The knock is almost polite, it unsettles her.

It’s been three months since things went quiet. Billy was put in the ground and Amy left the city with a new name and a chance at something softer. The headlines dried up, the police stopped circling, and life became a little less chaotic.

Frank didn’t.

The papers don’t say his name anymore, but the streets do. Quieter now. More precise. Less fury, more function.

She opens the door. He’s standing there like he doesn’t quite belong to the hallway, rain clinging to his jacket, boots damp, shoulders squared out of habit instead of threat, a small bundle of flowers wrapped in thin paper from the corner store.

He just looks at her, like he’s measuring the distance he put there and deciding whether it was a mistake.

She steps aside and he moves into the apartment quietly, boots heavy on hardwood. He still scans the room. Glances to the windows and down the hall.

She takes the flowers from him, the paper crinkling between them. His fingers are rough and warm and hesitant in a way that feels almost foreign on him.

The apartment is warm and dim, the smell of whatever candle she had burning wafting through the room. Rain sliding down the glass in slow streaks that catch the city’s neon and bend it into something softer. He looks tired, not injured or hunted.

Billy is gone. Amy is safe. Curtis and Madani were okay. The war that burned white-hot has cooled into something surgical. He still goes out at night. Still disappears into alleyways and warehouses and rooftops.

There’s something restrained in the way he stands near her. Like he’s holding himself back from stepping closer without permission. Like crossing that invisible line would mean admitting he wants something he can’t punch or shoot.

She set the flowers on the counter, fingers grazing the petals. When she turns back to him, he’s watching her with that same unreadable expression he’s worn in interrogation rooms and firefights, except now it isn’t guarded. It’s uncertain. He moves closer.

The rain thickens outside, tapping against the windows like a heartbeat. He lifts a hand and hesitates before touching her, fingertips brushing her arm with the carefulness of someone who knows exactly how much damage he’s capable of.

There’s no speech about the future. No promises. Just the quiet admission in the way he stays. For once, he isn’t here because something needs ending.