Kaleb is a permanent fixture in my head. His eyes, his infectious laugh, lazy lunch breaks in the sunshine. But it comes with shadows now. Apparitions of scars and fresh bruises, heavy chains and speculation about interrogation techniques. The state of my stomach rests somewhere between uncomfortable flutter and acidic eruption as I go through the motions of my schedule, expending most of my energy hiding from everyone—except Vi.
Her concern is justified, and I’m grateful she doesn’t insult me with platitudes about how everything is going to be okay. There’s no calling my soulmate’s death sentence a “setback” or “challenge.” It fucking sucks. A full-blown horror story, and sometimes when we’re alone in our room we sit in silence and go to that place where reality crushes hope. She’s patient as my tears attempt to cleanse the shadows from my mind.
It’s a customized, small-profile hybrid between a traditional table vise and vise grip pliers.
The idea was to create a super-weapon for interrogation that would maximize the pain and damage of torture with minimal time and effort.
Razor wire restricts your will to struggle against whatever else they’re doing to you.
Razor-wire. Glaxon Ionizer. ZB-783 Vise. The Kalik Closer. I shudder through the parade in my head. Even worse is the memory of Kaleb’s expression as he relived the trauma. Would his own people resort to the same? There has to be some order, some decency that separates enemy from ally. But Kaleb isn’t an ally right now. They don’t know what he his and think he’s worse than an enemy, a liar. A traitor.
“They’re going to kill him, Vi. I have this horrible feeling.”
Her arm slips around my shoulders. “We don’t know that. And besides, even if he’s found guilty and sentenced to execution, I’m sure it will take time to get to that point. We’ll get him out by then.”
“How? You didn’t see that place. It’s a fortress and they have him all chained up.” I scrub at the constant leak from my eyes.
“I know. It won’t be by brute force, but we’ll figure something out. We just have to do it the smart way.”
There’s no good side or bad side. They’re both the same.
Kaleb’s words keep hounding me, becoming clearer with each piece of the puzzle. I hadn’t understood then, but I see it plain as day now. It doesn’t matter who holds the keys to his cell; he’s facing the same fate. Circumstance makes us enemies and friends.
Vi pulls back when I stiffen.
“What is it?”
“The real traitor,” I say.
“Huh?”
“Kaleb’s being held as a traitor because there’s a real one. That person is probably still here and might even be on the task force that’s holding him.”
She curses. “Then someone has plenty of incentive to make him look guilty.”
“Or make him disappear.”
We exchange a glance.
“I need to get to him again. Alone this time.”
I tell Dennel, who passes along to the task force, that I remember Kaleb mentioning a military seal during his time in captivity. I’m not surprised this is new information for them since I made it up.
It’s a risk. They could decide to bypass my involvement and go straight to the source. I may have triggered another interrogation, but I have to get back on their radar. Days of breakfast, lunch, and filing have done nothing. So with Vi’s approval, I played the odds, betting that they’ll take the more humane route to their information through me. And here I am, fully present.
Dennel escorts me to the prison two days after my announcement.
“Same as last time?” I ask, not thrilled at the prospect of navigating the awkward peepshow again.
“I don’t know. They didn’t say. I’m supposed to report at 0900 with you.”
It’s not ideal, but pursuing those few seconds in Kaleb’s presence has become my entire existence.
Instead of leading me to the visitation room, however, the guards dump me in what resembles a lounge. Couches, a coffee machine, café tables, even a screen in the corner broadcasting the same compound propaganda as the one in my apartment. All the amenities designed for comfort work against relaxation now that they’re out of place.
My long wait gives my brain plenty of opportunities to second-guess itself. I’ve come more prepared this time, but it doesn’t change the fact that I’m still a minnow determined to take down an oil tanker. Vi and I have been talking late into the night, strategizing and doing our best to sort through the little we know and the more we don’t. Her mind works angles mine doesn’t, which gives me hope that we have a chance. I came with an actual plan today, but my surroundings have already thrown off my confidence. By the time they lead Kaleb into the lounge I’ve almost abandoned the mission altogether.
Kaleb seems to have the same reaction when they leave us alone without an explanation. The door snaps shut behind him and he pulls against the lock. Giving up, his gaze brushes mine before turning back to the door as though he expects the guards to return. I brave a look and see no evidence of new injuries on his face. He doesn’t seem as tired either.
