Page 86 of Fractured Allegiance
Then I walk away first.
Because if I don’t, I won’t.
I leave the club before she does.
Don’t wait for Dom. Don’t acknowledge Drazen’s nod of approval like it means anything. I take the long hallway out through the rear, bypassing the main floor, my fists still stinging, my body still humming with the fight.
No one stops me.
Not even Bishop, who watches from the end of the hall with his usual smirk, like he knows I’m a wire that’s just waiting for a match.
Back at my apartment, I don’t bother with food.
Just strip down in the shower and let hot water carve a straight line down my back. I scrub the blood off my knucklesuntil the skin flakes pink. The taste of the night — the smoke, the noise, her — lingers in places I can’t wash.
I dry off. Pull on a dark, nondescript gray shirt, nothing that stands out.
Then I step out.
I take the long route to the rooftop.
It’s a three-story residential building directly across from her loft — old, squat, coated in soot and pigeon shit. The stairs creak. The top level is flat, with just enough edge to crouch behind and keep out of view.
Her window is already glowing.
Warm gold spilling through white curtains.
She’s home.
And I’m back where I shouldn’t be.
I scan the street below. Empty. No guards. No shadows. Dom didn’t follow her. Drazen doesn’t need to. She’s already been warned what happens when you’re considered “useful.”
I raise the scope.
Just a peek.
Inside, Lydia’s moving through her apartment. Barefoot. Wearing something simple now — soft and dark. She picks up a glass from the table, rinses it in the sink, dries it with a towel.
She’s not pacing.
She’s not breaking down.
She’s functioning.
But every part of her is running on something close to fumes.
She steps away from the sink.
That’s when I notice it.
A flicker.
Not in the light.
In the monitor on her wall.
One of the small square feeds that loop her internal camera angles.
