12. Spiraling

It didn't matter how many years Sydney had spent as a Panacea agent—she still felt like a new recruit whenever she was with Niall.

"Tems still isn't answering," she explained the next morning, as they sat across from each other at a table in a bustling hawker market. All around them, people wandered from stall to stall under the massive, open-air building, balancing trays of steaming hot food and glasses of ice-cold sugar cane drinks. "Have you heard from him since you landed?"

"No," Niall replied. With his sunglasses and tropical shirt and cheeks flushed from the heat, the analyst looked less like an agent and more like a grumpy tourist. He picked up his chopsticks and took another bite of chicken. "Although his phone's tracker still pings in the city. Did you call him?"

She nodded through a bite of stir-fried rice noodles. "No answer for the last twenty-four hours, although my tracker also places him in the city."

"Where, exactly?"

"A lamp post at the corner of Dalvey and Evans Road," Sydney answered, nodding at a row of similar posts near the market, all mobile network towers in disguise. "He must have been passing through. Maybe on his way to the botanic gardens for a nice stroll."

Niall chuckled humorlessly. "And when did you get that location?"

Niall's questions were always designed to poke holes in a poor lie, even if he was speaking to his own team. Sydney kept her voice smooth. "Just an hour ago," she said. "What do you want us to do?"

There was a brief silence from Niall, and for an instant, Sydney imagined the conversation that could happen next.

Where is he?Niall would say. I know you're lying.

And Sydney would break down and tell him everything. A part of her ached to confess—to just let Niall know about Tems's plans, about the danger the president was in.

But instead, Niall said, "Stand by and keep trying. Nothing changes. If we connect, I'll confirm with you. Otherwise, plan to be at the gala."

"Yes, sir," she said.

Niall chewed thoughtfully, studying her from under his bushy eyebrows, before he returned to his chicken. Sydney watched him, gauging his mood.

"You're unhappy," she said after a while, taking a sip of her sugar cane drink.

He grunted. "Surely you're used to that by now."

"No—I mean, you're really unhappy."

He finished his bite before he leaned forward against the table and lowered his voice. "I haven't been able to ID your attacker," he muttered.

Sydney felt her chest tighten. "I figured."

"And there haven't been any other incidents since?"

"No."

He nodded. "Good."

Sydney put her drink down and forced a smile. "Stop worrying. I'll be fine."

"You've never been on your own like this before," Niall said.

"I'm not alone. Winter's with me. And I've been through years of training."

"You know what I mean. You've always had someone back at headquarters wholly dedicated to following your whereabouts."

"You think I'm silly enough to get myself into trouble like Tems has?"

"I'm not saying anything of the sort. Tems has always been more… emotional than you, more reactionary. But I'm saying that anything can happen. Anytime."

Sydney folded her arms against the table. "Niall, have you ever aborted a mission because things didn't go as planned?"

He shook his head.

"My point exactly." She quieted. Her words to Winter last night came back to her now. I feel like I'm the reason why Niall was unable to be a part of his own daughter's childhood. "You deserve to take a break… from all this."

"Sure. But for now, I'm still on your mission." He pointed his chopsticks at her. "And I expect you to remain careful. Don't go off chasing wild leads or doing something stupid, not without running it by me first."

Sydney felt another pang as she looked at the man. How long had Niall been in Panacea? More than twenty years? And yet here he was, dragging his feet toward freedom. "Were you always like this with Quinn, too?"

The mention of his daughter made him pause, and for a moment, Niall just ate in silence. "Back at headquarters, I tracked her whereabouts all the time."

"You had surveillance on her?"

"I'm not proud of it. I know I'm not supposed to." He shook his head.

"Mr. O'Sullivan," Sydney scolded the man teasingly. "Talk about a helicopter parent."

"It did once involve a literal helicopter. Don't tell Sauda. But I couldn't help it." He sighed. "I always wanted her to be safe, but I couldn't do the one thing that would have kept her safest—staying her father, staying near her."

"You're keeping the world safe."

"And she was the sacrifice."

"Do you regret having her?"

He looked at Sydney. "Never," he said.

"Then you did what you had to do."

"It's okay, Syd," he said quietly. "It is my fault, and I've owned that."

"You've always kept me safe. You're here, even now."

"I'm not your father."

"I know. But sometimes I feel like you are." She smiled. "For better or worse."

"More better than worse, I hope," he replied. And Sydney saw him look hopefully at her. Her heart bled a little. What kind of life was this, to have a family you could never see, then to love a woman you could never be with? She thought of Winter, leaning against his balcony and letting the wind comb through his hair.

