Her jaw flexed. “We know.”
“Then let’s move,” I said, tapping the board. “I’ll take Foxtrot and the northern levee breach. You stay in the air—eyes, not hero. We’re losing time to miscommunication.”
“You don’t give me orders, Stoker.”
I stepped closer, lowered my voice. “I’m not trying to. But I’m not letting you die either.”
Something flickered in her eyes before she turned away toward the weapons cage. “Briefing in five. You’re late.”
4
Raine
The hangar air was too thick, heavy with fuel fumes, wet canvas, and the metallic bite of adrenaline. My chest burned, but not from the rappel or the river. No—this was worse.
Adam Stoker was standing ten feet away, and the sight of him hit harder than the floodwaters I’d just crawled out of.
He hadn’t changed much—maybe broader, maybe sharper in the jaw—still as handsome as ever, but those eyes were the same. Calm. Steady. Infuriatingly sure of themselves. The kind of eyes that made people follow him into hell and back. I hated that I remembered how it felt when they softened for me.
I forced my gaze back to the maps spread across the table. Red circles marked flooded sectors, numbers scribbled beside names of the missing. That’s what mattered—not him.
“Sector Foxtrot’s about to collapse,” he was saying, voice low but carrying like it always did. “If we don’t stabilize the levee—”
“I know.” My own voice came out sharper than I intended. “We’ve been in the air for thirty-six hours. You don’t think I’ve seen what’s happening?”
A muscle twitched in his jaw, but he didn’t back off. Of course, he didn’t. “Then you know time isn’t on our side.”
“I don’t need a lecture.”
He stepped closer, his shadow brushing mine, and my pulse jumped. “It’s not a lecture, Carter. It’s the truth. And whether you like it or not, we have to work together.”
The room seemed to close in, the noise of shouting crews and slamming gear fading until all I could hear was the steady beat of his words. Work together. Like that was possible. Like two months in his bed hadn’t meant everything to me and apparently nothing to him.
I dragged my eyes up to meet his. “You want to work together? Fine. But understand something, Stoker. You don’t control me. Not now. Not ever.”
For a second—just a second—something flickered in his expression. Not anger. Not arrogance. Something that looked a hell of a lot like regret.
The conference table had been dragged into the center of the hangar, covered in maps, laminated grids, and a dozen coffee-stained notepads. The generator hummed against the far wall, throwing a faint vibration under my boots. My muscles ached to collapse into a chair, I barely had time to get into dry clothes, but I stayed on my feet.
My brother Logan leaned his hip against the edge of the table, trying to look casual, though the vein in his temple betrayed him. “We’ve got six confirmed dead. Twenty-seven missing.” His voice was steady, but I could hear the crack under it. “Flood levels are rising again. Foxtrot and Echo are the worst.”
Adam stepped in before I could. “Split the teams. I’ll take Foxtrot with Russ and Boone. Carter, you keep eyes in the air—”
“No.” The word came out clipped, sharp. Every head at the table turned toward me. I felt the weight of it but didn’t flinch.“I’m not sitting in the air while kids are trapped in attics. We’ve already lost too many. I’m going back out.”
Adam’s eyes locked on mine, steel meeting steel. “You’ve been awake for three days straight. You’re running on fumes. You stay in the air.”
“I don’t take orders from you. Besides I have slept for a few hours.”
A beat of silence. Logan coughed into his fist. Boone muttered something under his breath that sounded suspiciously likehere we go.
Adam didn’t raise his voice, but it carried, low and lethal. “This isn’t about orders. It’s about keeping you alive.”
Heat flared under my skin. God, he made it sound so simple—like my life was something he got to keep in his pocket. Like I hadn’t spent the last five years clawing my way through hell without him.
I stepped closer, close enough to see the faint stubble along his jaw, close enough to feel the tension rolling off him. “You want to keep me alive, Stoker? Stop getting in my way.”
For a second, nobody breathed. Then Russ—a tall, broad shadow with a calm voice that didn’t match his size—spoke up. “Look, we can argue all night or we can get our asses moving. Foxtrot’s drowning while you two measure pride.”
