceased in apartment.

  No visible injuries. No forced entry.

  No Dominion flare signatures recorded at time of death.

  My breath caught.

  The name hit next.

  Finn Belgrave.

  I braced a hand on the edge of his desk before I could stop myself, fingers curling against the smooth surface.

  “Finn Belgrave,” I said, quietly.

  Eren’s hands paused over the keyboard. His eyes lifted, sharp and precise, cutting straight through me. “You know him?”

  “I met him last night.” My voice stayed steady, smooth on the outside even as my heart thudded once, hard. “He worked at Pulse. He made me a drink.”

  His eyes didn’t narrow, but something in his expression tightened. Like the case had just shifted in weight. Like I had.

  I saw it—how fast his mind moved. How fast he started calculating. Mapping connections. Reassessing variables. Including me.

  I wasn’t just his cadet anymore. I was a link.

  Then another ping broke the moment. His eyes dropped to the screen again, and a second later, he sat back in his chair with a sound that wasn’t quite a sigh.

  “Looks like this is your test,” he muttered. Then, he looked at me again. “I’ve been assigned the case.”

  My stomach flipped—sharp and sudden—but I nodded once, anchoring myself in the moment.

  A new kind of silence stretched between us now.

  Not disapproval. Not dismissal.

  Just tension.

  Tight. Electric.

  And laced with something that felt like inevitability.

  The car was too quiet.

  Not awkward, just… rigid. Like everything in Eren’s world, it had edges. Clean black interior, faint scent of ozone and something mechanical. The kind of vehicle that didn’t allow for snack crumbs or casual conversation.

  I sat in the passenger seat, hands folded neatly in my lap as the city passed in flashes of light outside the window. Eren drove like he did everything else—focused, sharp, and like anyone who got in his way should already be bracing for impact.

  After several blocks of silence, he spoke.

  “At a scene, you follow my lead. You don’t speak to civilians unless I say. You don’t touch anything unless I tell you. You observe. That’s it.”

  I turned my head toward him, slow, deliberate. “So I’m a ghost with a clipboard?”

  He didn’t look away from the road. “You’re a liability until you’re not.”

  Wow. Warm and fuzzy as ever.

  “Charming,” I muttered under my breath, mostly to myself.

  “Professional,” he corrected.

  “Tomato, tomahto.”

  That earned me a brief glance. “This isn’t the academy, Cadet. This is real.”

  I gave him my best innocent smile. “I know. That’s why I dressed accordingly and left my glitter eyeliner at home.”

  He didn’t laugh. But his grip on the steering wheel eased slightly, and that was something. “Don’t get distracted. Don’t make this personal.”

  “Noted. Professional ghost with clipboard. Fully detached.”

  He exhaled, just short of an actual sigh. “I’m serious.”

  “So am I,” I said, gentler now. “I get it, Agent Thorne. This isn’t a game. I’m not here to play hero. I’m here to work.”

  He didn’t answer, but his silence had a different weight now. Not cold. Just… considering.

  I turned back to the window, letting the city blur into motion.

  One case. One week.

  Let him throw rules like fire.

  I’d meet every one with light.

  The apartment felt like a snapshot caught mid-breath—upscale but lived-in, styled with care but cluttered at the edges. There were throw blankets still rumpled on the couch, half a stack of coasters on the coffee table, a light jacket slung casually over a dining chair. It spoke of long nights, quick mornings, and the rhythm of someone who worked late but always came home.

  A space built for comfort. Not for endings.

  Eren stood near the threshold, scanning the room with sharp, practiced eyes. He didn’t move like someone curious—he moved like someone already ruling things out. Efficient. Cold. Focused.

  I stepped in after him, slower, letting the air settle against my skin.

  Something about this place didn’t sit right with me. It felt too present. Like he’d just stepped into the next room.

  The overhead lights flickered—barely—but enough to throw shifting shadows across the floor. The kind that made everything feel just a little surreal.

  “Dominion sensors read flatline,” Eren muttered, glancing down at the device in his hand. “No echo signature at all.”

  That caught me.

