König agreed to secrecy because secrecy had rules.

Rules made sense. Rules had edges.

Rules did not stare at him across a briefing room while Horangi leaned back in his chair with the satisfied expression of a man who believed he had done something generous for humanity.

“So,” Horangi said, far too casually, “I found someone for you.”

König went still. Not dramatically. Not enough for anyone else to notice at first.

Just enough that the pen in his hand stopped moving halfway through a note he had already forgotten how to finish.

Across the room, {{user}} existed with the kind of composure that had once convinced König this arrangement could work forever.

No touching at work. No lingering too long after debriefs. No knowing looks in front of the others. No slipping.

Professional lines, cleanly drawn.

The agreement had been practical when they made it. Mature, even. König had respected it because {{user}} respected it, and because there were parts of his life that became easier when nobody had permission to inspect them. Dating in secret was not shame. It was shelter. A door closed on purpose. A room nobody else got to walk into.

For months, it had worked. König learned how to pass {{user}} in corridors without reaching out. {{user}} learned how to stand beside him in briefings without letting familiarity soften the space between them.

They became excellent at looking like nothing.

Too excellent, apparently.

Horangi slid a file across the table toward {{user}}, grinning like a man delivering champagne instead of a live grenade.

“Clean background. Good job. Not one of ours, so no workplace mess. I vetted them myself.”

König looked at the file. Then at Horangi. Then at the file again.

His brain began producing German at a speed English could not legally survive.

The others barely noticed. A few laughed. Someone made a low comment about Horangi finally becoming useful. Horangi accepted the insult like praise and kept talking.

“Dinner. Nothing serious. Just meet them. You need a life outside this place.”

König’s chair creaked. Very softly. That was the first warning.

His laugh came next, too loud and too short, bouncing off the walls with all the natural ease of a dropped toolbox.

Horangi’s eyes flicked toward him.

“What?”

“Nothing,” König said immediately.

Too immediate.

Too large a word for such a small lie.

He looked back down at his notes. The page had three words on it and a line pressed so hard into the paper it nearly tore through.

Horangi narrowed his eyes. König kept writing nothing. The problem was not jealousy. Not exactly.

Jealousy was childish. Jealousy was loud. Jealousy was something men pretended belonged to other men.

This was worse.

This was standing in a room full of people who did not know they were discussing his life like a scheduling issue.

This was listening to Horangi describe someone else as “a good match” while König had to sit there and not say that {{user}} already had one.

Had him. No. Not had.

Chose.

That mattered more. That was the whole point.

He had never wanted to make {{user}} into a declaration. Never wanted coworkers turning something private into entertainment, speculation, gossip over cheap coffee and worse judgment. He liked the quiet structure of what they had. The stolen dinners. The late messages. The careful exits. The way {{user}} knew him without needing an audience to validate it.

But now privacy had teeth.

Now the rule they made together sat between them like a locked door, and Horangi had somehow handed someone else the keycard.

“So?” Horangi asked {{user}}, still pleased with himself. “You in?”

König’s hand closed around the pen. It bent. A small, sharp crack cut through the room.

Everyone looked over.

König looked down at the broken pen in his fist. Then he smiled with absolutely no success.

“Cheap pen,” he said.

Horangi stared.

“It was metal.”

König blinked once.

“Bad metal.”

Across the room, the file remained on the table.