“Tatum.”
Walt sighed, low. Silence settled again, heavy as the dark. When Titus looked up, the old warhorse was watching him.
“You gonna keep doing this?” Walt’s voice was rough, worn from years of smoke and command.
Titus knew the worry behind it.
Hell, he felt it too. He’d only ever worked for the military, and this—This was something else—a different kind of beast.
But he fucking loved it, and nothing Walt said was gonna change that.
“I told you before, yeah. What time is it?”
“Four p.m.,” Walt grunted, half a growl, and turned for the door. The sound of his boots faded down the hall.
Titus sat still a moment, jaw tight. Then he shoved the tangled sheet aside and stood, heading for the shower.
The old two-bedroom place he’d grabbed for a while sat on the edge of Needles, California, where the desert bled right up to the back fence. March wasn’t cold here—just warm enough to dry the air and kick up the dust.
A freight train wailed somewhere in the distance. The place was quiet, forgettable—exactly the kind of bolt-hole he used when he needed to disappear.
Steam rose as he twisted the tap. In the fogged mirror, his reflection stared back—different. The hair was shorter, the jaw clean. He looked less wrecked than he had a month ago. Still carrying the weight, just wearing it differently—and far from the world he’d walked away from.
He knew Walt was hurt that he’d chosen a different path. Walt was heading back to Virginia—back home. Titus didn’t have one of those anymore. His path lay elsewhere.
He didn’t push people away for the drama of it; he’d just learned that closeness came with a body count.
For the first time since Genesis took out his brother, he thought maybe there might be a future.
He stepped beneath the hot water and grabbed the soap.
Almost two months in, working for Savage—commander of Erebus—was still so damn new he had to remind himself it was real.
Not the kind of move he’d ever planned, but when former Secretary of Defense David Allen—Dave—called him personally, Titus had been curious.
The drive over to Colorado from Arizona had been quiet—too quiet. Too much road. Too much time to think.
He’d met Dave and Stone at a beat-up old diner down the mountain from Pike National Forest.
Colorado had been fucking cold—January carried the kind of chill that crawled under your skin and stayed there.
And don’t get him started on the snow. Piles of it everywhere, people bundled so thick they looked like walking dominoes, shoveling walkways and scattering rock salt like it might save them.
“You were a hard man to find,” Dave said, sliding into the booth across from him.
Titus scratched at the scruff along his jaw, eyes on the steam rising from his untouched coffee. Being hard to find was something he’d gotten damn good at over the years.
“Yet you managed,” he said, quirking a brow.
“I did.” Dave’s tone was easy, but his gaze wasn’t.
Titus leaned back, the vinyl creaking beneath his shoulder blades. “So, what is it you need?”
“I want to run something past you.” Dave reached for a strip of bacon, broke it in half, and went on like they were just talking about the weather.
Over breakfast, Dave laid it out—a quiet network working in the dark, same as Genesis.
Titus listened, not because he trusted. This wasn’t about trust. It was about motion. Standing still felt too much like dying.
