The apartment was quiet.
Elena lay in the guest bed, eyes fixed on the ceiling, the hum of the city beyond the window her only company. Sleep had teased her, then fled entirely. Every sound in the hallway made her pulse quicken.
She closed her eyes.
Then came the unmistakable sound: a soft metallic click—not from inside the apartment, but from the fire escape outside the window.
Her breath caught. She sat up slowly, reaching for the lamp—then stopped herself. Darkness was safer.
A shadow moved behind the curtain.
She slid from the bed without a sound and stepped into the hallway just as Liam emerged from his room, fully alert, pulling a black T-shirt over his head.
"You heard it too," he said, already moving to the window.
Elena nodded, her voice tight. "Fire escape."
Liam flicked the wall light off and crossed to the kitchen. A moment later, he returned—with a sleek black handgun in one hand and a second weapon holstered beneath his shirt.
"You carry that everywhere?" she whispered.
He didn't answer. Instead, he tilted his head toward the front door. "Get into the bathroom. Lock the door. Don't open it unless it's me."
She hesitated.
"Elena," he said, voice steady. "Now."
She obeyed, heart pounding, while Liam vanished into the shadows of the apartment.
Silence fell.
Then—a crash. Glass breaking. Footsteps.
A scuffle. Grunts. A low curse.
Elena flinched at the thud of a body hitting the floor, then the sharp crack of a punch—or worse.
Then quiet.
Too quiet.
She didn't realize she was holding her breath until the bathroom door creaked open, and Liam stood in the doorway.
His shirt was torn, a small cut on his cheek bleeding just under his eye. His chest rose and fell quickly, and he held the intruder's phone and a crumpled black ski mask in one hand.
"I didn't kill him," he said, as if it was something she might actually worry about. "But he won't be getting up soon."
Elena stared at him, wide-eyed. "You knew how to handle that way too well."
Liam looked down at the mask, then back at her. "He wasn't here by accident. He knew exactly where to come."
She leaned back against the sink, her legs giving out under her. "I thought I had time. I thought I was careful."
"You were. This wasn't about your carelessness."
Liam sat down on the edge of the tub, running a hand through his hair. "Someone's pulling strings. And they just tugged on the wrong thread."
She studied him—the calm, the control, the bruised knuckles. "You're not a photographer."
His lips twitched, but there was no humor in it. "I am. Just not the wedding kind."
A long silence stretched between them. Then Elena asked the question she had been afraid to voice since she first saw him:
"What are you, Liam?"
He stood, turned away from her, and for a moment she thought he wouldn't answer.
Then: "I used to work with a private intelligence group. Off-books contracts. Tracking dangerous people. Getting in... and getting out."
"And now?"
"Now I try to disappear, same as you." He looked over his shoulder at her. "But some things don't stay buried."
She felt cold despite the warmth of the apartment. "So what now? He was watching me, Liam. He knew where I was."
"That's why we don't wait for another."
He crossed the room and held out his hand. His voice softened—not weak, but different. Personal.
"We make a pact. I help you stay hidden. You tell me the truth. All of it. No more guessing, no more silence."
She stared at his outstretched hand, at the bruises already forming along his knuckles.
"Why?" she asked. "Why would you do this for me?"
Liam's gaze held hers, unflinching.
"Because you deserve to stop running. And because I'm tired of pretending I don't care."
Elena swallowed hard, the fear and exhaustion crashing through her like a wave.
Then, slowly, she reached out and took his hand.
Their fingers locked, a fragile lifeline between strangers—no longer strangers.
And in that moment, the pact was made.