Chapter 16 Felix
Felix
The duvet was my fortress. My cave. My tomb.
I’d been under here for… God, how long? Hours? Days? The thin shaft of sunlight creeping through the gap in my curtains suggested Sunday morning, but time felt meaningless when the entire world had imploded.
My phone buzzed against the mattress for what felt like the thousandth time. Another missed call from Lily, probably. The notification sound had become a form of torture, each buzz a reminder that the outside world still existed whilst I lay here like some sort of broken hibernating animal.
You’re mine, Felix.
Kit’s voice echoed in my head on repeat, the words burning through my skull like acid. The way he’d said it. So certain. So final. Like it was some cosmic truth I’d been too stupid to understand.
You’re my mate.
I pressed the heels of my palms against my eyes until I saw stars. This couldn’t be real. People didn’t just… they didn’t just belong to other people. That wasn’t how the world worked. There had to be some degree of choice!
Images surfaced—Rory and Theo. The way they looked at each other like the rest of us were background noise. The way they moved around each other like two parts of the same machine. Was that what Kit thought we were supposed to be?
No. Absolutely not. It must be a glitch. Someone like Kit wasn’t supposed to end up eternally bound to someone like me.
Kit was… Kit. Built like he could bench press a small car, with those storm-grey eyes that made hardened criminals confess their deepest secrets.
He moved through the world with the kind of quiet confidence that came from knowing exactly how dangerous he was.
When Kit walked into a room, people noticed. When he spoke, people listened.
And me? I was the person who tripped down stairs, spilled coffee on myself daily, and had once got so flustered during a team meeting that I’d accidentally referred to our secure server as “sexy” instead of “stable.” I was the one who lived on energy drinks and existed primarily in basement lairs surrounded by glowing screens.
My idea of exercise was frantically typing to meet a deadline.
We weren’t even in the same league—hell, we weren’t even playing the same sport.
The universe had clearly made some sort of cosmic coding error. Like when you accidentally assigned the wrong data type to a variable and suddenly your elegant algorithm was trying to multiply a string by a floating-point number. The whole system just… broke.
Someone like Kit was meant to be with someone equally formidable. Someone who could match his intensity, his strength, his unwavering competence. Someone who wouldn’t flinch when he looked at them.
Not someone who hyperventilated in crowds and often needed explicit written instructions to understand social cues.
My stomach lurched, and bile rose in my throat.
How was I supposed to face him tomorrow? How was I supposed to walk into Killigrew Street, sit through our Monday meeting, pretend everything was normal whilst knowing that Kit was absolutely determined we were soulmates. That he had been… what? Watching me? Following me? Stealing my clothes?
The hoodie. Jesus Christ, the hoodie.
My face burned with mortification, remembering Kit fumbling through his reassurances that he’d done “nothing weird” with it.
Umm… thanks?!
I’d have to phone in sick tomorrow. Tell Seb I had food poisoning or the flu or something. Another day to sort my thoughts out. Anything to avoid—
The doorbell rang.
I froze under the covers, holding my breath like that might make whoever it was go away.
Silence.
Then it buzzed again, longer this time. More insistent.
I dragged myself out of bed, my legs wobbly from lying horizontal for so long. My reflection in the hallway mirror was horrifying—hair sticking up at impossible angles, yesterday’s clothes wrinkled beyond recognition, eyes red and puffy.
The intercom crackled when I pressed the button.
“Hello?” I whispered, my voice hoarse.
“Felix? It’s me.”
Priya.
“Oh.” Relief flooded through me, followed immediately by panic. “Is this about…?”
“Buzz me in, Felix.”
I hesitated, finger hovering over the button. Did she know? Had Kit told everyone?!
“Felix,” Priya’s voice came through the speaker again, gentler this time. “Please.”
I buzzed her in.
Minutes later, Priya appeared in my doorway, bundled up in her purple scarf, ponytail particularly harsh today. She meant business.
“Oh, Felix.”
I led her into the living room and collapsed onto the sofa, pulling my knees up to my chest. Priya settled on the other end, her eyes drifting hopefully towards the kitchen.
Tea. She wanted tea. Of course she did. But I couldn’t summon the energy to even think about putting the kettle on. Plus, it wasn’t like I’d invited her here.
“Kit rang me last night,” she said quietly. “He told me everything.”
Relief crashed over me like a wave. Someone else knew. Someone else could help me make sense of this madness.
I nodded, not trusting my voice.
“Are you okay?”
“Umm… not really?” I managed.
“Fair.”
We sat in silence for a moment.
“So you had no idea about all of this?” I asked finally.
Priya flinched slightly. “Not about the stalking, I promise.”
“So… you knew about the whole… soulmate thing?”
She nodded. “Yes, I did. But only I know. Not the others. Not even Rory.”
Another wave of relief. I couldn’t cope with the idea of the entire Killigrew Street team laughing about this behind my back for years, sharing knowing looks whilst I remained blissfully unaware.
“I’ve been pushing him to tell you,” Priya said. “He’s just… hopeless. He became paralysed with the fear of it. He didn’t want to upset you or scare you.”
“Wow, he did a great job of that!” I deadpanned.
Priya shifted uncomfortably. “Try to remember that he didn’t choose you to be his mate, Felix. He didn’t choose for this to happen.”
“He chose to stalk me and creep me out!” The words exploded out of me, months of terror transforming into rage.
“I’ve been terrified for months! Months!
Especially when I saw the stalker looking through my window.
Then Kit had the audacity to come round here and pretend to go investigate it for me!
Such a hero,” I said mockingly. “And then he gives me training sessions to protect me from… himself! He even sort of implied Greywatch might be coming for me at any moment!”