What kind of life was that? Could she bear it?

She looked back at Niall, at the closest thing she had to a father. She was going to miss him—but she didn't have to quite yet. "You're not a bad option, as far as dads go," she said.

He snorted. "We'll see what Quinn ends up saying about that."

"You did the best you could."

He hesitated, taking a few more bites of food, then looking around as if he didn't know what else to do. "I wrote her a long letter," he finally said in a low, gravelly voice. "Months ago."

"Did she read it?"

He shook his head. "It's still sitting in my desk drawer. I haven't had the courage to send it yet."

"What's in it?" she decided to ask.

He prodded his plate with his chopsticks. "An apology," he rumbled, grief clouding his words. "Of sorts. I told her everything I could, at least."

Sydney swallowed, fighting back a tide of jealousy and bitterness, wondering what it would be like to get an apology from her own father. "You don't want her to see it?" she said.

"I want her to see it more than anything." He fell silent, then muttered, "Maybe I'm just a coward."

Sydney forced down her own resentment. It wasn't fair to Niall, her feeling this way. But she felt it, all the same. "You're not a coward," she said gently.

"I just…" He trailed off. "I'll hand it to her in person. If she'll see me."

"I think she will."

Niall looked afraid, and the sight made Sydney's heart bleed. "And if she won't?"

"Then give me the letter, for chrissakes, and I'll hand it to her myself."

Niall laughed, and Sydney stored the sound away in her memory, wishing she had a recorder on. "Deal," he said.

"To being competent." Sydney raised her drink to him.

"To being competent," Niall answered, clinking glasses, and nodded at her. "Make me proud, kid."

By the time they arrived at the stadium, the lines and clusters of fans on the streets had turned into a tidal wave, and as their car passed by, the wave seemed to crash against the concrete barricades lining the road, the thousands of people shrieking in delight at the sight of them. Some wore the augmented reality glasses that were required for watching the Warcross Opening Ceremony; still others likely had the contact lens version, as Sydney watched them gesture or wave at things she couldn't see. Their driver honked irritably as people at one walkway jumped over the barricade to get in the middle of the street, prompting officers to force them back.

"The games are even more popular than I remember," Gavi mused from her passenger seat. "Wasn't there a scandal a few years back?"

Today she looked even more resplendent than usual, her dress an ocean of lemon-yellow silks complemented by delicate gold jewelry. Sydney never cared about her clothing when she was undercover, but she couldn't help feeling a little self-conscious this time in her black suit.

"They restructured after their previous CEO was arrested—a data breach of some sort," Sydney answered. "Doesn't mean people stop liking something, though. Haven't you played before?"

"No. I don't do games—at least, not online ones."

"Well, think of it as virtual soccer, with dragons. It's even bigger in Asia than it is overseas."

"I'll say," Gavi replied as she stared out the window.

As they made it through the jam and sped up, Winter rolled down the window just enough to stick one hand out and wave. The gesture sent the crowd into a frenzy.

They drove through a private gate leading into the stadium, where the crowds finally were forced back, and stopped before a small entrance. Here, a guard opened the door for them, and Sydney stepped out to wait for Winter. As he emerged with Gavi on his arm, she fell into step behind him and headed into the building, yellow silks floating behind her.

"This way, miss," one of the guards told her as they walked along the stadium's interior hall. "Mr. Young, you're headed to the stage."

Winter approached her and held out an earpiece, along with a sound clip. "Here," he said.

Sydney took them. "Test?"

He nodded, then waited as she plugged the piece into her ear and clipped the sound device to the back of her trousers. As she did, Winter put in an identical earpiece, then walked around her to touch the device clipped to her. His fingers briefly brushed against the edge of her pants; she felt the slight pressure of them and shivered in spite of herself.

"Testing, testing," he said in a low voice. "Hear that?"

The sound came in crisp and clear from Sydney's earpiece, a near-perfect echo of Winter's voice. She nodded. "Testing, testing in return," she replied.

He turned the knob a little on her clip, then went to his own, adjusting it until he finally nodded. She couldn't help studying his serious expression for a minute, the way his hair fell over his eyes as he tilted his head down in concentration.

Behind him, Sydney saw Gavi watching them impatiently with her arms crossed.

"If I see anything suspicious from the box," Sydney told him, "you'll hear it in your earpiece. Do the same if you spot something in the crowd that makes you uncomfortable."

"Yes, ma'am," he murmured with a slight smile. "Hope we don't hear from each other until the concert's done."

