Page 44 of The Knight

“You could’ve given me a warning,” he muttered, eyes still locked on the clouds.

“What, so you could scream like a girl about it?” She was already taping the bandage in place. A tiny safety pin sealed the deal. “I’m no medic, but it’ll hold. Think you can sit up now?”

“Uh-huh.”

She clasped his good hand and helped lever him back upright. The world spun for a second, but he shook it off. She handed him two small pills and a bottle of water. “Take these.”

He swallowed them dry—because who needed water at this point—and flexed his strapped-up arm. The range of movement wasn’t bad. “Thanks. I owe you.”

“Maybe you can return the favor.” She didn’t release his hand. That simple touch set off every protective instinct he had, every urge to shield her, even from himself. “Can I ask you a question?”

“Anything.”

“Why did you kiss me? Back at Asta’s house.”

Anything but that.

His pulse spiked. His answer could jeopardize everything—her trust, her focus, her safety. He drew in a breath, steeling himself, his mind racing to lock down the words before they slipped out.

“I needed you to focus.” His voice was controlled, flat. “To anchor you in the moment. To keep you alive.”

“That’s why?” Those beautiful eyes narrowed, dissecting him, looking for a chink in his armor. “To help me focus?”

She searched his face. But years of Navy SEAL training had made him a master at masking what lay beneath. He kept hisexpression unreadable. Right now, she needed a protector—a guardian, not a man unraveling under the weight of his own feelings.

“Nothing else?” she pressed, a hint of vulnerability in her voice. It hit him hard like a punch straight to the chest, and for a second he wavered.

The war inside him reached a fever pitch. Every fiber of his being ached to pull her close, to give in to the emotions he’d buried for too long. But the mission came first.Always.If he gave in now, if he let those walls crack, everything could fall apart.

“If I said anything else, it wouldn’t change our current reality. Your safety is paramount. Everything else is secondary.”

A flicker of emotion crossed her face, but it was gone as quickly as it came. She straightened her shoulders, her posture hardening. The woman he’d first met in the lab was back, her guard reasserted.

“You’re right.” Her tone was distant. “We need to focus on survival.”

Abe nodded, ignoring the twist in his gut. He read her shift, the way she pushed down her vulnerability. It mirrored his own internal struggle. He swallowed it all down and slipped back into mission mode. “Right now, my only job is to keep you alive.”

“Keep me alive.” She echoed his words.

There was something about the way she said it that made him want to do more than just protect her—but he shut that thought down fast.

“So what do we do now?” She gave a soft sigh that tugged at him, but he forced himself to stay centered on the immediate problem.

“We need an escape route and we need to figure out how they found us.”

“Asta wouldn’t have betrayed us.” A furrow on her brow deepened. “She helped us escape.”

He weighed her words for a beat, considering the possibilities. If Asta was clean, that left them with an ugly truth. One that twisted the knife deeper. “Well, if that’s the case, there’s only one option.”

Her gaze locked onto his. “What would that be?”

He didn’t want to believe it, but his training—and survival instincts—told him not to ignore the facts. “One of us is working with Raptor.”

24

Freya stared at Abe.

She hoped he could discern the challenge in her eyes because the idea that she would work with the men who were chasing them was abhorrent.

---