Chapter 39 | Kincade
I awoke before dawn.
She slept peacefully. Safe, I thought, for the first time in weeks. One arm rested across my abdomen, placed there in the middle of the night to make sure I was still here.
I wasn’t going anywhere.
I lay motionless, breathing shallow and slow, unwilling to disturb her.
She’d said it in the dark. Soft. Unguarded.
I hadn’t answered.
Not because I didn’t feel it. But because once spoken, it became a promise I could never afford to break. If I gave those words back to her in the dark, I gave her my enemies, my war, my violence. It would bind her to my danger.
And after everything, she deserved peace. Security. Not a life lived under surveillance, hunted by threats she couldn’t see. And I would do whatever it took to restore that.
This stillness was rare. A fragile peace before the next battle, before she’d face the enemy she couldn’t see and I couldn’t fight for her.
Beyond the window, Istanbul stirred, the city suspended in morning twilight.
I stayed like that a while longer. Long enough to commit the weight of her arm, the warmth of her skin, the steady rhythm of her breath to memory. The way she’d let herself rest without fighting through nightmares. The peace that had settled over her features since the alteration.
Because peace like this never lasted. Not for us.
Carefully, I shifted to slide out from beneath her arm without waking her. She murmured something, turned onto her side, the sheet tangling around her legs. I pulled it higher over her shoulder before standing.
I turned to dress.
“Where do you think you’re going?” Her sleep-thick voice stopped me.
So much for not waking her.
I turned back. She was propped on one elbow now, watching me with those sharp eyes that saw too much. But there was something different in them this morning—something lighter. As though last night had shifted something fundamental between us, and she knew it, too.
I leaned over, kissed her cheek. “Rest.”
But she grabbed my arm, pulling me down. A playful grin on her face. “I did.”
She wasn’t stronger, but she was definitely faster.
“You’re going to get yourself into trouble.” A weak warning. A partial promise.
“I certainly hope so.”
The sheet slipped away. All she wore was the necklace. And temptation. Before I could make good on that promise, the phone buzzed. Sharp. Insistent.
It was still in my pocket on the floor.
One quick kiss, then I moved away to grab the phone and leave the room.
“You forgot your pants,” she called.
I kept walking as I answered. “What do you have?”
“Safe house in Haidhausen,” Silas said. “Twenty minutes on foot from the Werksviertel-Mitte facility.”
I slowed half a step. “That close?”
“Close enough to move fast,” he replied. “Far enough not to be seen, if you don’t make it personal.”
“When do we move?”
“Private charter will be ready for you at midnight. Take what you need. Leave the rest.”
“Quiet Watch?”
“I’ll have men ready,” Silas said. “On standby and embedded. You won’t be going in alone.”
“Good.” I glanced over my shoulder, but she had disappeared into the bathroom—already retreating, already giving me the space she knew I’d take, anyway. “I need a favor.”
“For the lass?”
A pause. “Yes.”
“Name it.”
“Her mother,” I said. “I want them to meet. Somewhere open. Somewhere safe. Near the safe house.”
She’d need that. After we burned the Knights’ headquarters to the ground.
After we destroyed every piece of surveillance data they’d collected.
She’d need to see her mother—to ask the questions she couldn’t ask before, to tell her I understand now.
To have that conversation without walls listening, without surveillance stealing another private moment between them.
I couldn’t give her back what they’d taken, but I could give her this—a chance to speak to her mother freely, safely, without the Knights watching.
There was a long pause. Then, “When?”
“After,” was all I said. “Ophelia is your contact.”
“I’ll make it happen,” he said. “One more thing. All the intel and weapons you’ll need will be in the safe house.”
“I owe you.”
“No,” he said. “Finish it.” Then hung up.
The bathroom door opened and steam rolled out. She stepped through it, wrapped in a towel, damp hair clinging to her shoulders. She halted outside the doorway, taking in the sight of me still holding the phone.
Still without pants.
“Silas?”
“Yes.”
She waited, searching my face for something. Looking for the weight of bad news. Or confirmation of what she already suspected.
“We move to Munich tonight,” I said.
Her hand stilled on the towel. For a long moment, she looked at me and I watched something dark and sharp move through her eyes. Not fear. Something colder. Harder.
“The headquarters?” she asked.
“Yes.”
A slow exhale. Then that cold thing in her eyes turned molten. “Good,” she said, her voice steady. Certain. “It’s time.”
No hesitation. No questions about the risk.
She knew what Munich meant—destroying the surveillance data, burning down the violation they’d committed against her, against us. Taking back what they’d stolen.
She moved deeper into the room, searching for clothes. I stepped inside, still holding the phone.
“There’s something else,” I said.
She paused, looked up at me, question in her eyes.
“I activated the Quiet Watch.”
Her brows drew together. “What is that?”
“Men loyal to me,” I said. “Not because they’re ordered to be. Because they choose to be.”
She blinked. “So,” she said. “You lead a shadow network of men who show up when you ask?”
“Yes.”
Her eyes flicked down.
“And you’re explaining this to me completely naked.”
“It wasn’t intentional.”
She resumed her quest for clothes. “Well, I’m going to need more information and coffee. But first—pants.” She paused to wave a hand at me. “Because that is wildly distracting.”
