Chapter 5 Talia
FIVE
Talia
PATTERN RECOGNITION
The safe house door closes behind us with a soft click that feels too final.
Jackson engages three different locks, the sequential snaps echoing in the quiet space.
The apartment is sparse—functional furniture, blackout curtains, and a kitchen that looks unused.
Everything is in shades of gray and black, like color would be a security risk.
I’m covered in blood. Some mine, most not. The stocky operative’s blood spatters my face and neck. My torn clothes hang off me like rags.
Jackson turns from checking the window and really looks at me for the first time since the alley. His eyes catalog damage with the same intention he uses for everything.
“You’re covered in blood.” Statement, not question.
“I know.”
He steps closer, fingers hovering near a cut on my temple I didn’t know was there. “This needs cleaning. Your ribs?”
I touch my side, wince. The leader’s boot left its mark.
“Bathroom’s through there.” He indicates a door. “Clean clothes in the cabinet. Take your time.”
Take your time. Like we have time. Like those men aren’t still hunting us.
But I need to wash their blood off me. Need to think without Jackson filling my vision, making my skin prickle with awareness.
The bathroom is as utilitarian as the rest of the place—white tile, basic fixtures, a stack of black towels that look military-issue. I close the door and engage the lock even though it’s pointless. If danger comes, a bathroom door won’t stop it.
I turn the shower on. The water hisses against the tile, steam rising to fog the mirror.
I stare at my reflection. Dark smudges under my eyes. Blood dried in a crust along my jaw. The woman looking back seems like a stranger—someone hollowed out and filled with fear.
I step under the spray without adjusting the temperature. The water is lukewarm, then hot, pounding against my skin. I grab the bar of soap, lathering my hands, scrubbing at my arms.
Scrub.
Red swirls down the drain.
Scrub harder.
But my mind isn’t here. It’s back in the alley. It’s back on the rooftop. It’s cataloging the trajectory of the bullet that hit the operative’s head. The angle of his fall. The volume of blood spatter.
Jackson’s body slamming into mine. His weight. His heat. The solid wall of him taking every impact.
The explosion should have killed us. Statistical probability of survival at that proximity to detonation is less than five percent. He threw himself over me without hesitation, made his body into my shield. Every piece of debris that hit him could have hit me. Would have hit me.
But he took it all.
My hands stop moving. The soap slips from my fingers, clattering against the tub.
I stand there, water beating down on my head, but I don’t feel it. I’m dissociated, floating above the scene. My body is a data point I can’t quite integrate.
Nathan never protected me from anything. Three years together, and he never once put himself between me and harm. Not physically, not emotionally. He was too busy cataloging my flaws and dissecting my inadequacies.
“You’re exhausting, Talia. Always talking, always analyzing.”
But Jackson protected me with his body. Wordlessly. Completely.
Something fundamental cracked open in that alley. Not from the explosion—from him. From the absolute safety of his weight, the brutal certainty of his protection, the way his body absorbed violence meant for mine.
My legs give out. I sink to the shower floor, knees pulled to my chest, water beating down.
I sit there for a long time. I don’t know how long. The water runs cold, but I don’t move to turn it off. I just stare at the drain, watching the water swirl, unable to connect the concept of “washing” with the physical action.
Eventually, the shivering becomes too violent to ignore.
I turn off the tap. Towel off with mechanical, jerky movements.
I put on the clothes from the cabinet—black cargo pants I have to roll up, a gray T-shirt that drowns me.
They smell like detergent and something else.
Gun oil, maybe. The scent of tactical efficiency.
I unlock the door.
When I emerge, Jackson stands at the kitchen counter, medical kit open. He’s changed too—black tactical pants, black Henley that clings to every plane of muscle.
I stop in the doorway, pulse tripping over itself.
Without the tactical vest. Without the chaos. Without the adrenaline masking everything else.
He’s just a man now. And that somehow makes him infinitely more dangerous.
The Henley pulls taut across shoulders that look built to bear the world—fabric clinging to every ridge and line of muscle.
The sleeves are shoved to his elbows, exposing forearms laced with veins and scars, strength that speaks of use, not vanity.
He moves with unthinking precision, organizing medical supplies like he’s still defusing bombs—every motion efficient, economical, controlled.
