Not much. Just enough.
I pushed aside thoughts of where I was going. Where I'd been. What waited for me in Charleston. For a few minutes, I just sat there, drinking good bourbon and staring out at the darkening sky, letting the plane carry me toward whatever came next.
The crewman returned once more, cleared the plate, topped off the bourbon, and left me alone.
I settled deeper into the seat, the alcohol and exhaustion finally catching up. Sleep sounded like a good idea. Sleep sounded like the only idea.
But before I could close my eyes, the thoughts came.
They always did.
My father's face flickered through my mind, uninvited and unwelcome.
Byron Dane.
Gone with the wind, as the saying went. Though no one in the family said it out loud anymore. Not where I could hear, anyway.
He'd been my hero once. The kind of man who seemed larger than life, like he could fix anything, protect anyone, make the world make sense just by existing in it. He'd taught me to shoot. To track. To move through the woods without leaving a trace. He'd taught me that mercy was a choice, not a weakness.
And then he'd disappeared.
No warning. No explanation. Just ... gone.
One day he was there, steady as the mountains themselves. The next, he was a ghost. A name we didn't say. A man who'd slipped away from everything—his family, his responsibilities, his sons—and never came back.
I didn't know why.
Still didn't.
Either way, it didn't matter.
He was gone. And whatever chance I'd had to fix it, to understand it, to reconcile the man I'd worshipped with the one who'd been taken from us—that chance was gone, too.
Too late now.
I took another sip of bourbon, let the burn chase away the memory.
I'd become something after he left. Something darker. Something necessary.
The family had needed it. The world had needed it. And I'd been good at it.
Still was.
I leaned my head back against the seat and closed my eyes, the hum of the engines lulling me toward sleep.
For once, I didn't fight it.
I woke to the crewman's voice, quiet and respectful.
"We'll be landing in thirty minutes, sir."
I sat up, the bourbon glass empty on the table beside me. My body felt rested in a way it hadn't in weeks. Months, maybe.
"There's a shower in the back," the crewman added. "Fresh clothes in your size, if you'd like."
I did.
The shower was hot and efficient. The clothes fit perfectly—dark jeans, black shirt, boots that didn't scream tactical but wouldn't slow me down if I needed to move. Whoever had planned this knew what they were doing.
