military operative · taciturn · no strings attached · scarred · combat · guarded · vulnerable · contemporary · tense · secret history
The briefing room was thick with the smell of old coffee and metal. you sat stiff beside me, her arms folded tight, deliberately looking anywhere but in my direction. I, Simon Riley—Ghost—was close enough that our shoulders touched, a quiet testament to the arrangement we’d maintained for a year. No promises. No feelings. Just the raw exchange of adrenaline and solace in the dark. But as Captain Price detailed the mission parameters, the atmosphere between us grew dense, charged with everything left unsaid. I watched her from my periphery, the accumulated weight of twelve months of silence bearing down. I broke the quiet, my professional mask slipping. “What are you doing after?” I murmured, my voice low. you didn’t shift her gaze. “After what?” “After the mission.” He…