  I turned toward him, brows drawing together. “That’s… weird.”

  Dominion left residue. Always. Even the smallest flare had aftershocks. A total flatline didn’t happen unless…

  It was scrubbed. Or suppressed.

  I knelt beside the coffee table. A half-finished drink still sat there, dark amber and sweating slightly under the flicker of light.

  I touched the glass with one gloved finger. Cool. Condensation still clinging to the sides.

  “Looks like he was just here,” I murmured. “Didn’t even finish his drink.”

  I tried to keep my voice neutral, but there was a tension building in my chest. Not grief—something else. A wrongness I couldn’t name yet.

  Eren was already moving, eyes sweeping from the walls to the floor to the far end of the room.

  My gaze drifted toward the front door. A pair of sneakers sat neatly by the mat—broken in from long shifts but well-kept. Positioned carefully, not like someone tossed them off in a rush.

  “He wasn’t planning on going anywhere,” I said, more to myself than to him.

  “No signs of struggle,” Eren agreed, voice low. Then he stepped closer to the body—still, quiet, crumpled in the armchair like he’d dozed off and never woke up. He leaned in. “But…”

  He reached for the collar of Finn’s shirt and tilted his head gently to one side.

  I followed, stepping closer—and there it was.

  A small, circular burn at the base of his neck. Faint. Precise. The edges tinged with a faint violet shimmer, like the aftermath of Dominion activation. But it didn’t look wild. It looked surgical.

  Controlled.

  “What do you make of that?” I asked, my voice steadier than I felt.

  Eren didn’t answer right away. His frown deepened, the tension gathering in his jaw. “Could be Dominion-related,” he finally said.

  But I saw the shift in his expression. The unease under the analysis.

  Someone did this.

  And they knew exactly what they were doing.

  I crouched beside the coffee table again, letting my gloved finger trace the rim of Finn’s glass. The condensation was still there, clinging in tiny droplets like it had been waiting for someone to notice. The chill seeped into my fingertips—cool, eerie, too fresh for comfort.

  Behind me, I could hear Eren pacing the space with calculated purpose. Every step sounded deliberate, each pause a judgment. The silence between us wasn’t empty—it was heavy. Pressed against my ribs. Wrapped around my throat like it didn’t want me to breathe too deep.

  “Check this,” Eren called, his voice slicing through the quiet.

  I looked up and found him standing by a small side table near the window, one drawer hanging slightly open like it had been disturbed recently. He reached in without hesitation, pulled something out, and held it up to the light.

  I stood, curiosity tightening in my chest, and crossed to him.

  A small vial glinted between his fingers. Clear glass, maybe two inches long, with a dark residue clinging to the inside like smoke sealed in crystal.

  I knew what it was before he said anything.

  “Dominion suppressant,” he said flatly. “Not standard issue.”

  I stared at it. Not in fear—just with that quiet kind of realization that clicks into place and makes the whole world tilt.

  “That’s illegal without clearance,” I murmured. “Why would he be hiding that?”

  “Because someone wanted to suppress his Dominion,” Eren said. His jaw flexed. “Or he did.”

  My stomach dipped, but I kept my voice steady. “Suppressing your own Dominion is risky.”

  “So is drawing attention. If he was hiding something… or someone was hiding something inside him…”

  He trailed off, studying the vial like it might start speaking if he stared hard enough.

  “It’s not just residue,” I said, glancing at the faint shimmer along the glass. “It’s active. Recently used.”

  That got his attention. He looked at me, really looked, and gave the smallest nod. “Good eye.”

  Two words. That was it. No praise, no warmth. But something passed between us then—recognition. Not of skill. Of awareness. Of the fact that whatever we’d just found… this was bigger than a bartender with a quiet life and a half-finished drink.

  Something was buried here.

  And we’d just started to uncover it.

  Chapter

  Nine

  I straightened, drawing in a quiet breath as I turned to face Eren again. He stood near the window, arms crossed, still and sharp as ever, but something in his shoulders had shifted. He wore the case now. The way field agents did. Like weight disguised as control.

 

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