The first time John Price met you, you were standing in the hallway outside your apartment with a ripped grocery bag hanging from one hand.

An orange rolled straight into the toe of his boot.

He’d just returned from deployment—exhausted, carrying a duffel over one shoulder with far too many unfinished thoughts in his head—and for a second, he simply stared at the mess scattered across the floor.

Then at you. You looked horrified.

“Oh my God, I’m so sorry,” you laughed, immediately crouching to gather everything. “I swear I’m not usually this much of a disaster.”

A low chuckle escaped him before he could stop it. “Wouldn’t be much of a story if you weren’t.”

You blinked, then laughed harder.

Price bent to help without another word, collecting a runaway can before it disappeared down the hallway.

“Thanks,” you said, offering him a sheepish smile.

“Anytime.”

Most people in the building kept their distance after that.

Price wasn’t exactly approachable. He was older than most of the tenants, broad-shouldered, perpetually tired-looking, and carried himself with the quiet confidence of someone who’d spent most of his life handling situations other people couldn’t. He disappeared for weeks at a time, returned with bruises he never explained, and answered questions about work with vague smiles and a quick change of subject.

You kept talking to him anyway. A quick hello in the hallway, asking how his day had been, offering him coffee when you noticed he’d returned home after another long absence.

You never seemed intimidated by him.

Eventually, Price started lingering. A few extra minutes of conversation in the hall, the occasional joke, stories that revealed enough to keep a conversation going without revealing anything important.

One evening, you mentioned your kitchen sink was leaking. The next, there was a knock at your door. Price stood on the other side with a toolbox in his hand.

“You mentioned the sink.”

That became the beginning of something neither of you ever put a name to.

Shared coffees before sunrise. Long conversations neither of you intended to have. Price fixing things around your apartment that barely qualified as problems. You teasing him relentlessly for finding excuses to use that toolbox.

Somewhere along the way, it stopped feeling like visiting.

Your apartment became the first place he looked for when he came home.

He found himself lingering on your couch long after conversations ended, listening to you ramble about your day, watching you move around the kitchen, existing in a kind of peace he’d almost forgotten was possible.

You never expected anything from him. You simply welcomed him back every time he returned.

Somewhere along the way, your apartment started feeling more like home than his own.

Which was exactly why he should’ve known better.

The night everything fell apart, Price had just returned from a mission overseas—exhausted, bruised, and looking forward to a hot shower and a decent night’s sleep.

The hallway was quiet when he stepped off the elevator. Then he noticed the warm light glowing beneath your door. Something in his chest softened.

Home.

The thought had barely crossed his mind before a scream tore through the hallway. Your scream.

Price froze for half a second, and then a crash echoed from inside your apartment, followed by a man’s voice.

Your front door hung partially off its hinges when he reached it. Inside stood two armed soldiers. One had a grip on your arm. The other demanded answers you couldn’t possibly give.

“Where is he?”

Price understood immediately. The surveillance. The countless hours he’d spent across the hall. The pattern they’d mistaken for vulnerability. They’d been watching him.

And now they had you.

Your eyes found his from across the room, wide with fear.

Price felt something cold settle in his chest. After decades spent protecting the people under his command, he’d made the one mistake he never should have.

He’d allowed himself to have something worth coming home to.

And now he was facing the consequences.