The knowledge didn’t distract me. It steadied me. I could call a flood line and call my own pleasure by name in the same breath. I could hold both—the public work and the private fire—without dropping either.
Forward only.
20
ETHAN
The rain beat down harder, a relentless drum that matched the pounding in my chest as I stood there, the note’s words—We are watching. Make the right choice.—burning into my mind. The mystery had coiled around me like the storm itself, and I could feel it now, the deep shit I’d stumbled into, pulling me under with every passing second.
Should I call Atlas?
The thought flickered, but doubt crept in—what if the Charleston Danes were in on it? What if this man in the gray suit, with his tests and duplicates, was some twisted trial orchestrated by the very family I’d just claimed? Or had they claimed me?
The idea rattled my reality, shaking the ground I’d stood on for years.
No, I couldn’t believe that. I’d looked into their faces, seen them. They were operators, like me, brutal when it demanded it but honorable, maybe to a fault, as I’d always been. I had to trust that, to hold onto the bond I’d felt in that war room, even as the uncertainty gnawed at me.
But right now, I needed one thing, and one thing only. The thunder rolled through the city, a deep rumble that shook the wet streets, and it drove home the urgency. I needed to get back to Natalie, now.
The thought of her, her steady voice and warm presence, cut through the chaos in my mind like a lifeline. I pocketed the note, the damp paper crinkling in my hand, and turned back toward City Hall, my boots splashing through the rising water, the rain stinging my face. The distance felt endless, the city a maze of flooded corners and shadowed alleys, but I moved with purpose, driven by an instinct I couldn’t ignore.
As I neared City Hall, the scene came into view, a chaotic swirl of activity under the gray sky. Politicians gone from the microphones, their voices replaced by pounding rain, while cameras lingered, their lenses trained on the chaos.
Natalie stood at the corner, ushering people away with a calm authority, her figure a beacon amidst the storm. I paused for a moment, admiring her poise, her strength, the way she moved with a grace that held the crowd together. She was a force, a woman who could face this flood and still lead, and that sight steadied me, if only for a heartbeat.
Then it all came crashing down, unfolding in slow motion like a nightmare I couldn’t wake from. She’d said it would be a slow flood—water seeping up through pipes and groundwater, a gradual rise we could manage. But this wasn’t that.
A jacked-up Jeep roared into view, its tires churning through the rising water, driven by a man with a beard hanging down to his belly, a wild look in his eyes. He thought he could power through, his vehicle’s bulk a match for the flood—or so he believed.
The water had other plans.
It swished the Jeep sideways, not toward the next intersection as he’d intended, but across the road, the currentseizing control. I saw it then, the inevitable arc, the vehicle veering straight toward Natalie.
I screamed her name, the sound tearing from my throat, raw and desperate. She looked up, her eyes locking with mine, and in that frozen moment, I fell in love with her. It hit me like a wave—her courage, her care, the way she stood tall, even now. She glanced at the two people beside her, a split-second decision, and pushed them hard out of the way, her hands firm against their shoulders.
But the Jeep didn’t stop. It barreled in, slamming into her with a sickening thud, the impact masking her location beneath its bulk, water spraying around it like a shroud.
I ran. The panic surged, drowning out everything else—my training, my doubts, the mystery of the gray suit. All that mattered was her.
I reached the Jeep, the driver blubbering something incoherent about not being able to stop, his hands shaking on the wheel. I ignored him, moving around the vehicle in water that rose to my waist, bits of debris hitting my legs as I searched for her.
But she wasn’t there.
The Jeep had knocked her aside, and my heart seized as I scanned the chaos.
A woman, one of the two Natalie had saved, pointed and screamed, her voice piercing the rain.
"There!"
I followed her trembling finger, and there she was—Natalie’s body, caught in the pulling current, being swept away down the adjoining road. The water moved fast, a relentless pull toward the harbor, and the panic in my chest erased all thought.
I ran after her, pushing my body to its limits, the water resisting every step, my boots slipping on the slick pavement.I had to reach her before her head slammed into something, before the tide swept her out to sea.
Everything—my past, my brothers, the gray-suited man—faded into nothing. All that existed was her, the woman I loved, slipping away in the flood, and the desperate need to bring her back.
21
NATALIE
