His gut tightened a little on those words, but he shook it away. This wasn’t Sudan. They weren’t walking into an ambush.

Hopefully.

“Sounds like you have it all buttoned up,” she said. “What has you out here pacing?”

The water had risen as they stood on shore, the tide coming in. The ocean pooled in rhythm around their ankles.

You. Us. The wrong goodbye.

“What are you doing here?” Coward, but the real words clogged inside him.

She dug her foot into the sand, the wind catching her hair. “I was thinking that maybe . . . well, I just wanted you to know that I’m glad you followed me to Seattle and to thank you for being here. I feel safer with you . . . locked in the box with me.”

He smiled then. “It is a box, isn’t it?”

“Tiny. And the walls are closing in because I haven’t figured out the vaccine yet. So, please, don’t get near the virus.”

“That might be hard, since that’s the mission objective.”

“You know what I mean. We’re not sure the virus is airborne. That would be a mutation of the pathogen, but it could be. And . . .” She looked away, out into the darkness.

He couldn’t stop the words pulsing inside him. “I promise.”

She looked back at him, her eyes big. “What?”

“If it depends on me, Tae, I’ll come back. I won’t do anything impulsive or . . .” He shook his head. “I’ll come back.”

Her mouth opened, a quick intake of air. “I know I shouldn’t have asked . . .”

“No,” he said as he dropped his flip-flops and reached up with his free hand, curling it around her neck. “You have a right to ask. Because . . . well, because of this.” He pulled her to himself.

He kissed her with all the hunger that had been building for the past three days, the thirst of needing her in his arms, in his dreams, his life, the hope that he hadn’t wanted to admit.

A future that just might be his, if he did this right.

And maybe he did do it right, because she dropped her sandals and wound her arms around his neck. Then, with a hum deep inside her, she stepped close, molded her body next to his and deepened the kiss.

Oh . . . yes. She tasted sweet, her lips soft, and he had the sense that around him, she too became less buttoned up, let her brain stop calculating genome sequences or whatever she thought about deep into the night.

It was just her, letting go, letting him catch her.

And she caught him right back.

He circled his arms around her and dove in, and he could practically feel his heart loosen—but it didn’t hurt, not right now at least—and vanish somewhere in the beautiful twilight, in the heat between them and the sweet release of everything he feared.

Maybe he wouldn’t hurt her.