Priya winced, her hands twisting in her lap.
“Fuck, I’m sorry. I agree—listen, that was all completely awful, and I would have put a stop to it if I’d known.
There’s a reason he didn’t tell me about it, because he knew it was inexcusable.
Incorrigible.” She paused, studying my face.
“For what it’s worth, he’s a complete mess right now. ”
“Good,” I muttered, though the vindication felt hollow.
“That’s… why I’m here. Mainly to check on you, of course, but…” She took a shaky breath. “Kit’s decided to resign from Killigrew Street. Effective immediately.”
My mouth fell open. “What?!”
“His top priority is you,” Priya explained, her voice careful and measured. “He wants you to be able to go to work without feeling unsafe or uncomfortable. He’s going to Seb this evening to tell him that he won’t be returning tomorrow.”
I gaped at her, stunned. The idea of Killigrew Street without Kit was…
impossible. He’d been there the longest aside from Seb.
He was Seb’s right-hand man, his lieutenant, the one who kept us all in line when missions went sideways.
Kit was the backbone of every operation, the steady presence that held everything together when chaos erupted around us.
More than that, he was woven into the fabric of the place.
The way he organised the weapons room with military precision.
His morning runs that mapped every potential escape route in a three-mile radius.
The granola bars he slipped into everyone’s pockets before long missions.
The protective fury that blazed in his eyes whenever any of us were threatened.
Sure, he spent most of his time being grumpy with everyone, nagging us again and again about keeping the kitchen clean. But he loved Killigrew Street—loved the team—with every inch of himself. It was obvious, plain as day.
Without Kit, we’d be missing our core operating system. All the other code would still exist, but nothing would compile. Rory would throw constant runtime errors with no exception handler. Seb would be stuck in an infinite loop. The whole system that was Killigrew Street would just… crash.
“No,” I found myself saying, shaking my head. “He can’t do that. Killigrew Street wouldn’t survive it.”
Priya’s eyebrows shot up. “Felix—”
“That can’t happen,” I interrupted, scrambling to my feet. “Kit isn’t just… he’s not replaceable. None of us are, but Kit especially. He’s the glue that holds everything together. Without him, we’re just a bunch of misfits playing dress-up in a haunted hotel.”
Priya laughed, shaking her head. “Don’t tell Seb all that. But you’re completely right, and believe me, I told Kit that. But I couldn’t change his mind.”
“I’ll quit!” The words burst out of me before I could stop them. “I’ll quit before he does, so he can stay.”
“No.” Priya’s voice turned sharp. “He’s doing this so you can stay. He won’t have it any other way.”
“But Killigrew Street is the most important thing to him!”
Priya shook her head sadly. “No, Felix. You’re wrong. You are.”
My head spun, that same dizziness that struck me every time I thought about the enormity of it all. The weight of being someone’s entire world and not even knowing it.
Priya shifted on the sofa, her hands fidgeting with her scarf. “I have no right to ask you this, after his behaviour, but…”
She looked at me directly, her dark eyes pleading.
My heart sank. “You want me to convince him to stay.”
The thought of seeing Kit every day after what had just happened made me want to cry. Those intense, stormy eyes following my every movement. Knowing that he thought we were destined to be together whilst I could barely wrap my head around the concept.
“He’s really, really sorry, Felix. And for what it’s worth, if you take this whole… stalking incident out of the equation, you know Kit and his morals. I think he’ll be the perfect gentleman from now on. He’ll go back to basically ignoring you.”
Was that what I really wanted? I’d been enjoying becoming friends with Kit.
I’d even found myself looking forward to spending more time with him alone again next week.
The way he’d praised me during our training sessions had made my heart beat faster, made me feel capable in a way I’d never experienced before.
But more than that, I enjoyed talking with him, for some reason.
Which was crazy, because I usually hated talking.
But there was something about the intense way he listened to me—like he genuinely wanted to hear every tiny nugget I had to say—that made me want to keep talking.
“Kit thinks I’m in love with Wren,” I said suddenly. “He kept bringing Wren up again and again. I was so confused.”
Priya laughed. “I thought about telling him a couple of times that you and Wren were just friends, but he kept telling me not to meddle, so…”
I rolled my eyes. Telling Priya not to meddle was a lost cause.
“Will you talk to him?” she asked, reaching over to squeeze my arm. “See if there’s a way he can stay at Killigrew Street, with you? But if it comes down to one or the other, it should be you who stays, Felix, okay?”
I sighed, defeat settling over me like a heavy blanket. “Ugh, fine. I’ll go get dressed.”
“Want me to come with you to Kit’s?”
I was tempted—having backup sounded appealing. But I shook my head. “If we’re going to keep working at Killigrew Street together, we need to somehow work out how to make it not awkward.”
Priya stood up, gathering her scarf around her shoulders.
“Hey,” I called out as she headed towards the door. “Can you message me Kit’s address? Also, what’s the latest with you and Emma? You know, after she rang me…”
Priya waved her hand dismissively. “Oh, I told you not to worry about all that. I’m sorting it.”
I sighed. “I love how you preached to Kit about honesty but will happily bury your head in the sand with Emma.”
Priya glared at me, pausing in the doorway. “You know, I think I preferred the first two years where you were too shy to challenge me.”
A slow grin spread across my face. “Sorry. No take backs. You have the upgraded Felix model now.”
She blew me a kiss and disappeared down the hallway, leaving me alone with the impossible task of convincing Kit Thorne that we could somehow co-exist at Killigrew Street.
Luckily, I lived to debug impossible problems.