Page 132 of Knight

"Why?" I ask again, my voice is quieter now.

"Because I need you to understand what you mean to me." His gaze locks on mine. "I’m willing to risk everything I’ve built, everything I am, even though it terrifies me."

I should throw him out. At the very least, I should make him work harder for this. But something about the intensity in his eyes keeps me rooted in place.

"I want to show you something." He whirls again, and stalks over to where my new laptop is sitting on a small side table. Flipping it open, he taps at the keyboard. "Your login password is terrible."

"Thanks for the critique," I deadpan. "Is there a point to that?"

"No. But you’ll thank me when I upgrade your system."

Lines of code fill the screen as his fingers fly over the keys. I have no idea what I’m looking at. They’re just lines of numbers and symbols that mean nothing to me. But the way he’s standing there, the way he’s typing rapidly, it’s clear that whatever he’s trying to show me is important to him.

"What am I looking at?"

"This is the first time I saw you through my cameras." His voice is quieter now. "The moment you walked into my building carrying that phone. This is how it looks in code."

More lines appear, streams of it filling the screen.

"This is every time you’ve been in my system since then. Every camera angle. Every access log. I documented all of it,trying to reduce you to data I could analyze. I needed to turn you into something I could grasp and manage." His laugh is bitter. "Because that’s what I do—turn everything into code so it feels safer."

"Knight—"

"But it doesn’t work." He straightens. "You can’t be reduced to data points. I can’t control you through algorithms. And you most definitely can’t be kept safely out of my way through screens. Trust me, I’ve spent weeks trying."

Understanding washes over me. This isn’t just meaningless strings of code on my screen. Not to him. It’s a roadmap to what he’s unable to put into words. Each line is him grappling with feelings he doesn’t know how to process. It’s an attempt to fit me into a structure he understands, and a record of his failure to do so.

"What exactly is this?" I gesture to the space between us. I need to hear him say it out loud.

"You want the truth? Fine." He stands there, his body almost vibrating with barely restrained tension. "I love you. Pretty sure I have done since you stood in my workspace refusing to let me ignore you."

The words steal the air from my lungs. I swallow, licking my lips, searching for the right response.

"If that's true, then you have to stop running.” I take a breath, trying to keep my composure, but my voice still shakes a little. “You have to stop retreating every time something feels out of control.”

"I know." He spins, coming toward me so quickly I back up. My back hits the wall. He braces his good arm beside my head. “But I need to know you want it too.”

The closeness of him, the heat radiating from his body, the sheer intensity in his gaze, leaves me breathless.

"Tell me to leave," he whispers. "If you don’t want this—if you don’t want me—just say the word. I’ll go. I will cut all the feeds. I’ll stop sending you money. I’ll?—"

I grab the front of his shirt, my hands tightening in the fabric as I pull him down to me. His mouth crashes against mine, and it’s not soft or tentative—it’s a collision of everything we’ve held back, a month of distance and frustration igniting into something uncontrollable.

"Eva." My name emerges rough as his mouth blazes a path down my neck.

“This doesn’t fix everything. I’m still mad at you.”

He pulls back just enough to meet my gaze, the faintest smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. “Good. You’re hotter when you’re mad.”

“You’re impossible.” But the words don’t carry the bite they should.

“It’s been said.”

“Don’t get cocky.” My fingers are already moving to the hem of his shirt. “I haven’t decided if I’m throwing you out or not yet.”

His eyes darken as I push the fabric up, and then he tenses when I reveal the faint scars from his injuries. His sharp inhale doesn’t go unnoticed when my fingers stroke over the edge of the scar on his side.

“Does it still hurt?”

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