The nightmares started two weeks after Adrian's arrest.
Isla would wake gasping, drowning in darkness, convinced cameras were watching, convinced Adrian had escaped again, convinced Ryder was bleeding out on a floor somewhere while she stood frozen. The rational part of her brain knew it was trauma processing, delayed stress response, completely normal after what she'd survived.
The irrational part didn't care. It just wanted to scream.
Ryder always woke with her. Combat reflexes meant he slept light, aware of every change in breathing, every movement. The first time she woke sobbing, he'd been alert and armed before she'd fully surfaced.
'You're safe,' he murmured, pulling her against his chest. 'Just a nightmare. You're safe. I'm here.'
'He had a gun to your head.' Isla clung to him. 'In the dream. He was going to kill you and make me watch and I couldn't move, couldn't shoot, couldn't—'
'But you did shoot. In real life, you saved us both.' Ryder's hand stroked her hair, soothing. 'The nightmare isn't real. This is real. Me holding you. Both of us alive and whole and together.'
She focused on his heartbeat, steady and strong beneath her ear. Real. Present. Alive. Gradually, the panic receded. 'Does it ever stop? The nightmares?'
'Eventually. With time and processing.' His voice held experience, hard-won knowledge. 'I still have them sometimes. Combat scenarios, losing my team. But they get less frequent. Less intense. You learn to recognize them for what they are—echoes of trauma, not current threats.'
'How long did it take you?'
'Years. But I didn't have someone holding me through them. Didn't let anyone close enough to help.' He kissed her forehead. 'You have me. That'll make the difference.'
Isla settled deeper into his embrace. 'Tell me about them. Your team. The men you lost. I want to know.'
Ryder was quiet for a long moment. Then, slowly, he began. 'Davis was our medic. Could patch anything from bullet wounds to broken hearts. Always had a joke, even in the worst situations. He's the one who owned this apartment building—left it to me in his will because he said I'd need somewhere to disappear someday.'
'He knew you well.'
'Better than I knew myself.' Ryder's chest rose and fell beneath her. 'Martinez was our communications expert. Spoke six languages. Could charm his way into or out of anywhere. He saved my life in Kandahar—talked down an armed civilian while I was pinned with a separated shoulder.'
'Thompson?' She wanted to know them all, these men who'd shaped Ryder into who he was.
'Explosives. Could defuse anything, build anything. Had a wife and two kids back home. They were his whole world.' His voice roughened. 'The IED that killed them—Thompson would have spotted it if I'd let him take point instead of sending them in blind on bad intel.'
'You couldn't have known.'
'That's what everyone says. Doesn't change that I was their team leader. Their safety was my responsibility. And I failed them.' The guilt was still there, a wound that hadn't healed despite years passing. 'Chen was our sniper. Youngest of us, just twenty-two. He could hit targets I couldn't even see. Had this dream of becoming a park ranger after his service ended. Wanted peace and quiet after all the violence.'
Isla turned in his arms, needing to see his face. 'They wouldn't blame you. You know that, right? It was war. Bad intelligence. Wrong place, wrong time. Not your fault.'
'My head knows that. My heart hasn't accepted it yet.' Ryder's thumb traced her jawline. 'But protecting you—keeping you safe when everyone else failed—that's helped. Like maybe I can balance the scales. Save the people I'm supposed to save this time.'
'I'm not your redemption, Ryder. You don't owe the universe a life saved to make up for theirs.' She kissed him gently. 'You're a good man who survived a terrible thing. That's all.'
'You make it sound simple.'
'It is simple. Complicated things we make complicated. Simple truths we accept.' She settled back against his chest. 'Tell me something good. A happy memory with them. Before the end.'
Ryder smiled—she felt it against her hair. 'There was this time in Germany, between deployments. We found this tiny bar, completely off the beaten path. Davis convinced the owner to let us sing karaoke despite none of us being able to carry a tune. Martinez chose Bohemian Rhapsody. All of us. Full six-minute operatic catastrophe.'
'That sounds terrible.'
'It was magnificent. The owner tried to kick us out halfway through. Thompson bribed him with American whiskey. We finished the song, got a standing ovation from the three other people in the bar, and were permanently banned.' His chest shook with laughter. 'Best night of my life, before I met you.'
Isla closed her eyes, picturing it. Young soldiers finding joy between horrors, building brotherhood through ridiculous moments. 'They sound amazing.'
'They were. And they'd like you.' Ryder's arms tightened. 'Davis especially. He always said I needed someone who could match my stubbornness. Someone who wouldn't let me wallow in my damage.'
'Sounds like Davis was smart.'
'The smartest. He knew I'd struggle after they were gone. Made me promise not to isolate. Not to let the guilt consume me.' A pause. 'I broke that promise for five years. Until you.'
'Until me,' Isla echoed. 'Now you're stuck with me and all my damage alongside yours.'
'Your damage makes sense to me. We match.' He kissed the top of her head. 'Two broken people building something whole together.'
They lay in comfortable silence, darkness and intimacy cocooning them. Outside, Manhattan never slept—traffic hummed, sirens wailed, the city continued its endless motion. But here, in this bed, they'd carved out peace.
'I talked to a therapist,' Isla admitted. 'About the stalking, the shooting, everything. My father set it up.'
'How'd it go?'
'Hard. She said what I'm experiencing is normal. That healing isn't linear. That nightmares and hypervigilance and trust issues are all expected after sustained trauma.' Isla traced patterns on his chest. 'She also said having a support system helps. That I shouldn't isolate or try to handle everything alone.'
'Good advice.'
'I told her about you. About us. She asked if our relationship was healthy or if I was using you as a coping mechanism.' Isla felt him tense. 'I said both. That you help me cope AND we're building something real. That those things aren't mutually exclusive.'
'What did she say?'
'That as long as we're both aware of it, as long as we're choosing each other consciously rather than desperately, it can work.' She tilted her head up. 'We are choosing each other consciously, right? Not just clinging to survival partners?'
'I choose you every morning when I wake up and every night when I fall asleep.' Ryder's voice was certain. 'Consciously, deliberately, completely. This isn't desperation. This is love.'
'Good. Because I'm in this for the long haul. Nightmares, therapy, trauma processing, all of it. I want you through the ugly parts too.'
'You've already seen my ugly parts. You shot a man to save me and watched me bleed on a floor. Dealt with my PTSD and guilt and emotional constipation.' He kissed her softly. 'If you can handle that and still want me, the rest is easy.'
'Nothing about this is easy.' But she smiled. 'And that's fine. I don't need easy. I need real.'
'Then real is what you'll get.' Ryder pulled her closer. 'Every day. For as long as you'll have me.'
'Forever, then.' Isla let her eyes drift closed, safe and warm and loved. 'I'm thinking forever.'
'Forever works for me.'
They fell asleep tangled together, two damaged people building something beautiful from the wreckage. The nightmares would return—trauma didn't heal overnight. But they'd face them together, one late-night conversation at a time, building trust and intimacy and something that felt remarkably like forever.