"That's the plan," Sydney replied, answering his smile with her own polite one. Somehow, the eyes of their security team felt like more than she could stand. She took a step away and nodded toward the stadium, where fans were leading each other in rounds of chants and cheers. "Good luck out there," she said.

"You too," he replied. He gave her a polite hug, but as he pulled away, he murmured in her ear, "Stay safe."

Her stomach fluttered again at the warmth of him near her, of his concerned words. She nodded, unable to find the right reply.

Then the rest of Winter's security staff gathered around him. He cast a final glance over his shoulder at Sydney before he turned away and headed down the hall toward the practice rooms.

Sydney walked slightly behind Gavi as they were ushered in the opposite direction. She'd been in stadiums before, but never one like this. The walls looked alive, their surfaces curved screens that responded to their presence as if aware of them—images of flowers bloomed as they walked by, along with music notes and specialized ads for luxury perfumes and couture outfits. Even the floor reacted to them, glowing pale blue under their every step.

At last, they headed down a flight of stairs and emerged through a lush entrance draped with real plants. Sydney found herself standing in a spacious box with a balcony that overlooked the stage, with a spectacular view of the rest of the stadium.

Already, most of the seats were filled, while on the stage below, she could see workers testing an enormous prop of Winter's logo, a rabbit with ears shaped like two halves of a broken heart.

Gavi left Sydney's side without a second glance, her attention focused on the many important people in the room. Sydney watched her go, noting the way the girl's chin tilted higher, her poise sharpening as she entered her element—charming her way through a circle of strangers. Already, she could see one of the gentlemen turning in Gavi's direction, chuckling as she grabbed a drink, pointed down toward the stage, and said something with an affecting grin.

She couldn't help feeling a little respect for the girl's fearlessness. Sauda would like her.

Sydney moved automatically to the edge of the room, where she could see other security staff standing by, staying out of the way of the guests while keeping an eye on everyone. Her gaze wandered from person to person before hitching on the one they were here for.

Mr. Seah stood near the edge of the balcony, speaking in an animated voice to a woman she recognized as Emika Chen, the CEO of Henka Games, who sported a rainbow-dyed bob and a sleek red jumpsuit, as well as Hideo Tanaka, the company's director and her fiancé.

Seah looked relaxed and friendly—if he was indeed in on the assassination job, he certainly gave none of it away.

As if he'd heard her thinking about him, Tems's voice came on unexpectedly in her earpiece. "Get closer when you can," he said.

She fought to keep the scowl off her face. This was the other reason why she had this earpiece—to everyone else, Sydney was using it to communicate with her client, but to her, it was a line that Tems also had access to.

He was watching her through the box's security cams, she knew. She didn't look toward them, but she did purposely turn so that the cam could see her clearly.

"I'm not an amateur," she snapped quietly.

"Just a friendly reminder," Tems said. "See if you can focus on his jacket. I want to know if any of the medals on his decorated uniform give away a clue."

"Working on it," she muttered, and moved away from the wall, heading carefully through the throngs until she reached the edge of the balcony where the cabinet member was standing. Sydney kept her eyes on the stage down below, as if scanning the crowds and waiting for Winter to appear. Idly, she listened in on pieces of the man's conversation.

"—to see such a large audience for the ceremony," he was saying now to Emika Chen.

The woman nodded politely with her arms crossed as she stood close to her fiancé. "Yes, it helps to get a great opening act," she replied.

"I hear he's attending the prime minister's gala?" asked Hideo.

"Yes," Mr. Seah replied with a smile. "It'll be quite the party with Mr. Young in attendance. Will you both…"

As the conversation went on, Gavi reappeared nearby, her dress gliding gently against the floor.

"Shrimp wonton?" Sydney heard one of the servers ask Gavi politely.

"Yes, please," she said, then took a bite of her food and came to stand by the balcony, her gold earrings clinking.

"You like him," she said without looking at Sydney.

Her words were enough to make Sydney turn from the stadium to face her. "Ma'am?" she asked.

"I know you were out on your balcony last night, having a nice nighttime chat with Winter," Gavi said, popping the rest of the wonton in her mouth.

"We were discussing security for today," Sydney answered.

"I've seen a million people fall for Winter. You think you're immune?"

Careful,Sydney told herself. "I think you might be projecting your own feelings for Mr. Young onto others, ma'am," she said.

Something about those words seemed to get under Gavi's skin, and for an instant, the girl's eyes flashed. She smiled at Sydney. "I think you might be doing the same."