“What’s going on?” he asks, inspecting the room like I had done. They left the restraints on his wrists, but he’s mobile this time.
“It’s better than the other room.” He doesn’t seem so sure as he moves from object to object.
I watch him explore his freedom in silence, guilty when my body reacts to the way his flexes and moves with restrained power. My mind returns to kisses, the blister of warm skin. Hard muscle straining against my curves. Those brilliant eyes dark with passion, searing into me as they speak of ravenous hunger. I hate the sudden cravings stealing my will while he fights for survival. It’s wrong, selfish—so inextricably me.
I clear my throat. “I made some drawings.” I pull a stack of pages from my pocket and hold them out to him. “I remembered how you said you liked palm trees.”
His eyes train on me, burning through my façade, and mine speak right back. I need him to read my mind.
“I’m surprised you remembered.” His expression remains neutral as he pages through the sketches and stops at the one with small words etched into the leaves.
“Let’s see if they’re monitoring us. Tell me you saw a seal when you were captured and we’ll see what they do.”
“They look more like strawberries than palm trees,” he says, squinting at the paper.
“Gee, thanks.”
Even his forced grin chips at my strength.
“No, they’re great. Thank you.”
He returns the pile, and I muster a hurt look. “They’re that bad? You don’t want them?”
He sighs. “Of course I do. It means a lot, but they won’t let me take anything back to my cell. Hang onto them for me?”
I stuff the pages in my pocket.
“Kaleb, I have to tell you something.”
I grab his hands and flinch. I’d come to rule the game… and now? I grip tighter. What if I can’t let go again? He’s too close not to seize, our time together too scarce.
So no more acting, just the desperate kiss that’s been in my head for days. Crushing him, suppressing his startled reaction. Another mistake I don’t regret as the longing magnifies the pain that this could be the last moment my senses experience him. The last time I lose myself in the man who has my heart but can’t claim it.
“Kaleb…” I push him down to a cushion and slide over him. My fingers thread through his hair, grasp his neck so I can absorb every part of his lips, his tongue. I want it all in that second. Too much when I challenge his body against his conscience.
“What are you doing?” He gasps, expression somewhere between pain and longing. I’m hurting him with these promises he can’t keep, these reminders of what he’s being denied, but I can’t stop. He’s the air that’s been sucked from my lungs and I’m selfish as I breathe him back in.
His body surrenders to the pressure of my touch, and I steal every nerve, every muscle that tenses at my attack.
“Wait…”
“One more time,” I breathe. “Just once—”
“Fuck, Andie,” he mutters when the restraints interfere with his own demands. It kills me that his hands aren’t free to take everything I want to give him. Oh god, his pain that he can’t satisfy me. But he has. Over and over again, my light in this darkness, about to be snuffed out by a machine that has no concept of beauty.
I trace his cheek, his unshaven jaw. Haunted green eyes carve into me and settle as a memory that will torture me later. “I can’t lose you, Kaleb.” The tears were not part of the strategy, the begging. But there is no plan anymore, just Kaleb and me in a desperate bond that will be shattered because reality is stronger than love.
“Andie, stop. Just…”
I’m killing him with my sobs.
“Why can’t they see what you are? I need to make them see!”
He shakes his head. “You have to stop taking responsibility for things you can’t change. It will destroy you.” He leans back and cups my face. “This is not your fault. None of this.”
I know he believes that, but I don’t. He was a building supervisor before I turned him into a traitor. “I meant what I said. I love you. I’m sorry. I need you to know that.” I’ve practically forgotten about them at this point. What does any of it matter if I’m fighting without Kaleb?
His fingers lock with mine, and the sting of metal slices into my own wrists.
“You were the only good thing in my life since I got back,” he says quietly.
I shake my head. “Not ‘were.’”
I almost choke at his resigned sigh, heart hammering against my chest. No, you’re not giving up!
“You were right, Andie. About everything. It destroyed me to hear you say it, but you were right. I was living a lie. This is my reality.”
He holds up his hands, and I can’t breathe anymore. I want to throw them back down. Erase this awful image from my memory.
Please be acting. Stop!
The pleas are screaming in my head, and I push them to my face. His sincerity, dammit! I need a liar right now.
“Kaleb, there’s something I have to tell you.” I don’t have a choice. My plan is stupid now, but I need the words if only to prove one of us will still fight.
“I told them about the seal.”
“I know.”
I stare at him, blood running cold. “You know?”
