Page 150 of Fractured Devotion
I can’t tell her. Not yet.
If I show her that file, it’ll split her open, though not like the last time. Not in pieces. It’ll destroy something final in her,the part that still thinks she has any choice left in who she becomes.
And maybe that’s what Rourke wants. Maybe that’s what he’s always wanted. To prove there’s no such thing as healing, only obedience.
But not with her. Not if I can help it.
Outside, the clinic lights flicker, and an alarm barks three times in the distance before it silences.
Something’s happening.
And not just in the system.
In her.
She’s starting to remember things I never wanted her to see.
And I don’t know what she’ll do when she finds out I’ve known all along.
Because there are only two ways this ends now.
With her breaking free.
Or with both of us buried in what we built.
Chapter 45 – Celeste - Sacred Violence
I can feel him before I hear him. And not in the way people mean when they talk about intuition. This is cellular. A shift in pressure. An ache in the space behind my ribs that knows when he’s near.
I haven’t seen Kade since our last encounter. At least not properly. There was a brief exchange in his office two nights ago, soft but sharp-edged and unfinished. I said I needed time, and he didn’t argue. He just looked at me with that unreadable calm, like he already knew I’d be back. Aside from that, there were only glimpses in the hallway and accidental tension in the corridor outside Diagnostics. Nothing sustained. Nothing with teeth.
I asked Mara to reschedule my non-essential sessions for the evening, citing exhaustion. It isn’t a lie.
Not exactly.
My fingers itch to touch something sharp.
Instead, I run a final audit on the Heretic Loop substructure. The code pulses on the monitor, steady and rhythmic. Like breath, like defiance. It’s almost ready.
But that’s not what tonight is for.
Tonight is for strategy.
I text him a single word:Now.
No pleasantries. No build-up. Just the signal.
And less than ten minutes later, I hear his footsteps outside my office.
The door doesn’t creak. It glides open smoothly. He doesn’t knock. He never does these days. Not with me. He steps inside like he belongs, like my air has always made more sense with him in it.
“Kade,” I say, not rising from my chair. The screens cast a dim blue light against the walls, painting his features in surgical cold.
“You said now.”
I turn to face him. “And you came.”
His eyes flick to the terminal behind me, then back. “Always.”