"Ma'am," Sydney said in her most condescendingly professional tone, "it's my job to take interest in everything about my clients, in order to keep them safe."

Gavi smiled and looked back down at the stage. "I'm sure that's what you tell yourself," she replied. "You don't need to give me the excuses—I've lived it. I know how you feel." She leaned closer to Sydney. "Listen to me. Winter doesn't do relationships—not the kind that you might want, at least. If you're lucky, he'll make you a part of his work. But you'll always be second place to that work. So if you're going to go after him, just have the fun. That's all he is. Trust me."

Sydney let her expression stay cool and unbothered as Gavi turned away. But the girl's words buzzed in her head, stubborn and unrelenting, burrowing deep into her thoughts.

"Always dangerous to fall for your partner, isn't it?" Tems said, his voice teasing.

Damn this earpiece, she thought. Gavi was still too close for Sydney to reply, but her hands closed so tightly against the railing of the box that the skin over her knuckles turned white.

At her silence, Tems went on. "I didn't think superstars were your type, to be honest."

Gavi finally moved far enough away, her attention now turned to Emika Chen. "He's not," Sydney whispered into her earpiece. "And I don't think you know much about my type, Bourton."

"Don't I? I think I know a little, Cossette."

"You think you're my type?"

"I think if we had the chance to do it all over again, then yes."

She rolled her eyes. "Optimistic of you."

"You're still angry about the passport. I didn't think I had to explain it to you, of all people."

"I didn't ask for an explanation."

"I know. Because we're a good pair, Syd. You and I."

There was an inflection in his tone that made Syd's heart twist a little, reminded her of why she'd kissed him on that snowy day in the hotel, why she'd let him take her to bed. "We were never a pair, Tems."

The stadium darkened, and down on the stage, the rabbit logo illuminated, sending the mass of fans into an explosion of cheers that shook the floor.

Above the noise, Sydney heard Tems utter a low laugh. "Give me a call when you're done with your new boy, Syd."

Sydney's temper flared, and she was about to retort, but the static in her earpiece cut off abruptly, signaling his departure.

Down on the stage, the first deep beats of Winter's intro music came on. Sydney recognized it immediately as the opening single from his new album. She listened as everyone else around her cheered and clapped, murmuring in admiration as the staged shifted and changed with the music, as if it were made up of massive tectonic plates.

Then Winter appeared on the stage. The entire stadium came alive with wild cheering—even the ministers around her in the box all turned to clap, their attention riveted on nothing but the boy in a silken black suit studded with diamonds.

Winter didn't look up in their direction. He kept his focus on the broader stadium, his face bright with energy, his voice filling the air as his dancers spread out to fill the rest of the stage. As he went, her gaze followed the ripples of motion in the audience standing nearest him. They moved like water, their hands reaching up for him whenever he passed by. And even though Sydney was here to track suspicious activity among the crowd, she couldn't help going back to Winter over and over again. The diamonds on his suit caught the sweeping spotlights and turned him blindingly bright.

And his voice. His voice was effortlessly clear and powerful, filling the entire space, reverberating in her chest, making tears well unexpectedly in her eyes.

Her jaw clenched. No, Gavi couldn't have caught on to any attraction she had for Winter, because they were done. She could still her heart around Winter. She could treat him exactly the way she was supposed to treat him: as a professional partner. Nothing more, nothing less.

She thought of Niall's words over breakfast, the tragic, faraway look in his eyes when he spoke of family, of love and mistakes.

Winter blew through two more of his biggest hits before the upbeat tempo calmed into something deep and melancholy. The lights on the stage changed, and Winter's backup dancers filed away, leaving Winter seated on a lone stool, a guitar propped on his leg. The audience cheered, then stilled in anticipation.

It wasn't until he began singing that Sydney recognized, with a start, the song he was performing.

And this hurricane goes on and on

Every time I look at you

You are my meditation

Am I ever yours, too?

It was the one he'd never released, the song he had been writing in London when they were on their first mission together, the song they'd opened up about last night.

It was the song he'd written about her.

It was one thing to read the lyrics scrawled on paper, one thing to listen as he admitted that it'd been about her—and quite another to hear it here, in a performance watched by millions, the words brought to life by an acoustic guitar and his velvet voice, which had transformed from its earlier power into something vulnerable and exquisite.

No. Goddamn it, Winter.Terror seized her—she looked quickly away from him, but not before it brought back a surge of everything that had happened during their previous mission. The fear she'd felt for him when she'd arrived back at their empty London apartment. The lump in her throat when he'd told her that this song was about her. The feeling of him lifting her into his arms and carrying her into the pool, of his lips on hers and her arms around his neck and legs straddling him in the water, the searing heat of his skin.

