Scene Fourteen The Person Who Shouldn’t Know Her Name
Kade didn’t take her home. He didn’t take her anywhere familiar. He rode until the streets blurred into places she didn’t recognize — quieter neighborhoods, older buildings, roads that felt forgotten.
He finally stopped behind a warehouse with boarded windows and a rusted loading dock. The engine cut off, leaving a silence that felt heavier than the ride.
Wren climbed off slowly, her legs shaky, her breath uneven.
“Kade,” she said, “I need you to tell me what’s going on.”
He didn’t answer.
He swung his leg off the bike and stood there, shoulders tense, eyes scanning the lot like he expected something to step out of the shadows.
Wren swallowed. “Someone was in my hallway.”
His jaw tightened. A small movement. A dangerous one.
“He said your name,” she added.
Kade’s eyes snapped to hers — sharp, focused, unflinching.
“What else did he say?”
“He said you walked me home last night.”
Kade’s expression didn’t change, but something in him did — a shift she felt more than saw.
“And he said,” Wren continued, voice tight, “that you don’t usually do that.”
Kade looked away, exhaling once, slow and controlled.
Wren stepped closer. “Kade… who was he?”
He didn’t answer.
He didn’t retreat. He didn’t soften. He didn’t pretend he didn’t know.
He finally said, “Someone who shouldn’t know your name.”
Her pulse slammed.
“Kade—”
“He shouldn’t know you exist,” he said, voice low, steady, dangerous in the way restraint becomes when it’s about to break. “He shouldn’t know where you live. He shouldn’t know you were with me. He shouldn’t know anything.”
Wren’s breath caught. “But he does.”
Kade’s jaw flexed again. “Yeah.”
“Why?”
He didn’t answer.
He walked a few steps away, running a hand through his hair, pacing once before stopping, shoulders tight, breath controlled.
Wren followed him. “Kade, tell me.”
He turned sharply, eyes locking onto hers.
“You weren’t supposed to be in that stretch of road last night.”
“That doesn’t explain anything.”
“It explains everything.”
“No, it doesn’t.”
He stepped closer — not enough to touch her, but enough for her to feel the heat of him, the tension, the danger he carried like a second skin.
“That man in your hallway,” Kade said, voice low, “isn’t random.”
Wren’s stomach dropped. “Then who is he?”
Kade didn’t look away.
“He’s someone who watches people like me.”
Her breath caught. “Like you?”
He didn’t blink.
“He shouldn’t be watching you.”
Kade exhaled, slow, steady, like he was fighting the urge to tell her something he wasn’t supposed to.
“Because you were with me,” he said.
The words landed between them like a fracture — sharp, dangerous, intimate.
Wren stared at him, chest tight, breath shallow.
“And now,” Kade added, voice barely above a whisper, “he thinks you matter.”
Her pulse slammed.
“Kade… do I?”
He didn’t answer.
He didn’t move.
He didn’t breathe in a way she could see.
But something in his expression — a flicker, a fracture, a warning — told her the truth he wouldn’t say:
She mattered in ways she wasn’t supposed to.