Chapter 45 Geneva
GENEVA
THE APARTMENT IS SILENT WHEN WE STEP INSIDE, SHADOWS stretching long across the floor like the memory of the graveyard still clinging to us. Ghost moves through the space like he never left. He checks windows, resets security, and removes his jacket without ceremony.
I hover near the doorway, fingers curled around the strap of my bag. I’m still shaking. Not visibly. Not in a way anyone else would see. But somewhere deep in my soul, in the marrow of my bones, something won’t stop trembling.
When I finally drop the bag, it lands with a dull thud. Ghost glances over from the kitchen, where he’s pouring water into a glass like we didn’t just return from hell. Like I didn’t find out he buried someone alive. It was justified, but still…
“You should get some sleep,” he says.
Yeah, right.
I nod, but I don’t move. My limbs are made of concrete. My mind is mud. I amble to the couch and sit. Not because I want to. My legs decided to stop working.
The city lights blur through the windows, painting faint reflections across the walls. I trace them with my eyes, following the flickering patterns as though they’ll lead me back to myself.
Ghost doesn’t prod me. He sets the glass of water down on the coffee table and then disappears into the bedroom.
I sit there for a while. Maybe ten minutes. Maybe an hour. I can’t tell. But eventually the silence starts folding in on itself, collapsing like dying stars. And the thoughts creep in.
We’re closer than ever. Stanton’s identity and motivations have been revealed. After some research, we’ll have one more move, maybe two, and I’ll kill him.
And then what?
What the hell happens after that?
I wrap my arms around my torso, suddenly freezing, and not from the air-conditioning. For years, I’ve lived for this moment.
For answers.
For justice.
For revenge.
Whatever word made it easier to wake up in the morning.
But after Stanton is gone, after the mission is complete, after meeting Ghost… who am I?
I won’t be a daughter seeking justice. I won’t be a weapon with a target. I’ll just be a woman with too much blood on her hands to pretend this didn’t happen.
The bathroom door creaks open and the sound is followed by Ghost’s light footsteps. He stops next to me, staring down with his arms folded. He doesn’t speak at first. Just studies me in that unnerving, surgical way of his. I’m not sure I’ll ever get used to it.
Or the way he always makes me feel.
“You look like you’re trying to crawl out of your own head,” he says quietly.
“I’m fine.” I drop my gaze to my lap. “I’m just tired.”
He sits beside me, slow and measured, like he doesn’t want to startle me. His shoulder brushes mine, but he keeps his hands to himself. I can feel him looking at me. Waiting.
“I know the silence that comes after,” he says softly. “When the killing is over and nothing feels real. When the gaping hole in your chest is still there, and possibly even bigger than before.”
“I said I’m fine.”
Ghost takes hold of my chin, forcing my gaze to meet his. “I don’t need you to be fine. I just need you to be honest when you’re not.”
I breathe out slowly, something fractured and brittle loosening in my chest. “I don’t know how to do this. How to stop moving forward when forward is the only thing that’s kept me from falling apart.”
“Then don’t stop.”
I blink. “What?”
“I’m your ‘end,’ just like you are my ‘beginning.’ That’s all that matters. ”
“Beginning of what?”
He leans forward while using his grip on my chin to pull me closer.
His breath skims my lips and his eyes bore into mine.
“The beginning of my life. A real one. With you. With a love that terrifies me. Because for once, I see something worth being sane for.” He gives me a wry smile. “Or at least attempting to.”
His words steal my breath. Not because they’re soft. But because they’re raw and unscripted, like they escaped his heart by cracking his rib cage open.
My lips part, and nothing comes out. I don’t know what to say to that. To him. To the man who destroys things but is trying, with bloodied, trembling hands, to build something pure instead.
“I don’t know if I can give you that,” I whisper.
Ghost doesn’t flinch. But he doesn’t let me pull away either. He brushes his thumb over my cheekbone, slow and tenderly.
“You already have. With you, I have everything I could ever need. Or want.”
I wish I could fall into this moment and never look back. But the rest of the world doesn’t disappear just because he loves me. And I love him.
And right now, that love is suffocating me.
“Ghost…”
He doesn’t move, but I feel the shift in him. It’s in the way his eyes narrow and how his grip tightens on my chin.
“You think I don’t understand what we’re up against?” he asks quietly. “You think I don’t wake up every day wondering how long I can hold on to something that feels impossible… but also incredible?”
I swallow hard, forcing myself to hold his stare, even as it weakens me. “You’re a psychopath. I’m a criminal psychologist. Us having a future isn’t logical.”
“No,” he agrees, his gaze unflinching. “It doesn’t. And yet here we are.”
I blink, trying to fight the emotion rising in my throat. “You and I… we don’t get the fairy-tale ending. We don’t get picket fences, two-point-five kids, and a dog.”