Still using that sharp humor even with Munich looming. I reached for my pants. “I’ll answer everything.”
“Good,” she said. “Because Munich doesn’t sound like a place for surprises.”
I made coffee while she dressed. The ritual of it steadying. Water, grounds, the slow drip filling the silence. When we were both settled on the balcony, her with a mug in hand, I knew this was the last time we’d sit here like this.
The last time before everything changed again.
“I’m listening,” she said.
I fixed my gaze on the distant sea, where ships cut through the blue, leaving white trails of foam. Easier to explain this while looking at something besides her face. Easier not to see if the truth of what I’d done changed how she saw me.
“The Quiet Watch isn’t a unit,” I said.
“What is it then?”
“It’s what happens when the Brotherhood decides someone is a liability and I disagree.”
Her expression didn’t change, but she went still. Coffee mug halfway to her lips.
“Over the years,” I continued, “I was sent to clean up failures. Defectors. Assets that couldn’t be controlled anymore.”
“And instead?”
“Instead, I found men who were useful right up until they weren’t convenient.”
She lowered the mug. Listening now with that complete focus she gave to things that mattered.
“Some broke orders. Some refused to cross a line. Some crossed it and couldn’t live with it afterward.”
“So, you saved them.”
I shook my head. “No. I gave them what the Brotherhood wouldn’t. A choice.”
She waited.
“Disappear. Start over. Stay reachable.”
“Reachable how?”
“If I ever needed help,” I said. “If something mattered enough.”
Her fingers tightened around her mug. “And they said yes.”
“Not all of them,” I said. “Enough.”
“Because they’re loyal to you.”
I met her gaze. “Because I didn’t own them.”
She studied me for a moment—assessing, not questioning. And I saw the moment she understood what I’d done. The risk I’d taken. The years of deception. Every mission where I’d been sent to eliminate a problem and had instead created an ally.
Every time I could have been caught.
Every time it could have ended.
“You’ve been building this for years,” she said.
“Yes.”
“Right under their noses.”
“Yes.”
Something fierce flickered across her face. Not shock. Something closer to respect. “That’s incredibly dangerous.”
“It was necessary.”
She considered that, then nodded once. Understanding, I thought, why I’d done it. Why I’d needed my own people. My own network. Something the Brotherhood couldn’t touch or control or take away.
“Munich isn’t something we do alone,” I added. “They’ll handle surveillance, run interference, extract us if it comes to that.”
“And if it doesn’t?”
“Then they stay ghosts.”
She picked up her mug again, took a slow sip. Thinking it through with that tactical mind of hers.
“Okay,” she said. “Then we plan like you have allies.”
I exhaled. “I do.”
“This is bigger than we thought, isn’t it?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“That’s why you want backup.”
“Yes.”
She nodded. “And if anything goes wrong?”
“They’ll be there.”
A beat of silence. Then, quieter, “Thanks.”
I looked at her. “For what?”
“For trusting me with this.” She met my eyes. “For not going in alone.”
Something in my chest tightened. Because she understood what I was telling her. Not about the Quiet Watch, but about us. That I wasn’t shielding her anymore. That I was letting her stand beside me in this. That after last night, after everything, there were no more secrets between us.
“You should know what you’re walking into,” I said.
“I always want to know,” she said. Then added, softer, “Especially now.”
Especially now. After she’d said those words in the dark. After I hadn’t said them back. After she’d chosen me, anyway.
I reached for her, covered her hand with mine. Long enough to let her know I heard what she wasn’t saying.
She turned her hand over, laced her fingers through mine. Squeezed once.
Then let go.
“I assume it’s another safe house?” she asked, returning to practicalities. Giving us both an out from the weight of the moment.
“It is.”
Her gaze drifted from the mug to the distant sea. “It was a nice view.” Then she slipped me a glance. “I hope there’s whiskey where we’re going.”
My mouth curved. “There’s always whiskey where we’re going.”
“That’s good. Be a shame to break tradition,” she said. “When do we leave?”
“Midnight charter.”
“Oh, Silas. He’s always so dramatic.” But she was smiling when she said it.
“He has a flair for it.”
“At least we’re not meeting in another episode of Mysteries of the Abandoned.”
I chuckled. “No.”
She drained the rest of her mug, then stood.
For a moment, she pinned me with her violet gaze.
And I saw it again, that dark certainty in her eyes.
The thing that had settled in her since the alteration.
Since she’d learned to fight the programming.
Since she’d reclaimed herself one painful inch at a time.
“They watched us,” she said. Not a question. A statement. “Our private moments. Everything.”
“Yes.”
Her jaw tightened. “And now we’re going to torch it.”
“Every last file,” I confirmed.
She nodded once, and I saw the fierce satisfaction that crossed her face. This wasn’t about destroying data. This was about reclaiming what they’d stolen. Taking back the privacy they’d violated. Making sure no one else could use those intimate moments against us.
“Good,” she said simply. Then went to pack.
I stayed on the balcony, the sea stretching endlessly before me.
Munich would be loud. Public. Dangerous.
But we’d have ghosts at our back. And she’d have me beside her.
And the Knights—the Knights would learn what came for men who violated something sacred.