Chapter 140 Harper
Harper
The safehouse was too quiet after the storm.
I sat on the edge of the cot, boots still on, hands braced against my knees like I couldn’t trust the floor to hold me steady.
The silence pressed in, broken only by the distant hum of generators and the soft creak of footsteps in the hall.
Every time I blinked, I saw the monitors again—those faces Redwood had catalogued, trapped and unnamed.
Carter crouched in front of me, his forearms resting on his thighs, gaze steady. He hadn’t taken his vest off yet, hadn’t let himself relax, but the tension in his jaw was starting to ease.
“You’re shaking,” he said softly.
I looked down at my hands. He was right—they trembled like I was still pulling a trigger. “Adrenaline,” I muttered. “It’ll burn off.”
He reached forward, covering my hands with his. The tremor stilled, not because it was gone, but because he anchored it. Anchored me. “You did good, Harper. More than good.”
I wanted to believe him. I wanted to take the words and stitch them over the hollow parts Redwood had carved into me. But my chest was tight, my throat sore. “I almost killed him,” I whispered. “I wanted to.”
Carter’s eyes darkened, but not with judgment. “You didn’t.”
“I don’t know if that makes me strong or weak.”
“It makes you human,” he said. He squeezed my hands, his voice dropping lower. “And it makes you mine, because I’m not letting Redwood take one more piece of you. Not tonight. Not ever.”
Something inside me cracked at that. A tear slid free before I could stop it, hot against my cheek. Carter caught it with his thumb, his touch rough and tender all at once.
Outside the door, I heard Gideon arguing with Cyclone about stitches, River’s laugh sharp with relief, Faron humming some tune that didn’t belong in a place like this. Life was still happening. Somehow.
I leaned forward until my forehead touched Carter’s, the world shrinking down to just us. His breath was warm against my lips, steady, certain. For the first time since this mission began, I let my body sag, trusting him to hold me up.
Redwood was gone. The faces were free. And maybe—just maybe—I could start to feel free too.
Carter didn’t move when I sagged against him. He just stayed there, steady, his forehead pressed to mine, his breath slow and even like he meant for me to borrow it. The cot creaked beneath us when he shifted closer, his hands sliding up to cradle my face as if I might splinter without him.
“You’re safe,” he whispered. His voice wasn’t the hard command from the fight—it was softer, raw. “I’ve got you, Harper. Always.”
That word—always—undid me more than any bullet could. My lips trembled under the weight of everything I couldn’t say, so I said it the only way I could. I kissed him.
It wasn’t the frantic kind of kiss that came from fear or survival.
It was slow, aching, like we had both been waiting too long to let ourselves breathe.
Carter’s mouth moved against mine with a patience that burned hotter than desperation, a vow in every brush and press.
His thumb traced the line of my jaw, grounding me, and I curled my hands into his vest like I’d never let go.
When he pulled back, his eyes searched mine, fierce and tender all at once. “You scare the hell out of me,” he admitted. “Not because of what you’ve been through… but because of how much I can’t lose you.”
A tear slid down my cheek, but this one wasn’t heavy—it was release. “You won’t,” I whispered. “I’m not going anywhere.”
For the first time in hours, his mouth tipped into something that almost resembled a smile. He leaned in again, kissing me softer this time, a promise stitched into the quiet.
The door banged open and Gideon’s voice carried in, gruff and annoyed. “If you two are done with your honeymoon moment, we’ve got intel to sort through before the brass storms this place.”
I laughed—shaky, but real. Carter sighed against my temple, pressing one last kiss there before standing. He shot Gideon a glare that could’ve leveled walls, but I caught the flicker of gratitude in it too.
I stayed seated a moment longer, touching my lips, letting the warmth of Carter’s words sink into the cracks Redwood had left behind. Then I rose, because there was still work to do. But I carried Carter’s promise with me like armor.