Nora opened the door two inches.
Enough to see.
Not enough to invite.
The hallway had changed overnight—not with blood.
With procedure.
Yellow-and-black tape webbed the stairwell door at the far end like the building had been declared a wound. A portable camera on a tripod stared straight at 12C. Its red light blinked like a heartbeat.
Her ears still carried the ghost of the full-name verdict. The metallic taste came and went when she breathed too shallow.
Four men in matte black stood in the corridor.
Two with rifles slung low but ready. One with a tablet. One taller, older, gray threaded through his hair—the kind of posture that said he'd been given permission to speak and permission to lie.
His eyes went to Nora's face first.
Then flicked down, quick, to her hands.
Checking for a weapon.
Or a leash.
"Ms. Lin." His voice was calm enough to be practiced. "Captain Mercer. Civic Containment."
"You're blocking the building," Nora said.
"Temporary quarantine," Mercer replied. "Elevator disabled. Stairs monitored."
"That's not protection," Nora said. "That's a cage."
"Same architecture," Mercer said. "Different reason."
Behind Nora, Kaelen stood in the kitchen doorway like an accident waiting for permission. Heat pressed at Nora's spine like weather.
Rix stayed deeper in the apartment, half in shadow, eyes bright with predatory curiosity.
Zane—
Nora heard the faint scrape first: a chair leg. Then he was there, leaning against her counter like the hallway couldn't see him unless he allowed it.
Mercer's gaze slid past Nora, trying to inventory the room. His eyes skated past the place Zane occupied, refusing to settle.
He couldn't see Zane properly.
But Nora saw the tiny tightening at Mercer's mouth—something in him registering that the room was wrong.
"Ma'am," Mercer said, still polite, "we need to verify the occupants of this unit."
"No," Nora said.
A beat.
Mercer's gaze narrowed. "This is not optional."
Nora didn't raise her voice. She didn't need to.
"This is my home," she said. "If you want inside—"
She let the sentence hang for the camera. Let it become record.
"You ask."
Something like hesitation crossed Mercer's face. Not fear.
Calculation.
Because the camera blinked red.
The man with the tablet shifted, impatient. "Captain, we—"
Mercer lifted one finger without looking back.
Nora saw the neighbor across the hall crack their door open—eyes wide, mouth already forming gossip—
Then Kaelen stepped into Nora's line of sight.
Not in front of her.
Behind her.
A wall of heat held back by choice, not chain.
The neighbor's mouth snapped shut. Their door closed fast. Click.
Mercer's attention sharpened, and for a moment his eyes weren't on Kaelen.
They were on Nora.
On the fact that the monster had been placed.
"You're the stabilizer," Mercer said.
Nora smiled without humor. "I'm the homeowner."
Mercer flicked his tablet, scrolling. "We have a cooperative recovery order."
"And I have a door," Nora replied. "And a camera pointed at it."
Zane's voice drifted to Nora's ear, intimate and dangerous. "They're waiting for you to get tired," he murmured. "Then they'll call it consent."
Kaelen heard it. Nora felt the jealousy spike behind her like heat on a fuse.
Rix gave a quiet, cheerful exhale. "If he whispers again, I'm going to start charging rent."
It was almost a joke.
Almost.
Mercer's gaze didn't flinch. "Ma'am, we are not here to harm you."
Zane exhaled—a sound that might have been laughter if it hadn't been so cold.
Rix's eyes glittered. "They always say that."
Mercer continued, "We're here to ensure the anomalous entity is secured."
Kaelen's heat surged. Nora felt the tiny shift in his weight—the first micro-step toward violence.
She didn't say Stay.
She reached back and touched his wrist.
Small. Firm.
A reminder.
"Behind me," Nora said.
Kaelen's fingers twitched. His shoulders trembled.
Then—impossibly—he stayed.
Nora didn't waste it.
She tipped her head back just enough and murmured, "Good."
Kaelen's breath broke like the word landed somewhere tender and private.
Mercer watched the exchange like a man watching a lock being tested.
He nodded once.
Two officers rolled a hard black case forward from behind him.
The latches snapped open.
Inside was a folded mesh coiled like a sleeping animal—matte black threaded with silver lines too clean to be just tech and too neat to be magic. A launcher sat beside it. A clamp system. A restraint designed for something that didn't belong in human anatomy.
Nora's throat tightened.
"That's for him," she said.
"It's for the incident," Mercer replied.
Kaelen's voice dropped, feral with offense. "You bring a net to my door."
Rix's smile was sharp. "I love this part. The part where men bring tools to gods."
Nora's eyes went to the launcher.
To the officer holding it.
His index finger rested too near the safety. Too casual.
Testing.
And behind them, half-hidden by a rifleman's leg, Nora caught a second detail—small, almost laughably ordinary: a squat canister clipped to a belt, marked with a hazard stripe she couldn't read from here.
Mercer touched his earpiece, listened for a second, then looked at Nora like she was the target.
"Ms. Lin," he said carefully, "open the door fully."
Nora held his gaze.
"For the record," she said, and nodded slightly toward the blinking camera, "you're asking me to unlock my own home for armed men with a net."
Mercer's jaw tightened. He knew she'd just framed it.
"Then I'm asking," he said, smooth. "Will you cooperate?"
Nora inhaled through her nose. Her stomach rolled. She kept her voice steady anyway.
"Not like this."
Mercer's eyes narrowed. "Then how?"
Nora's smile went sharp. "On my terms."
Behind Mercer, the officer with the launcher adjusted his grip.
The barrel lifted a single inch.
Shoulder height.
Not aimed at Kaelen's heart.
A test.
Zane's whisper came again, colder: "He's going to do it."
Kaelen's heat surged—violent, protective, furious.
Nora didn't flinch.
She smiled at Mercer, small and bright and dangerous.
"You brought a net," she said. "You'll leave it closed."
A beat.
Mercer didn't answer with words.
He answered with the smallest nod toward his man.