Chapter 98
Evelyn's POV
I woke to sunlight streaming through the windows and the smell of coffee. For a disorienting moment, I couldn't remember where I was or why I felt so warm and safe. Then I registered the arm draped across my waist, the solid presence behind me, and memory flooded back.
Julian.
I turned carefully, trying not to wake him, and found him already awake, watching me with those sharp gray eyes.
"Morning," he said, his voice rough with sleep.
"You made coffee."
"I did. Also raided those new groceries and made breakfast. Or at least, I made toast and found some jam." He smiled.
"You didn't have to do that."
"I wanted to." He brushed hair back from my face. "Today's a big day. Figured you should eat something."
Right. Today. The beach, the phone, the symbolic severing of ties with my past.
My stomach twisted with anxiety, but I pushed it down. I'd made my choice. Now I just had to follow through.
"What time is it?" I asked.
"Just past eight. I figured we could leave around nine, beat the traffic out to the Rockaways. Should give us plenty of time before—" He stopped. "Before whatever comes next."
I nodded and sat up, taking the coffee he handed me. It was perfect—exactly the way I liked it, which meant he'd been paying attention.
"Nervous?" he asked.
"Terrified," I admitted. "But I'm doing it anyway."
"That's my girl." He kissed my forehead and stood up. "Come on. Let's eat, then get this done."
We ate breakfast in comfortable silence—toast and jam and more coffee than was probably healthy. I kept glancing at my bedroom door, knowing the phone was in there, hidden in a false bottom drawer. Waiting.
After we finished eating, I went to retrieve it. The phone was exactly where I'd left it, a phone with only one contact saved. Viktor. My handler, my connection to the organization, my lifeline for the past years.
I held it in my hand, feeling its weight, and thought about all the messages I'd received on this device. Orders, confirmations, threats. The entire architecture of my life as an assassin, contained in this small piece of plastic and circuitry.
"Ready?" Julian asked from the doorway.
I took a breath and nodded. "Ready."
We drove out to the Rockaways in Julian's car, the city gradually giving way to residential neighborhoods and then to the wild, windswept beach. It was cold and gray, the kind of day that kept most people indoors. Perfect for what we needed to do.
Julian parked near the beach access, and we walked down to the water in silence. The waves crashed against the shore, relentless and eternal, and I felt the phone heavy in my pocket.
"This is it," I said when we reached the water's edge. "Last chance to tell me this is a terrible idea."
"It's not a terrible idea." Julian stood beside me, close enough that our shoulders touched. "It's you choosing your future over your past. That's never a terrible idea."
I pulled out the phone and stared at it one last time. Five years of my life, reduced to this. Seven years of isolation and violence and survival at any cost.
I thought about Viktor, about the organization, about the girl I'd been when they'd first taken me to Vorkuta. About everything I'd done, everyone I'd killed, all in service of a promise of freedom that had turned out to be just another cage.
And then I thought about Julian—about his persistence and his protectiveness and the way he looked at me like I was worth fighting for.
The choice wasn't hard at all.
I drew my arm back and threw the phone as hard as I could. It arced through the air, spinning end over end, before disappearing into the gray Atlantic with a small splash that was immediately swallowed by the waves.
Gone.
I stood there for a moment, watching the water, half expecting to feel regret or panic or the urge to dive in after it.
But all I felt was relief.
Julian's arm came around my shoulders, pulling me close. "How do you feel?"
"Free," I said, and was surprised to find I meant it. "Terrified, but free."
"Good." He kissed the top of my head. "Now comes the hard part."
"What's that?"
"Figuring out what to do with all this freedom." He turned me to face him. "What do you want, Evelyn? Not what the organization wants, not what Adrian needs, not what anyone else expects. What do you want?"
I looked up at him, at this man who'd somehow become essential to me in such a short time, and found the answer was simpler than I'd expected.
"This," I said. "You. Us. Whatever that means."
His smile was brilliant, transforming his usually sharp features into something almost soft. "Then that's what we'll figure out. Together."
"Together," I agreed.
We stood there for a while longer, watching the waves, and I felt something shift inside me. The phone was gone, sunk to the bottom of the Atlantic, and with it went the last physical tie to my old life.
I was still the same person—still carried the same scars, the same skills, the same capacity for violence. But now I had something else too.
I had choice.
And I was choosing this. Choosing him. Choosing the terrifying, exhilarating possibility of something real.
"Ready to go back?" Julian asked eventually.
I took one last look at the ocean, at the place where my old life had disappeared beneath the waves, and nodded.
"Yeah. Let's go home."
And as we walked back to the car, his hand in mine, I realized I meant it.
Home wasn't a place anymore. It was this—him, us, the fragile new thing we were building together.