Chapter 15 Mac #2
She'd been here. In Ma's house. In my room. Had touched my things and left her scent like a signature.
My hands shook as I reached for it—expensive paper with a linen texture.
Inside, a card. Her handwriting.
Wrong approach. The market was theater, not truth.
You surrounded yourself with strangers and called it protection.
But protection means isolation, means proper conditions, means removing damaging elements.
Come alone to the address below, December 18th at sunset, or they all burn.
Your choice. Your family's lives. Tick tock. —V.K.
It was a Concrete, Washington address.
Come alone, or they all burn.
The card slipped from my fingers.
I heard footsteps on the stairs. Eamon called my name.
I couldn't answer. I stood staring at the proof Vanessa Kensington had been in my room.
Eamon entered the room. "Mac? What's wrong?"
I gestured toward the bed.
He crossed in three strides. Picked up the card and read it.
His jaw dropped, and then he looked at me.
"Sit down," he said quietly.
"She was here. In this room—"
"Mac. Sit."
I lowered myself onto the edge of the bed.
Eamon knelt. Put his hands on my knees.
"Look at me."
I followed his request.
"You're not going alone. Ever. Understand?"
"She said—"
"I don't care what she said. We're raiding the cabin tomorrow night. We're ending this before December eighteenth even arrives."
"But what if—"
"There's no what if. We breach, we clear, and we take her into custody. That's the plan."
I looked at his scarred knuckles and callused palms.
"She was in my room," I said quietly. "Touched my things. Left her smell."
"I know."
"Ma's house was supposed to be safe."
"I'm sorry. We didn't watch closely enough. I should have—"
"Don't. She's been making plans for eighteen months. She knew the market was a trap. So she came here instead."
Footsteps marched up the stairs. Michael appeared with Marcus behind him.
"What happened?"
Eamon handed over the card.
Michael's free hand clenched into a fist. "When?"
"Today. While we were at the market."
Marcus took the card and looked at me. "You okay?"
I nodded.
"Claire and Ma need to know. And Clairmont. We need to increase the frequency of surveillance sweeps."
"Already on it," Michael said, texting rapidly. "Sweep team, thirty minutes."
More footsteps. Ma appeared, Claire behind her.
"What's going on?" Ma saw my face. "Cormac?"
Michael handed her the card.
Ma spoke softly. "She was in my house."
"I'm sorry," I said.
"Sorry?" Ma's eyes flashed. "You think I'm angry with you? That woman violated my home. Threatened my family." She looked at Marcus. "Tomorrow night. You're still going?"
"Eighteen hundred assembly. Twenty-one hundred breach."
"Good, because I want to see her in handcuffs."
Claire stood in the doorway, hands shaking.
"Mom," I said.
She looked at me. Her eyes were damp with barely withheld tears. "You're not going alone."
"I know."
"Promise me."
"I promise."
She nodded once. Sharp. Then turned and walked back downstairs.
Ma reached out to squeeze my hand. "We're ending this tomorrow. You hear me?"
"I hear you."
She left. Marcus followed, coordinating on his phone.
Michael lingered. "Sweep team's en route. Until they clear the house, assume everything's compromised." He turned toward Eamon. "Watch him."
"Not planning on doing anything else."
As Michael left, only Eamon and I and the lingering perfume remained.
"Come on," he said. "You're not sleeping here tonight."
"Where—"
"Downstairs. Where there are people." He held out his hand.
I took it.
At the door, I looked back. It was the same room, but now it was contaminated.
I followed Eamon downstairs.
The Christmas tree still blinked. Red. Green. Counting down.
Twenty-four hours until the raid.
Four days until December eighteenth.
And somewhere in Concrete, Vanessa Kensington was waiting.
The sweep team found nothing.
By 10 PM, Clairmont's team had left. Radios murmured from the dining room. Footsteps creaked overhead—Matthew checking windows while Miles walked the outside perimeter.
No one slept.
I sat on the living room couch. My coffee had gone cold.
Rain hammered the windows. Seattle winter rain, sideways and relentless.
Eamon sat beside me. He'd been there two hours, silent except for radio checks.
"I keep smelling her perfume," I said quietly. "Even down here. Chemical-sweet. Wrong."
"Olfactory memory. Your brain's trying to keep you alert. It'll fade. Eventually."
"How long?"
"Depends. Could be you walk into a store next year and someone's wearing it and it hits you all over again."
I smirked. "That's encouraging."
"You asked."
"Tomorrow night," I said. "What happens if she's not at the cabin?"
"Then we keep looking."
"For how long?"
He didn't answer.
The radio crackled. Michael: "Perimeter check complete. Next check in sixty."
