Page 167 of Joker

The room is still talking around me.

Logan saying something about tightening perimeters. Cain mentioning gate rotation. Blaze already listing likely entry routes if someone’s trying to move from soft surveillance to contact.

I hear all of it. I process all of it. But underneath every word, there’s a darker, simpler thought moving through me like a second heartbeat.

He got eyes on them.

That alone is enough to make murder feel like a reasonable administrative task.

“Joker.” Logan’s voice cuts through whatever the hell is happening in my head.

I look at him.

His expression is flat and calm and knowing. He knows me too well not to understand exactly what’s sitting under my skin right now. And because he’s not stupid, he says the thing I need him to say before I go make a terrible decision out of instinct. “Not yet.”

That’s all.

Notcalm down.Notbe smart.Notdon’t do anything stupid.

Just, not yet.

Meaning…

We will if we have to.

I know where your head is.

Don’t force my hand before we have enough to close around his throat properly.

I hold his gaze for one beat. Then nod once.

Because he’s right. Because rage is useful only if you leash it first. Because I can’t protect Raven and Lexi if I go full animal before I know where to aim.

But Christ, it’s close.

Real close.

The hardest part of the morning isn’t the picture.

It isn’t the message.

It isn’t even the fact that Cal’s people are physically close enough to start breathing down the edges of our life. It’s the fact that I have to walk back out into that kitchen and look Raven in the eye and tell her the danger isn’t theoretical anymore.

I don’t want to. Not because I think she can’t handle it.

She can. She’s handled more than anybody ever should’ve asked her to.

But because for the last couple weeks, despite the fear under everything, despite the planning and the cameras and the extra eyes and the contingency routes and the constant background hum of threat, she’s had something that almost looked like peace.

Not perfect peace. Not permanent. But enough. Enough to laugh. Enough to breathe. Enough to let Lexi start acting like a little girl again instead of a witness.

And now I have to be the one to put a crack straight through the middle of it.

I find her in my room.

She must’ve read enough off my face when I came out of Logan’s office to know I wasn’t coming back with good news.

Lexi’s not with her.