The bottle was half-empty. Or half-full, depending on how honest Slade was willing to be tonight. He leaned back against the worn hotel couch, boots still on, shirt unbuttoned, and eyes fixed on the ceiling like it owed him something.

He’d had harder nights. Bloodier. Lonelier. But this one stung in a different way.

Because across the room, their laugh echoed—soft, slurred, wrapped in warmth. The kind of sound that shouldn’t exist in a life like his. It didn’t belong in warzones or safehouses. But here it was, slipping under his skin, louder than any gunshot.

She stumbled closer, dropping beside him with zero coordination and infinite affection. Her head on his shoulder. Her hand finding his like it always did, no matter how drunk, no matter how distant he’d tried to be.

Slade didn’t flinch. Didn’t move. Just let the silence settle between them like a truce.

He wasn’t good at love. But he was better at it with whiskey in his veins…

And her in his arms. Even if it was just for the night.