Rowan POV
Rowan hasn't slept in thirty-six hours.
He sits in the dark of the guest room listening to Daniel move through the penthouse and telling himself this is manageable. He's handled worse. He's been shot and kept moving. He's been interrogated and said nothing. He's killed people and felt nothing. Surely he can handle living in the same space as Daniel Hart without losing his mind.
He's wrong.
This is worse than torture. Torture is pain he can compartmentalize. Pain is something to push through and survive. But this is something else. This is being so close to someone he loves that he can hear their breathing through a wall. Close enough to smell their shampoo in the hallway. Close enough to know that if he walked down the corridor right now, he could see Daniel sleeping.
Close enough to never touch.
That's the real punishment.
His training taught him to survive isolation. Taught him that emotional attachment is a weakness that gets you killed. But it never prepared him for this specific hell. Being forced into proximity with the one person who breaks every rule he's ever learned.
Rowan forces himself to focus on the monitors. Security feeds from every camera. The penthouse is locked down tight. Nothing gets in. Nothing gets out. Daniel is safe.
That's the mission. That's all that matters.
At seven in the morning Daniel's bedroom light turns on. Rowan watches on the monitor as Daniel moves around before sunrise like he does every day. Getting ready. Preparing. Living his life like an assassin isn't supposed to kill him before breakfast.
Then Daniel heads to the shower.
Rowan should look away from the monitors. Should respect the privacy he promised to provide. Should do a lot of things he doesn't do.
He keeps watching as Daniel undresses. Keeps watching as the water turns on. Keeps watching as the steam fills the bathroom.
Rowan's jaw clenches.
This is bad. This is the opposite of control. This is exactly the kind of weakness that gets you killed.
He turns off the monitor and stands up. He needs to move. Needs to create distance. Needs to do something other than sit in darkness thinking about Daniel's skin underneath that water.
Instead he walks to the kitchen and makes coffee. Black. Like Daniel likes it. Out of habit. Out of muscle memory. Out of three years of making coffee for a man who doesn't know Rowan makes his coffee every morning.
By the time Daniel comes out of the shower Rowan has composed himself. Or mostly composed. His hands are steady when they need to be. His face is blank when Daniel appears in the kitchen hallway.
Water is still dripping from Daniel's dark curly hair. He's wearing a white shirt that's partially unbuttoned. His skin is flushed from the hot water. He looks like he looks every morning and Rowan's chest tightens anyway.
Rowan forces himself to look at the security feeds instead of at Daniel.
"You're awake early," Daniel says. He's talking about his schedule. About an important meeting with three other senators about the healthcare bill. About how he's nervous and needs the votes and doesn't know if he can pull it together.
Rowan hears almost none of it.
He's remembering instead. Remembering the way Daniel's wet hair felt between his fingers three years ago. Remembering running water through those curls while Daniel leaned into his chest. Remembering the taste of water on Daniel's neck. Remembering the way Daniel smiled in those moments when they were completely together and nothing else mattered.
Remembering why he had to leave.
"You should wear the gray suit," Rowan says, cutting off whatever Daniel was saying. His voice comes out rough.
Daniel stops talking. Looks at Rowan like he's trying to translate a language he doesn't speak.
"The gray suit will make you look more authoritative than the navy," Rowan continues. He's speaking professionally but his body is screaming to touch Daniel. To pull him close. To remember what it felt like to belong to someone.
"How did you know I was thinking about what to wear?" Daniel asks.
Rowan doesn't answer. Can't answer. Can't say that he knows Daniel so completely that he can predict every decision before Daniel makes it.
"I'll wear the gray suit," Daniel says quietly.
He walks past Rowan on the way to his bedroom.
It's a simple movement. Nothing dramatic. Just a man walking through a kitchen toward his closet.
But his shoulder brushes against Rowan's.
Just a touch. The brief contact of fabric and skin. Nothing that should matter. Nothing that should affect someone trained to not feel anything.
Rowan's hand shakes.
Actually shakes. His fingers tremor like he's been holding his breath for three years and just released it. Like his entire body is remembering what it felt like to be touched by someone he loves.
He grips the counter to steady himself.
Sixteen years of training crumbles in a single moment of contact.
Daniel keeps walking like he didn't notice. But Rowan sees the moment he pauses. The second where Daniel's steps slow. The instant where his hand comes up to touch his own shoulder like he can still feel Rowan there.
This is unsustainable.
Rowan realizes that in about seventy-two hours everything is going to collapse. Daniel's father will give information to federal investigators. The shadow organization will make a move. The carefully constructed lie of James Morrison will shatter like glass.
And Rowan will have to choose. Disappear and let Daniel think he's been abandoned again. Or stay and watch Daniel realize that the man protecting him is the same man who killed thirty-seven people and is being hunted by the government.
Rowan's phone buzzes.
Message from Sebastian. Federal warrants being prepared. Timeline accelerating. Grace Carter has been digging into classified files.
Rowan reads the message and realizes that Daniel is about to uncover everything on his own.
Daniel comes back out of his bedroom wearing the gray suit exactly like Rowan predicted. He looks at Rowan with an expression that says he's trying to solve a puzzle that doesn't have pieces that fit.
"I'm going to be meeting with federal investigators later," Daniel says carefully. "About a shadow organization that's supposedly running illegal operations. I don't know what it means yet but I need to understand what I'm walking into."
Rowan's blood goes cold.
"Don't go to that meeting," Rowan says.
"What?"
"Don't meet with federal investigators. Don't answer questions. Don't do anything except stay in this penthouse where it's safe."
Daniel's expression shifts. He's starting to understand that this is bigger than security. That James Morrison knows something about why someone tried to kill him.
"Who are you?" Daniel asks.
This is it. This is the moment where everything falls apart.
Rowan's phone buzzes again. This time it's an alert from his security system.
Motion detected in the building. Multiple tangos moving toward penthouse level.
"They're coming," Rowan whispers.
"Who's coming?"
Rowan moves toward Daniel instinctively, pulling him away from the windows. His hand finds Daniel's arm and the contact burns through him like recognition.
"The people who want to kill you," Rowan says. "And the people who want to kill me."
The first bullet shatters the window.
And Rowan realizes they're out of time.