Chapter 14
Captain Jonathan
The hooded head in front of me is bowed, shoulders rising and falling beneath rough fabric, wrists zip-tied to the steel ring bolted into the floor.
The room smells like oil and sweat and burnt metal, the kind of scent that settles into your lungs and never really leaves.
Fluorescent lights buzz overhead, too bright, too clean for the mess that led us here.
The concrete is still wet in places from rain tracked in on boots, streaked with mud and blood and the black smear of brake dust from the tarmac outside.
They’re calling it a win already.
I don’t feel it.
The op was wrong from the moment we touched down—too dark, too many bodies moving through the perimeter, shadows where there should’ve been clear lanes.
Mikhail doesn’t crowd his operations like that unless he’s hiding something, unless he wants confusion, wants us looking at movement instead of meaning.
And he never lets himself be that close to the line.
Ever. Men like him don’t get caught in the spillover. They build it.
So no. I don’t let myself breathe yet.
If it isn’t Mikhail under that hood, then it’s at least someone who knows something. Someone who bled for it. Someone worth dragging answers out of.
“Bring him in,” I’d said as they dragged the prisoner across the tarmac, boots skidding, resistance violent enough to draw blood from three of my men.
Now here we are.
I step forward, already pulling a cigar from my pocket, rolling it between my fingers while I scratch at my beard, the motion grounding even as irritation coils tight in my chest. I don’t light it.
I just let it sit there, an extension of my mood.
Something to bite down on instead of someone’s throat.
“You put up a hell of a fight,” I say evenly, circling him once. “That tells me you either believe in what you’re protecting… or you know exactly what happens if you fail.”
He grunts. Low. Defiant. Familiar in a way that makes something in my gut twist.
I stop walking.
That’s when I know.
“Take it off,” I say sharply.
One of the operatives hesitates just long enough to annoy me before reaching forward and ripping the hood away.
And the world tilts.
Sam blinks against the light, blood streaking down his temple, lip split, one eye already swelling shut.
He looks like hell—like he’s been dragged through it and then dared to crawl back out—but his mouth curls into a crooked grin anyway.
His hair is plastered to his forehead with sweat and rain.
There’s dirt in the cut above his brow and the kind of exhausted amusement in his face that makes murder feel reasonable.
“Well,” he rasps. “This is gonna be a fun one to explain to Jasmine.”
My jaw locks so hard it aches.
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” I mutter.
Sam chuckles, then winces, clearly regretting it. “If it helps, I was gonna be late either way.”
Anger slams into me, hot and sharp and immediate. “We didn’t grab a single enemy combatant,” I snap, rounding on him again. “Not one. And you’re telling me Seaborn decided to crash my op without bothering to tell anyone?”
Sam shrugs as much as the restraints allow. “We thought you might need backup. Tide said the pattern was solid. Comms were a mess. Guess the memo didn’t land.”
I drag a hand down my face, frustration buzzing under my skin. Mikhail slipping through our fingers again, the chaos, the timing—all of it stacking into one giant, mocking failure. The whole thing feels like a joke told in bad taste, and I’m the idiot still standing here waiting for the punchline.
The door swings open before I can respond.
“Sorry,” Moe says brightly, strolling in like he hasn’t just walked into a nightmare. “Our chopper apparently wasn’t fast enough to chase yours down.”
I stare at him, at Sam, at the whole fucked-up picture of it, and think dimly that I do not need a family reunion right now. Not here. Not like this. Not with Mikhail still out there and Delilah still under my skin like a splinter I can’t stop pressing.
I turn on my heel and storm out before I say something I can’t take back.
The hallways blur as I move, boots echoing off polished floors, my thoughts a tangled mess of rage and strategy and the sickening realization that we’re no closer than we were seven days ago. Mikhail is still free. Delilah is still fragile. And now I have to deal with this on top of—
I pass Larkin’s office and slow despite myself.
Through the glass, I see her pacing, hands in her hair, jaw tight with concentration. And then I see Delilah.
Curled on the couch, knees drawn up, hair a dark spill against the cushion, fast asleep in a way that looks more like collapse than rest. One arm is tucked under her head, the other wrapped around her middle like she’s holding herself together in pieces.
Even asleep, she looks tense. Like she went under by accident, not because she felt safe enough to let go.
Something sharp twists in my chest.
I push the door open hard enough that it slams against the wall.
Delilah jolts awake, eyes wild for half a second before recognition settles in. Larkin whirls on me instantly.
“She’s not mentally there anymore, Jon,” Larkin snaps, already gearing up for a fight. “She lashed out at another soldier, she’s dissociating, and you—”
The cigar slips from my fingers and hits the floor, rolling to a stop near Delilah’s boot.
I don’t look at it.
I look at her.
At the way she blinks sleep from her eyes and rolls them like I’m an inconvenience instead of a walking pressure point. The pain in my chest sharpens into something ugly. Into relief and fury and need tangled so tight I can’t tell one from the other anymore.
“Get out,” I say flatly, eyes still locked on Delilah.
Larkin scoffs. “This is my office.”
“Then go check on the prisoner,” I fire back, finally turning on her. “Because apparently you weren’t mentally there either if you let us drag in Seaborn’s second-in-command and forgot to mention they were joining the op at all.”
Her mouth opens, fury flashing across her face, but I don’t give her the chance to argue. I step closer, lowering my voice just enough to make the point land.
“Go.”
The room goes tense, stretched thin between us. Then, with a sharp glare, Larkin grabs her tablet and storms past me, muttering under her breath as she leaves.
The door slams shut.
Silence falls heavy between Delilah and me.
