Chapter 16
Specter
I stepped into the cramped sleeper first and sighed. One narrow berth, a fold-down table, barely enough floor to turn around. The walls pressed in, upholstery worn by too many strangers. Not ideal, but it was what we could get with a last-minute change.
Small for one. Tight for two trying to pretend we had space. But defensible. One door. A lock. No roommates.
The train jerked as I spoke, metal grinding on rails. The motion offered a thin illusion of safety. Moving targets were harder to pin than stationary ones.
Selina slipped past me, careful of my bad side. The bruises from Blackout’s beating had gone purple-black. Every breath counted. She looked as tired as I felt, washed out, eyes shadowed. It pinched something in me.
“Home sweet home.” She dropped her bag on the lower berth. Humor tried and failed to mask the strain.
I watched her tuck hair behind her ear, noted the tremor in her fingers. She’d been running as hard as I had—cleaning my cuts, keeping watch, not complaining.
“You should rest.” I locked the door and tested it twice.
“So should you. Those ribs need time.” She settled on the edge of the mattress.
The rumble traveled up through the floor into my boots. Prague’s outskirts slid by, giving way to white fields. The air smelled stale, tinged with metal from the heater. Down the corridor, quiet voices settled in.
I stayed standing, unsure where to put my body.
“You can sit.” She scooted, making space. “I promise not to take advantage of your weakened state.”
The corner of my mouth lifted. “That’s not what I’m worried about.”
“Then what? That I’ll snore? Can’t promise I won’t.”
I hesitated, then lowered myself beside her. The thin mattress dipped, forcing shoulder to shoulder, thigh to thigh. No place to hide. Whatever professional distance we’d pretended to keep had burned off in Munich.
“At least we can lower our guard for a few hours.” She let the rail rhythm fill the space. “Nobody knows we’re on this train.”
“Nobody we know of.”
She rolled her eyes. “You’re exhausting, you know that?”
I felt every contact point: shoulder, arm, thigh. Small shocks under my skin that had nothing to do with conditioning. The compartment shrank.
“We should run the plan again.” I reached for strategy instead of the scent of her shampoo or the heat next to me.
“We’ve covered it three times.” Her head tipped back against the wall. Her eyes slid shut, fight draining. “Zagreb. Surveillance. Wait for Damon’s team.”
Her breathing slowed, not asleep—just letting her eyes rest. My body throbbed from the fight. Muscles barked. My mind refused to sit. Bad mix. It keyed me to Selina at my side.
She shifted, half-drifting, head landing on my shoulder. The easy trust caught me off guard. Her hair brushed my jaw, soft, faintly smelling of the hotel shampoo. I lifted a hand and brushed a strand from her face. My fingers stayed a beat too long.
Munich washed over me, her body against mine, her skin under my hands, my name on her mouth.
Something pulled tight in my chest. I had memories of sex, sure—transactional, strategic, a purge. With Selina, it wasn’t that. It was something else. More.
A rough patch of track jolted us. Her eyes opened, dazed for a beat. We were close enough that I could see flecks of gold in her hazel.
“Sorry.” She straightened, carving out an inch between us. “Didn’t mean to use you as a pillow.”
“I don’t mind.” It came out rougher than planned.
She studied my face, glanced at my mouth, then back to my eyes. “You should sleep too.”
The berth was built for one. If we lay down, we’d be pressed together. Every breath shared. Heat rolled through me anyway.
“I’ll take the floor,” I said, even though there wasn’t much of one.
“Don’t be ridiculous.” She shifted, making more room. “We’ve already shared a bed. This is just sleeping.”
Just sleeping. As if Munich could be filed and forgotten. As if the imprint of her wasn’t cut into me.
I eased down beside her. Our bodies aligned in the narrow space. My arm slid under her head, careful to keep her against my better side. Her hand rested light on my chest, skirting my bandages.
The train rocked, hypnotic. Outside, evening thickened, fields slipping from blue to black. In this tiny box, cut off from everything, time thinned out.
“This is crazy,” she said at my neck.
“Which part?” My fingers traced small patterns along her shoulder.
“All of it. Running from assassins. Conspiracies. Sleeping with a man whose real name I don’t even know.”
I went still. “I don’t know it either.” She pushed up on an elbow, looking at me in the dim. “Does it matter? The name?”
I weighed it. It mattered more than I wanted to admit. “It’s the difference between being someone and being something. A weapon doesn’t need a name.”
Her hand came to my face. Fingers skimmed my jaw, gentle enough to ache. “You’re not a weapon to me. You never were.”
Something inside me loosened. I caught her hand, pressed it to my cheek, felt her pulse beat against my skin.
