Page 54 of California Wild

Tomorrow was game day—deployment, adrenaline, the mission that would take him thousands of miles away.

So he’d let himself crash, his muscles aching from the morning run, his mind wiped blank from hours of tactical prep.

Nothing else mattered.

Not any of it.

Just sleep.

Jesse woke to nothing.

No sound.

No movement.

Just that eerie kind of silence that made the hair on his arms prickle.

His breathing was slow, deep.

His body still, listening.

The sheets were warm, heavy, tangled around his waist, the cool night air slipping through the cracked window.

He reached for his work phone on instinct, fingers brushing over the screen.

Nothing.

No messages. No calls.

Just the quiet hum of the base across the bay, the rhythmic crash of waves in the distance.

He exhaled, letting his head drop back onto the pillow.

Then—a shift.

A shadow.

Movement in the dark.

His entire body went rigid.

And then—

She stepped forward.

Hayley.

Standing in his goddamn bedroom, bathed in silver moonlight, her silhouette sharp, unrelenting.

His pulse slammed against his ribs.

She tossed something onto the floor.

A small metallic clink.

A key.

“I never gave it back.” Her voice was sharp, clipped, seething with something between anger and something else she wasn’t willing to name.

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