Chapter 15 KATHERINE
KATHERINE
Addison hasn’t called. It’s been two days.
Two freaking days too long. I’m checking my phone so often it’s embarrassing.
Every time the screen lights up with a notification that isn’t her, my stomach drops, my body reacting before my brain can catch up.
I set the phone down. I pick it back up.
I tell myself she’s busy. She’s in Somalia.
Communications are unreliable. She’s done this before. But never like this.
The news doesn’t help much either, and the media house has no credible information.
She’s okay. She has to be okay. I tell myself that over and over as I move through the apartment on autopilot, doing the things that have to be done because Julian depends on me to keep the world predictable.
Bottles get warmed, diapers get changed, and laundry hums softly in the background like nothing is wrong, like the silence pressing in on me isn’t growing heavier by the hour.
Julian is sprawled on his play mat, kicking his legs with unearned joy, his dark eyes tracking the movement of a dangling toy. He lets out a squeal, delighted by something only he understands, and I force a smile that he doesn’t need, but I do.
“I know,” I murmur, crouching beside him. “You’re having a great day.”
He grabs my finger with surprising strength, grounding me in a way nothing else quite can. The contact is warm and real, reminding me that spiraling doesn’t help. It never has.
“Okay,” I say as I pick him up and buckle him into his carrier, deciding fresh air might help. “We’re going for a walk.”
The sun is out, bright and indifferent. People pass us on the sidewalk—couples laughing, someone walking a dog that looks far too happy with its life. No one looks at me like they know anything. No one slows down, stares, or does anything that would justify the tightness coiled low in my belly.
The walk does not help me at all, but Julian loves it, cooing and giggling at the birds and clouds the whole time. He fades off on our way back, oblivious to his mom’s turmoil about his godmother’s whereabouts.
Back home, I check my phone again. Still nothing.
Addison told me not to do anything, so I didn’t leave a message or call the embassy like I desperately want to. I’m choosing to trust her. She will call—she always does.
Ignoring his cot, I sink into the couch with Julian sleeping peacefully in my arms, one hand resting on his back. I stare at the street below, watching shadows stretch longer as the day slides toward evening.
“This is fine,” I whisper, though the words feel thin. “Everything’s fine.”
Then, my phone rings. The sound is sharp, cutting clean through the quiet, and my body reacts before my mind does. My heart slams hard enough to make me dizzy as I grab it, not even looking at the screen before answering.
“Addison?!”
There’s a pause on the other end, just a fraction of a second, before her voice comes through. “Katie.”
The way she says it—soft, careful, already bracing me—tells me everything I need to know. Something is wrong.
I shift Julian slightly, instinctively shielding him, my grip tightening around the phone. “Where have you been?” I demand, trying and failing to keep my voice light. “You disappeared.”
“I know. I’m sorry. I needed to make sure I could talk freely.”
That makes my chest constrict. “Addison—“
“I’m safe,” she cuts in quickly, anticipating the question. “For now.”
The words land heavy, sinking straight through me. I close my eyes, forehead pressing briefly against Julian’s soft hair.
“Okay,” I sigh, though nothing feels okay at all. “Talk to me.”
“I need you to listen,” Addison continues, and the softness disappears from her voice, replaced by something harder and more professional. The version of her that walks into places most people run from.
I nod even though she can’t see me. “I’m listening.”
“There’s a list,” she starts.
The words don’t register all at once. They hover, abstract, like something said on the news that belongs to other people in other places.
“What kind of list?” I whisper fearfully because my brain is still reaching for normal explanations.
“A kill list. Names of Americans connected to the Somalia peace talks. Media. Security. Diplomats. Anyone who was present when Barre was taken out.”
My stomach drops—cold and fast.
“Addison, why are you telling me this?”
There’s a pause before she drops a bomb on me. “Because your name is on it.”
The room tilts.
For a moment, I can’t hear anything but the rush of blood in my ears. Julian shifts against me, sensing the change, his fingers curling into my shirt. I press my hand flat against his back, grounding myself through him.
“That doesn’t make sense. I’m not— I wasn’t— I’m nobody.”
“That’s not how they see it. You were there. That’s enough.”
The silence stretches, thick and suffocating. I stare at the wall across from me, my eyes landing on nothing, my mind racing ahead despite my efforts to keep it reined in.
“How many dead so far?” I ask.
“A dozen or so.”
The number lands like a physical blow.
“Your name is on the list, too?”
“Yes, but I’m at the embassy and security’s tight. I’m safe here, at least for now.”
“For now,” I echo.
“I didn’t want to scare you, but I couldn’t not tell you. Especially with Julian.”
At the sound of his name, something in me hardens. Fear sharpens into something more focused, more dangerous.