“What am I to you, then?” The question slipped out.
In the thin dark, with the train carrying us toward whatever waited, Selina looked past Oblivion’s edits—past the killer, past the blank spaces.
“Something I’ve never had before.” Her voice blended with the hum. “Something I can’t name and don’t want to lose.”
I drew her in, careful of my ribs, wanting her warmth more than air.
My hand slid up, cupped her cheek, thumb tracing her cheekbone. Warm. Alive.
I leaned in, pulled by something I couldn’t label and had no interest in fighting.
Her palm landed on my chest. Gentle, but firm. “Wait.”
I froze and pulled back enough to see her face in the strip of light from the window. The stop-start of it hit harder than it should. Her pulse ran high against me. Pupils blown. A flush worked up her throat. Her body said yes. Her mouth said…
“What’s wrong?” My voice scraped.
She looked away, hair spilling forward. “I haven’t showered since Prague. I feel disgusting.”
A short laugh slipped out before I could choke it down. “That’s what you’re worried about?”
“It’s not funny.” Her mouth twitched anyway. “Some of us care about hygiene.”
“Selina.” I tipped her chin with a knuckle. “Do you regret Munich?”
The words hung between us, heavy with what we hadn’t said. Her eyes widened a fraction. I braced myself.
“God, no.” She shook her head. “But you’re hurt, and I’m gross, and we’re on a train being hunted, and I don’t even know what this is…”
I set a finger lightly on her lips. “You could skip showers for a month and I’d still want you.”
She rolled her eyes, some tension bleeding out. “That’s gross.”
“It’s honest.” I shifted, my side complaining. “And my injuries are superficial.”
“Your definition of ‘superficial’ needs work.” The doctor edged into her tone.
I searched for words I didn’t have. In the scraps I remembered, I’d had women—faces without names. For leverage. For intel. To burn off adrenaline. Empty. This wasn’t that.
“I don’t know what this is either.” My voice dropped. “I don’t have the language.”
I found her hand and laced our fingers.
“You’re the first real thing I’ve had since… before.” The rest stuck. “Your hair’s a mess, there’s a smudge on your cheek, you haven’t showered in two days—and I don’t care. It makes you real.”
Her expression softened. “Is that what you want? Something real?”
“I want you.” The clarity of it surprised me.
She searched my face, then nodded slowly. When she leaned in this time, I met her halfway.
The kiss wasn’t Munich. Not desperate. Not rushed. Slow. Intentional. Her mouth soft against mine, unhurried even with danger at our backs. I slid my hand into her hair and drew her closer, memorizing the taste of her, the small sound she made when I tugged her lower lip.
Fragments flashed before me—anonymous rooms, alleys, safe houses. Bodies as tools. Pleasure as currency. All of it hollow. Nothing like this.
I broke away and pressed my mouth along her jaw, down to the pulse at her throat. It beat against my lips—warmth and life I wasn’t supposed to have.
“Careful with your ribs.” Her fingers skimmed the bandage.
“Worth every ache,” I said into her skin.
I wanted to take my time. I’d never wanted that before. Munich had been need. This felt like discovery. I wanted to map her, hold every inch in memory in case this was all I got.
The train curved. She bumped into me. Pain lit my side. I welcomed it. Pain meant being alive. Here. With her.
“We need to be careful.” Her mouth hovered near my ear.
“We should.” My hand slipped under her shirt to the heat of her back.
Her laugh vibrated against me. “You’re a terrible patient.”
“And you’re a terrible doctor.” I caught her mouth again. “Seducing your patient.”
“You seduced me first.” Breath against my lips.
“Then we’re both guilty.”
Her fingers found my shirt’s hem and tugged. “Let me see.”
I winced, helping her peel it off, fabric scraping over bruises. Her gaze darkened at the spread of blue-black across my torso. Her fingertips hovered above the worst of it.
“You shouldn’t be upright.” Clinical, heated, both at once.
“I heal fast.” I caught her hand and brought it to my mouth. “And I’m exactly where I want to be.”
The train swayed, pushing her forward. I steadied her by the waist, and our faces ended up close again. In the dim, her pupils were nearly black.
“We ought to be careful.” Her hands braced on my shoulders.
“That’s not what either of us wants.”
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
“You won’t.” I slipped a hand behind her neck and drew her down until our foreheads touched. “But if you’re worried, there’s a fix.”
“What’s that?”
I lay back on the narrow berth and pulled her with me until she settled astride my hips. “You take control.”
Something flickered across her face—surprise, then want. She sat up, her weight settling in a way that cleared my head of everything but her. Even through clothes, the pressure lit me up.
“Lie back.” Her palm went flat on my chest. “Don’t move.”