Nathan’s body was sculpted for mirrors. Jackson’s was forged for survival. For violence. For protection.
And every part of me reacts to that difference.
Heat slides through my veins, pooling low, my breath catching on the sight of him.
The damp edges of his hair cling to his temples; a single droplet traces the sharp edge of his jaw before vanishing into the stubble shadowing his throat.
The light from the kitchen gilds the scar cutting through his left brow, softening nothing—if anything, sharpening him further.
He shouldn’t be beautiful. Not like this. Not when every instinct screams danger.
But he is—beautiful the way a blade is beautiful. Purpose and precision. Violence in repose.
And as he turns, catching me watching him, that easy control in his movements doesn’t falter. His gaze just lifts—steady, unreadable—and for one breathless second, I swear he sees exactly what he’s doing to me.
This man killed three people in front of me less than an hour ago.
Shot them with the same precision he’s now using to organize bandages.
The men in the alley—he detonated an explosive and took them down without breaking a sweat.
His hands have ended lives tonight. Those same hands that are now carefully arranging medical supplies.
I should be terrified.
I should be backing toward the door, looking for escape routes, calculating the distance to safety. Any rational person would fear a man who can kill so efficiently, so calmly. Who can transition from violence to casual conversation, like changing channels.
Instead, I’m mesmerized.
My body hums with awareness, skin prickling with each small movement he makes.
Something’s fundamentally wrong with me that I’m standing here, pulse racing, thighs clenched, attracted to a man who is objectively dangerous.
A killer. A stranger who could snap my neck as easily as he opened that medical kit.
But he threw his body over mine. Took shrapnel meant for me. Protected me with a ferocity that was somehow gentle. Threw me over his shoulder on that fire escape like I weighed nothing, carried me to safety while I was paralyzed by fear.
The memory of being held against him—my stomach pressed to his shoulder, his arm locked around my legs, the solid strength of him the only thing between me and a five-story fall—makes heat pool in my belly.
The contradiction makes my head spin. Lethal and protective. Dangerous and safe. Everything about him is a paradox that my body understands even if my mind doesn’t.
He looks up, and his attention hits like a physical touch. My nipples tighten beneath the borrowed shirt. I cross my arms, hoping he doesn’t notice.
“Sit.” He indicates a kitchen chair. “Let me check those ribs.”
I sit. He kneels in front of me, eye level now. This close, I can see the faint scar through his eyebrow, the gold flecks in his green eyes. He smells like cedar and gunpowder, a combination that makes my mouth water.
“May I?” His hands hover near the hem of my shirt.
I nod, not trusting my voice.
He lifts the fabric carefully, exposing the bruise spreading across my ribs. Purple-black, the perfect imprint of a boot. His fingers ghost over it, barely touching, but even that minimal contact sends electricity through me.
“Not broken.” His voice is low, clinical. “But deep bruising. Painful but not dangerous.”
He reaches for medical tape, movements economical. His hands work with the same care he used setting that explosive—sure, practiced, deadly. But gentle now. So gentle it makes my chest tight with something that isn’t pain.
“There.” He smooths the last piece of tape, fingers lingering a heartbeat longer than necessary. Or am I imagining it? “That should help.”
He stands, putting distance between us, and I immediately miss his proximity. Miss the heat of him, the solid presence that makes me feel simultaneously safe and completely off-balance.
The silence stretches, tension thick enough to choke on. I need to break it before I do something catastrophically stupid. The USB drive is now in the pocket of my borrowed clothes. I feel for it through the fabric of the cargo pants, needing to know it’s safe.
“I need to check the drive,” I say quietly, the words scraping past my damaged throat. “Victor’s drive. See what he died protecting.”
“The drive?” he prompts.
The small device cost so many lives. “I need a computer. A laptop. To check the files.”
“There’s one in the bedroom.” He moves toward the hallway. “Secure system, encrypted connection.”
I follow him, trying not to notice the way he moves—controlled, purposeful, dangerous. The bedroom is as sparse as the rest of the safe house. A single bed, military corners. A desk with a laptop, closed and waiting.
“Non-traceable,” he says, powering it on.
Right. The drive. The reason we’re here. Not to obsess over being in a bedroom with him, or the way his presence fills the small space.