“We’ll go to the authorities. FBI. Homeland Security. Someone. Anyone.”
Addison exhales. “We tried. DOS, FBI—anyone with a badge, but their members are on the list too, Kate. Some of them are dead.”
My grip on the phone tightens. “That’s not possible.”
“I wish it weren’t. Protection’s compromised. Whatever net they thought they had? It’s full of holes.”
Julian lets out a small sound, half-awake now, and I sway instinctively, rocking him even as my mind fractures into a thousand worst-case scenarios.
“So what are you saying?” I ask. “That we just… wait?”
“No,” Addison counters firmly. “I’m saying you run.”
“Run where?” I snap, panic creeping in around the edges now despite my efforts. “I can’t just disappear. I have a baby. I have—“
“I know,” she cuts in, her voice fierce. “That’s why you have to take this seriously. They have addresses, Kate. They know where you live.”
My gaze flicks toward the front door without my permission, as if danger might be standing just outside it.
“I’ll go to my mom’s. She has a house, it’s quieter—“
“No. Absolutely not.”
“What do you mean, no?” My voice cracks despite my best effort.
“I mean, you don’t take this to her doorstep. They’ll trace you there, too. And then what? You put a target on her back as well?”
The image hits hard—my mother answering the door, unaware, unprotected—and my chest tightens painfully.
I swallow. “Then where?”
“I have an idea, but you’re not going to like it.”
I close my eyes, Julian warm and solid against me, my world narrowed to the sound of Addison’s breathing on the other end of the line.
“Say it.”
“There’s someone you can go to. Someone who was there with us but isn’t on the list.”
My heart starts to pound harder, faster, like it already knows where this is going and is trying to outrun it.
“No. Absolutely not.”
“Kate—“
“No.” I tighten my hold on Julian as if the word itself could build a wall. “You don’t get to say his name like it’s a solution. He disappeared on me. He chose that. How did you even find him?”
“I have my ways,” she deflects. “Point is, I did, and he’s real, Kate. Very real. He’s off-grid, but not unreachable if you know where to look.”
“No,” I whisper again, weaker this time. “I can’t just show up on his doorstep with a baby. His baby and a target on my back.”
“You can if the alternative is worse, and it is.”
Silence stretches between us, filled with the weight of unspoken truths. I think of the way he moved—controlled and efficient. The way danger seemed to bend around him instead of toward him. The way he never promised anything, never offered comfort he couldn’t guarantee.
“His name really is James. Ryder James Morgan.”
Morgan. The name settles into place with a strange, almost inevitable click.
“He looks like a Morgan,” I murmur, the words slipping out before I can stop them.
Addison huffs a quiet, humorless laugh. “I know, right?”
I shake my head, disbelief warring with something far more dangerous—hope.
“You have his address?”
“Yes.”
“And you want me to go there.”
“I want you to live, and I think he’s your best chance.”
“I don’t even know if he’ll help.”
“I do,” Addison replies without hesitation.
That certainty scares me more than anything else she’s said.
“Send it,” I relent, my voice steady in a way that surprises even me.
A second later, my phone vibrates with an incoming message. I don’t open it yet. I just sit there, my son warm against my chest, the future narrowing to a single, terrifying point.
“Kate,” Addison calls quietly, reading my silence. “You don’t have time to freeze.”
“I know,” I say, and I do. I’ve never known anything more clearly. “I just… need a second.”
Julian squirms, awake now, his small face puckering in the way that means he’s about to cry.
I bounce him gently, resting my cheek against his head.
He smells like milk, baby soap, and something indefinably him.
The idea that anyone might hurt him, might even try, snaps something cleanly into place inside me.
“Okay, I’m doing this.”
Addison exhales audibly, relief breaking through her control for the first time since she called. “Good.”
“I’m not saying it’s smart,” I add.
“I never said it was.”
I glance toward the front door again, this time with purpose instead of dread. “How long do I have?”
“I don’t know,” she admits. “That’s the problem. The list is circulating. People are moving.”
“Then I move first.”
“That’s my girl,” she says softly.
I hang up after promising to text once I’m on the road, once I’m safe, once I can lie convincingly enough that she’ll believe me. The call ends, leaving the apartment too quiet, the air too still.
I open the message with the coordinates. A town name I don’t recognize immediately. Rural and remote. Of course it is. The kind of place you go when you don’t want to be found.
“Looks like we’re taking a road trip,” I murmur to Julian, forcing brightness into my voice.
He responds with a gurgle that feels like blind faith.
“Don’t worry, baby,” I whisper, the words catching slightly in my throat. “Daddy will keep us safe.”
God, I hope so.