“They came to me yesterday. They gave me two options. Tell them everything and see you or…” His voice trails off as he meets my eyes again, and now I know there’s no acting. No character. No other truth. “This meeting is my reward for cooperating.”
“What did you tell them?”
“That the seal was on a folder the rebels carried into my interrogation room and was definitely one of ours.”
I don’t know what to do now. I know he made that up. There’s no way a random lie I threw out in order to see him could be true. What did I do?
“Did they believe you?”
“Now that they know I lied about that, they want the rest of what I’m hiding.” He doesn’t seem angry, just exhausted. It’s so much worse.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper, giving him as much as I can in those two words.
He clenches his jaw. “You did what you thought you had to. I know you just want to help. I didn’t tell them about the seal because I hadn’t remembered it until you brought it up.”
Translation: You screwed me again, but I forgive you.
My brain doesn’t know what to do with that, my body trembling from its latest betrayal. How do I convince them I’m the real traitor in all of this?
There are so many things that need to be said, but even if we aren’t being watched, they’re locked away by the lack of time, how none of it matters anymore.
“I don’t want to see you again, Andie.”
I freeze.
“I mean it. I’ve told them everything I know. There’s no reason for you to keep coming here. Just live your life and forget about me.”
“What? Kaleb…”
“I’m serious. I agreed to this meeting because I wanted you to hear it from me. Our relationship was a mistake and shouldn’t have started. This is my life now, and there’s no point in pretending anything different. You wanted to see our future? Here it is.”
He’s lying. I know he is. Has to be. But… He rises from the couch.
I jump up and intercept him on his way to the door. “What are you talking about?”
His eyes narrow. “I thought that was pretty self-explanatory.”
“Kaleb, I don’t know what’s going on, but I love…”
“Stop it,” he snaps. “You don’t love me. You don’t even know me. You have no idea what this is. Go back to 9B and be happy.”
He reaches past me for the door, but I shove him away.
“No!”
We’ve left the game, and his stance turns hostile. “This isn’t confusing, Andie. I don’t want you in my life.”
I’m pretty sure my jaw is on the floor. I don’t recognize this man standing before me, looking at me like I’m a smashed insect on the sidewalk. The magnitude of my betrayal has finally settled in. Does he truly hate me for what I’ve done to him?
“You don’t mean that.”
“Stop getting involved in something you don’t understand. It’s over. It’s done, okay? You need to accept that and move on.”
Move on? But there. The shifting gaze, evidence that his words are gutting him too. I soar and crash at the same time.
He shakes his head and pushes past me. “Good luck with everything. Move on, Andie,” he repeats before banging on the door and calling for the guards.
I’m lost as Kaleb’s silhouette disappears down the hall in the grip of his captors. His limp is more pronounced than I remember. Then again, so is everything else about him.
Henry follows my gaze. “You look upset. Is everything all right?”
It’s a stupid question.
I don’t know the next move, but what’s the point if Kaleb refuses to play? There’s no plot or rescue plan, no hope for a fight he doesn’t want. It would have been hard with him on our side. Without him— Who rescues prisoners who don’t want to be freed?
“The meeting didn’t go well,” I respond. Fact.
Maybe Kaleb will have a change of heart. Maybe I’ve completely misinterpreted what just happened. Maybe I know nothing.
“No? I’m sorry to hear that.”
I stare at the cheap tile, the only thing that makes sense at the moment. Vinyl probably. Several sections need to be replaced. “He said he told you everything about the seal, and I believe him. I thought for sure there would be more there that could help.”
Henry sighs. “Emery said what you gave us was helpful, my dear. No need to put so much pressure on yourself.”
“I’m trying to be patient, but I know he doesn’t belong in prison. I don’t understand why you think he’s dangerous. He’s told you everything he’s ever told me. He was scared when he got back. Traumatized. It’s only been a few months. How can you be so surprised he’s just opening up now?”
He’s listening to me. I can see it in his eyes, the way he leans in to receive my speech. Burlington Henry, the face of our enemy, doesn’t look evil. He looks thoughtful.
After a long pause, he takes a deep breath and presses back into his chair.
“You should know that I have a soft spot for that kid.”
His confession hangs between us. Game-changing for one of us, and I don’t dare to speak.