"Copy," Eamon said.
"I almost bought you something today," I said. "At the market."
He looked at me. "What?"
"Didn't actually buy it. Picked it up. Thought about it. Put it back." I kept my eyes on the tree. "Leather journal. Small, fits in a pocket. I thought when this was over, I'd go back and get it."
"You don't—"
I looked at him and interrupted. "I keep thinking about Portland. Your apartment with the books and vinyl. About visiting. Seeing you in your space instead of mine."
He didn't respond. Only kept his eyes fixed on me.
"I keep thinking about after," I continued. "When Vanessa's in custody and you're not my bodyguard, whether you'll just leave. Or if maybe there's something else we haven't named yet."
The rain kept falling.
Eamon reached for my hand and threaded his fingers through mine.
"There's something else," he said quietly. "You know there is."
"Yeah. I do."
"And when this is over, we're going to figure out what it is."
"Promise?"
"Promise."
We sat like that for a long time. Breathing through the waiting.
At some point, the Christmas tree timer clicked off. Darkness filled the living room except for the glow from the streetlights.
"You should try to sleep," Eamon said. "Tomorrow's going to be—"
"I know what tomorrow's going to be."
"So sleep."
"Can't. Every time I close my eyes, I smell her perfume. I'm back in that room, seeing the envelope." I squeezed his hand. "I can't sleep knowing she's out there. Knowing there are a thousand ways tomorrow can go wrong."
"We'll stop her."
"You keep saying that."
"Because I believe it."
He was quiet. Then: "Come on."
"Where?"
"Your room. To reclaim it. So it's not just the place she violated. So it's where you pushed back."
I looked at him. His gray-green eyes were steady.
"Okay."
We stood with our fingers still intertwined.
We climbed together—third step, seventh, tenth.
At the end of the hallway, the guest room door stood open, and we entered together.
The perfume had faded. The room felt more like itself.
"Better?" Eamon asked.
"Getting there."
He released my hand. Checked the window—locked. Checked the closet—empty. Checked under the bed.
"Clear," he said.
He sat on the edge of the bed. The mattress dipped. Springs creaked.
"Come here," he said.
I crossed the room and stood before him.
"Sit," he said.
I sat beside him. "I need—" I started. Stopped. "I need something that's ours. Something she didn't touch. Something separate from all this."
"Okay."
"I don't know what that looks like. I—I can't keep living in the countdown. I need—"
Eamon reached out and gripped my chin. "I know what you need."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah."
He leaned in and kissed me.
It wasn't like the first time under the Christmas lights. It wasn't tentative.
He was claiming me. This kiss said: You're mine and I'm yours, and everything else can wait.
I made a sound—half relief and half surrender. I wrapped an arm around him, pulling him closer.
He pulled back just enough to speak. "Lie down."
"Eamon—"
"Lie down."
I shifted backward. The pillows that had held Vanessa's envelope now held my head. Eamon moved beside me, propped on one elbow, looking down.
"What are you—"
"Shh." He traced my jaw with his index finger and then down my throat. It drifted across my collarbone where the wire had sat. "You've been performing for everyone all day. Now you're done."
"I'm not—"
"You are. You control the version of Mac that everyone sees. Make jokes when you're scared. Charm people when you want distance. You've done it so long you don't know how to stop."
My throat closed around a deflection, another joke.
He saw it. "Don't."
"Don't what?"
"Don't perform. Not here. Not now."
His hand slid under my shirt. Palm warm against my ribs. Resting. Feeling me breathe.
"I'm going to touch you," he said quietly. "And you're going to let me. You're not going to reciprocate and make this equal. You're just going to lie there and receive. Can you do that?"
Everything in me wanted to say no. Wanted to take control.
Eamon's hand pressed slightly. "Can you do that?"
"I don't—I've never—"
"I know. That's why you're doing it now."
He kissed me again. Slower. His tongue traced my lower lip before sliding inside my mouth.
When he pulled back, I was breathing hard.
"Shirt off," he said.
I pulled it over my head. The adhesive from the wire had left marks—small rectangles of irritated skin.
Eamon touched them. "Did this hurt?"
"A little. Pulling it off was worse."
"I'm sorry."
"For what? You didn't—"
"But I let you wear it. Let you walk into that market. I'm sorry."
"Don't be. I chose it."
"Doesn't mean I have to like it."
His mouth followed where his fingers had been. Kissing the irritated skin. Gentle. Like he was slowly erasing my memory of the wire.
He touched my ribs with his hands. My stomach. The body I'd trained and controlled, programmed to perform on command.
"You're beautiful," Eamon said quietly. "You know that, right?"
"People tell me that."
"That's not what I asked."