She thought of the words they'd exchanged before they parted ways, of how he'd leaned his head against hers and closed his eyes.

A little like the sun and the moon, aren't we? Never in the sky at the same time.

But sometimes the sun and the moon were visible together. Sometimes they were. And sometimes she couldn't hold her breath any longer around him, couldn't deny that she felt pulled to him in every way, that here, she felt like everything around her was spiraling out of her control.

As he sang, he looked steadily around the stadium, pausing now and then to focus on the crowd. His gaze made its way up until it reached the reserved box where Sydney stood. And there, he let his eyes fixate briefly on her, locking on her so surely that Sydney could almost feel it click into place.

Then he moved on to the rest of the crowd. But the embers of their brief stare still seemed to drift in the air, and heat flared on her cheeks as surely as if she'd been burned.

She wanted to scream at him for pointing his attention at her, for bringing this song to life before an entire audience. She couldn't bear the emotion that the song was surfacing in her chest, whole tendrils of her heart exposed to the open air. She needed to replace it with something else, with anything else.

He shouldn't have done this. It was a good song, too good, the kind where people would hunt down information on who inspired it, where they would dissect every lyric, where everyone in the world would soon be singing it. And if they started digging deeply enough, would they find out who he was singing about? Would they somehow connect it to her? Sure, he had looked around the entire stadium—but to her, the moment when he'd settled on her felt like the only thing people might notice.

You are my meditation.

The light on Winter went out with the final note of the song. The stadium burst into thunderous cheers. Sydney let out her breath, her skin still hot, her throat thick from holding back tears.

Then, in the midst of the noise, as she fought to collect herself—she saw Mr. Seah bow his head at his guests.

"Excuse me," she heard him say. Then he stepped away from the cluster of people watching at the balcony and headed for the door.

Sydney forced herself to calm her breathing, to focus. Then she moved like a shadow out of the distracted crowd. No one watched her leave. Like a phantom, she headed toward the door, her eyes trained on where Seah stepped through the sliding glass door and out into the hall.

As she went, she tried to push the memory of Winter's performance from her mind. But it stayed there, refusing to leave, along with the ghost of Gavi's words and Tems's bold bet. Her heart hammered frantically. They couldn't do this, this little dance around each other. Every time they drew close, the world around them drew closer, suffocating them, threatening to crush them. They had every reason to not work and no reason to be together.

Besides. They were dangerous together. Too dangerous. What would happen if others really caught on? What would happen if Gavi started spreading public rumors about them, or Dameon started connecting the dots? Compromising their cover, revealing such a weakness, could kill them.

No time, no time.She simply had no time to think about what it meant that Winter performed that song. She gritted her teeth, shoved him out of her mind again, cleared her throat, and filled her heart with anger. That, she knew how to do. She let herself be angry about the unfairness of it all, that she should have to think about nonsense like this while on a life-threatening mission. And as the anger built in her chest, it began scalding away her confusion. She let it burn and burn, until she could focus again, until she saw not Winter in her head, but the corridor before her.

She was here for a job. And she'd be damned if she'd screw it up over a boy.

There weren't many people outside. Security guards patrolled up and down the corridor, their eyes flickering to the occasional person hurrying along the hall. Sydney blended in with the guards, her black suit matching theirs, and as she went, a few of them seemed to acknowledge her with a terse nod, as if she were one of them, tasked with maintaining order at this concert.

A new song had started inside the stadium. The screams from the crowd were so loud now that Sydney could feel the floor vibrating. She walked near the wall as Seah headed down the corridor, his figure disappearing through the sparse crowd. For a moment, she thought perhaps she'd been mistaken, and that all he was doing was heading to the restrooms.

But then she saw him reach the curve at the end of the hall and glance momentarily over his shoulder. Sydney stayed where she was, silent and still.

When Seah finally disappeared, she moved, walking as quietly as she could.

Abruptly, the hall widened into an open-air section of the corridor, the wall turning into a long railing that overlooked the parking structure and then the tangle of thick trees beyond.

Sydney froze and pressed herself against the wall, blending into the shadows of a doorway.

The silhouette of Seah appeared again—this time while standing over part of the railing, with his back turned to Sydney. His head was tilted slightly to one side, and his hand was pressed against his ear, as if he were trying to hear someone on the phone.

Right away, she could tell that Seah was speaking in Mandarin. But one Western name stuck out, the sound startling and clear.

Rosen.