And I realize, with a bitter clarity, that the mission isn’t the only thing falling apart.
The silence stretches, thick and volatile, snapping under the weight of everything we haven’t said and everything we absolutely shouldn’t.
The office still smells like coffee and ozone and Larkin’s citrus hand cream.
The monitors behind the desk blink quietly, casting low blue light over Delilah’s face.
She sits up slowly, eyes sharp now, too sharp for someone who was curled in on herself minutes ago.
That alone should tell me she’s not fine, that she’s running on adrenaline and stubborn willpower and the kind of survival instinct that doesn’t shut off just because the danger has moved elsewhere.
But all I can see is the way she looks at me—defiant, wounded, daring me to try and cage her again.
“You don’t get to kick everyone else out and then stare at me like that,” she says, voice rough from sleep and something deeper. “Say whatever it is you’re thinking.”
I laugh once, short and humorless. “You don’t want that.”
“Try me.”
That does it. Something snaps clean through whatever restraint I had left.
“You assaulted another soldier,” I bite out. “You’re not cleared, you’re not stable, and you damn sure aren’t stepping anywhere near another op. At this rate, you’ll be lucky if I don’t stick you on medic duty and keep you there until further notice.”
Her feet hit the floor. She’s in front of me in a heartbeat, chin lifted, eyes blazing. Too pale. Too thin. Too alive for the way my chest clenches when she gets this close.
“I am a soldier,” she fires back. “You don’t get to bench me like I’m some liability just because you’re scared.”
I step into her space without thinking. “This isn’t about fear.”
“Then what is it?” She snaps. “Because from where I’m standing, it looks a lot like you deciding when I’m allowed to matter.”
The words hit low. Personal. Accurate in a way I don’t want to unpack. They go straight past rank and reason and lodge somewhere soft I thought I’d already cut out of myself.
“You want to be treated like a soldier?” I ask quietly, dangerously. “Fine. You want that from me?”
Her breath stutters, but she doesn’t back down. “Yes.”
My hand comes up before my brain can stop it, fingers curling into the collar of her shirt, not yanking her closer but making damn sure she understands the line she’s toeing. The fabric bunches beneath my fist. Her pulse jumps hard in her throat. Mine answers like it’s been waiting for an excuse.
“Then I can write you up,” I say, voice low and brutal. “I can strip you of field clearance. I can have you reassigned, isolated, monitored every hour on the hour. I can make damn sure you never see another live op again until I’m satisfied you won’t break under pressure.”
Her eyes darken, something raw flashing across her face. Fury first. Hurt right behind it. “You’d do that?”
“I could,” I correct. “And you know it.”
Her hand connects with my cheek before I even register the movement.
The sound cracks through the room, sharp and final.
For half a second, everything freezes. The sting blooms hot across my face. Her chest is rising too fast. My hand is still in her shirt. Her palm is still half lifted between us like neither of us can believe she did it.
And then—fuck.
I don’t think. I don’t plan. I don’t weigh consequences or morality or the thousand reasons this is wrong.
I don’t give myself time to remember where she’s been, what was taken from her, what any touch might mean now.
I just move on instinct and anger and relief and something uglier, needier, that’s been starved too long to be trusted.
I grab her face and kiss her.
It’s instinctive and reckless and born of too much restraint finally giving way.
Heat and anger and relief and terror collide in one breathless second, and the world narrows to the taste of her and the way she stiffens before melting into it just enough to ruin me.
Her lips are soft and startled and then suddenly answering, and that tiny answer hits me like a detonation.
My grip shifts, thumb against her jaw, the other hand braced hard at her waist without meaning to.
She tastes like rain and sleep and everything I’ve been trying not to want.
And then I’m stumbling back like I’ve been burned.
“What the hell did I just do,” I breathe, hands already dropping, space opening between us like a wound.
Shock slams into me hard and fast. Guilt follows right on its heels. Not the abstract kind. The immediate, gutting kind. The kind that makes every nerve in my body feel wrong.
“I’m—Delilah, I’m sorry,” I say immediately, the words tumbling out rough and urgent. “I shouldn’t have done that. I wasn’t thinking. After everything they did to you, I—fuck, I can’t even imagine what that—”
I stop.
Because she isn’t shaking.
She isn’t angry. She isn’t distant or panicked or folding in on herself the way I expect, the way I dread. She’s not recoiling from me like I deserve.
She’s staring at me.
Wide-eyed. Breathless. Like the ground just shifted under her feet and she’s still deciding whether it’s going to drop out entirely.
Her lips are parted. One hand is still half curled in the air between us.
There’s color in her face now that wasn’t there a minute ago, and the sight of it makes guilt cut even deeper.
That somehow makes it worse.
“Listen to me,” I say, forcing steel back into my voice because if I don’t, I’ll unravel.
“You are not going back out there right now. You’re going to therapy—every session, no excuses.
And until medical clears you, you will be working the med bay.
That’s not a punishment. That’s me keeping you alive. ”
Her jaw tightens, but she doesn’t argue this time. That silence feels more dangerous than yelling ever did. Like the whole room is holding its breath around the thing I just did and the fallout neither of us is ready to name.
“And if you want to help,” I add quietly, meeting her gaze, “that’s how you do it.”
The room hums with unspoken things—what that kiss meant, what it didn’t, and what it can never become.
The air feels thick enough to choke on. Her scent is still on my skin.
My mouth still remembers hers. I hate that I remember it as clearly as I do.
I hate more that some part of me already wants it again.
I turn away before I cross another line, because I don’t trust myself not to reach for her again.
And this time, I know I wouldn’t stop.