“Maybe not. But I’d rather have a few stolen nights with you than a lifetime with anyone else.”
My heart twists, and I suck in a breath from the pain. “I’m scared,” I admit, the words barely audible.
Ghost leans in, his forehead resting against mine, breath warm and steady. “I’ll take scared. I’ll take uncertain. I’ll take every broken piece of you, if it means I get to keep you.”
A single tear slips down my cheek before I can stop it. Then another. I don’t sob. I just fall apart quietly, softly, like petals from a dying flower.
Ghost doesn’t say a word. He just loves me in the silence.
He brushes the tears away with his thumb, slow and reverent, like each one matters. Without warning, he slips his arms beneath me, one under my knees and the other behind my back.
Ghost cradles me to his chest, holding me like I’m something precious. Like he’s done this in his mind a thousand times.
I bury my face in his shoulder as he carries me down the hall. His warmth and the scent of him soothes me, halting my tears. Although the emotional anguish is far from gone.
The bedroom is dimly lit, the duvet pulled back and the sheets inviting. He sets me down, kneeling beside the bed and brushing the hair from my face.
“I know you love me, Doc.”
The words land with precision. Not arrogant. Not assuming. Just true, in that quiet, ruthless way only he can make truth feel.
I start crying again. Not because I want to deny it, but because I can’t.
“You don’t have to say it back,” he whispers. “I just needed you to know I see it. I feel it. Every time you look at me like I’m worth saving. Like I’m worth loving.”
I close my eyes because I’m a coward. When I open them, he’s still there. Still kneeling. Still looking at me like I’m the most sacred thing he’s ever touched.
“You scare the shit out of me,” I whisper. “Not because of what you’ve done. But because of what you make me feel.”
“Good. Then we’re even.” He leans in, his lips brushing my forehead, soft, warm, and utterly devastating. “You should know my name… for when you say the words I want to hear. Because you will, Geneva. Someday… ”
It’s the same word I once asked of him concerning his past. Now he’s saying it back to me, but it sounds different in his voice. It’s not a demand like mine. It’s not even a question.
For Ghost, someday isn’t about hesitation. It’s about hope. Of a future with me.
I bite my lip, holding back all sound, scared to ruin this moment. This isn’t casual. It’s a confession buried under years of silence, handed to me like a loaded weapon he believes I won’t turn on him.
By revealing his legal name, Ghost is declaring he trusts me. Because after everything that’s happened, he’s still here. Still choosing me.
No secrets.
No aliases.
Just truth.
And I know what that costs him.
He leans in, his voice little more than a breath. “Liam. Liam St. James.”
The syllables are normal. Simple. Human. It shouldn’t change anything. But it does.
Ghost is who the world fears.
Liam is who he is when he looks at me like this.
He watches me, his body tense. With the anticipation of rejection? Or acceptance? Why does he still brace himself as though my next breath could either save him or destroy him?
The power of love is the only thing strong enough to break a man like him. Not bullets. Not blood. Just me, whispering his name.
I inhale slowly, pulling the name into my chest. My soul. “Liam.”
My hand rises on instinct, brushing through the hair at the back of his neck. He closes his eyes, like it touches the version of him that only exists with me.
Liam. My Liam.
He doesn’t say anything else. Just reaches for the hem of my shirt and lifts it slowly, giving me every chance to pull away.
I let him undress me piece by piece, his movements unhurried. The silence between us is filled with the sounds of my breath, the soft rustle of fabric, and the quiet hum of emotion I refuse to name out loud.
There’s nothing sexual in this. But I feel his longing for me.
It’s in the way his hands pause just a fraction too long on my skin.
It’s how his jaw tightens when his fingers skim the curve of my shoulder or the slope of my waist. It’s the way his eyes drink me in, growing brighter with every second.
He strips me down to my underwear and gestures for me to slide beneath the covers. I do. And when the sheets settle around me, warm and soft and safe, I feel my chest start to ache all over again.
Ghost walks over to the dresser.
For a second, I think he’s going for a weapon or a distraction, but he turns around with something in his hands. The stuffed elephant.
He comes back to me and holds it out awkwardly. Doesn’t say a word. Just waits. And that’s what undoes me more than anything.
Not the fact my parents gave it to me.
Not the gesture.
The waiting.
Like Ghost is offering another piece of himself.
I don’t want to hurt him. Not after refusing to say the words he clearly already knows are in my heart.
So I reach out and take it. The stuffed elephant is soft from wear, the fabric slightly matted. I press it to my chest, dropping my gaze in order to avoid Ghost’s as he undresses.
I drag my fingertips down the curve of the elephant’s belly, along each of its stubby limbs, and finally its tail. A small stain lies on the animal’s rump. It’s faint but there.
After raising the toy into the lamplight, I blink at the uneven outline that’s faded with time.
It’s blood.