“I’ll never forget the day they brought him back,” he continues. “After he was taken we thought for sure he was dead. We sent teams out, but they all returned with nothing. We’ve had guys disappear before, but rarely without a demand. Usually, the rebels knock down our door trying to make a trade after snatching one of ours, but with Kaleb, nothing. Not even a confirmation that they had him. We actually wondered if he deserted. That’s probably where his trouble started. Those first labels never go away even when they’re proven false.
“We finally caught a break a month later. An anonymous source tipped us off that one of our men was being held at a rebel safe house in the mountains thirty-five miles outside of Harmonie. It never occurred to us it could be Novelli. Even if they had taken him, there was no way he was still alive after all this time without a word.”
He looks at me then, his hard face contorted with the free release of emotion. It’s frightening in its implications.
“When our extraction team reported back that he was alive, the immediate buzz around HQ was that he must have turned. What else could explain the fact that he was still breathing? The extraction team said he was in rough shape but it didn’t matter to us at HQ. Any dedicated spy would be willing to take a few blows for his mission.” He quiets. I can already see the horror, everything I’ve always feared, reflected in his features.
“I suspected him too. Until I saw him.”
His eyes close. “I’ve never seen anything like it, but there was not a place on that kid’s body that wasn’t ripped up. Even the medical team couldn’t explain how he was breathing.”
“And yet you grilled him? Accused him of being a traitor?” It’s a scream in my head but comes out as a tremor.
A troubled look settles over him. “It doesn’t sound fair now, but at the time, things just unfolded the way they did.
“War is a funny thing. A man becomes an abstract idea, tokens that you move around on strategy boards and reference in briefings. Kaleb was sentenced before he got back, and when we saw the evidence of what had been done to him, we knew there was a story worth uncovering.”
“But he wouldn’t share it. At least not the version you wanted,” I say.
“Not openly. He became a puzzle, not a victim. His wounds were studied so we could try to make sense of them. Then, when the evidence started pointing toward our own techniques, well, he made things worse by not waving the white flag and telling us everything up front.”
“And you can’t see how difficult that would have been for him?”
“I can. Of course it was a lot to handle, but we’re soldiers. We’re trained to make hard choices when the time comes. Just the fact that he disobeyed direct orders is enough for a court-martial. He’s lucky he didn’t end up in a cell long before now.”
I can’t believe what I’m hearing as any understanding I felt disintegrates into disgust. “Are you kidding me?” His brow furrows at my jump onto dangerous ground, but I’ve stopped caring about consequences. I’m not going back to my room without punching a hole in this mess of lies.
“Your man was kidnapped and ripped apart because of you. Because of his commitment to this cause. And he gets prison for it? So what if he didn’t tell you what you wanted to hear. You criticize him for not making the hard choices, but what about the hard choices he had to make while being wrapped in razor mesh or terrorized with the ionizer? What about losing his leg, his face, his fingers? He should be on a beach in Region 1 sipping cocktails as a thank you for what he suffered on your behalf, and you’ve thrown him in prison?”
“Andie, listen for a minute—”
“No, I’m not listening to any more of this. You brought me here because it’s possible that I know the new Kaleb better than you do. Well, let me tell you what I know. I know Kaleb Novelli is no traitor. He’s a hero who cares about the refugees in 9B, a man who serves when he should be served. So I’m sorry if his timeline didn’t work for you and your strategy boards. He made the hard choices over and over again, and when the time came for all of you to make them you chose wrong.”
I take a breath and shut my eyes, waiting for the call for the guards, the restraints on my wrists. Instead, I feel a tug on my arm pulling me back to the chair.
“That’s what I’m trying to tell you.”
I look at him, unable to ignore the return of that disturbing compassion to his face.
“I agree. I’m here to tell you that I’ve recommended he be released. In fact, I’ve insisted on it.”
I shake my head, speechless.
He squeezes before letting go. “If that happens, he would be under strict surveillance, but I don’t believe that Lance Corporal Novelli is the one we’re looking for. He’s just a tough kid who got extremely unlucky and ended up in one hell of a mess. I don’t know how we’ll work through it, but we’ll find a way. I’ve already submitted my petition to Captain Emery.”
By his expression he’s expecting a response. He’ll be disappointed because announcements like that don’t come with reactions. They’re supposed to be stale memos, delivered in context. A pause, a reread, processing with informed comrades. They’re not meant for vacuums, to end heated arguments that scream stalemate. So I stare. And finally, nod too. There might have been a “good” muttered as well, but I’m not sure who says it.