Page 21 of Beautiful Scars: Unshakeable

Levi exhales a sound from the center of his chest—like he's being gutted. Colt's face has gone pale, ashen gray. The room tilts around me, gravity shifts and my world reorganizes itself around this single, monumental truth—she's alive.

For thirty days now, I've carried the weight of not knowing, of uncertainty I couldn't shake regardless of the reassurance I've offered to Levi and the men. I've woken up every day with part of me expecting to get news of her being found dead. Countless times I've imagined her cold and still lying in a ditch somewhere. The relief in this moment should be overwhelming.

But it's not. It's agony.

Because she's alive, and she'sthere. With him. Hearing what's happening makes it seem more real. More desperate.

Garrett's voice becomes a low whisper, almost too quiet for the phone to pick up. I can't make out the words, but the tone—the tone says everything.

There is no barking of orders. No extreme sounds of brutal violence. What we're hearing is so much worse than those things.

His voice has dropped to something tender, sickeningly intimate. Like he's coaxing her, gentling her, getting her ready for…

My blood turns to ice in my veins.

I've heard that same tone carry through interrogation room walls when lines start getting crossed that shouldn't be. When breaking someone stops being enough and the goal becomes their destruction instead. It's the tone of a predator satisfied their prey is theirs and they have all the time in the world to savor it.

The edges of my vision go fuzzy and I feel sick.

I understand now with crystal clarity what it is we're listening to. What it is we're going to hear.

My throat closes and I can't swallow.

The rational part of my brain—the part that's kept me alive through war and worse—starts calculating. She's survived this long. Whatever's about to happen, she's likely endured it before. And she's still breathing, still fighting, stillhere.

But the other part of me, the part that remembers her laugh over morning coffee, the part that would check in on her every night as she slept peaceful and safe in my bed, in my room—that part is screaming. That part wants to reach through the phone and tear Garrett apart.

I grip the edge of the desk until my knuckles crack.

Focus.

Breathe.

Think.

This call is a gift. Our first real lead in a month. Our only chance.

I take in a deep breath as another sound filters through—soft, pained, and unmistakably hers.

Focus, Z. For her. Just focus.

I grab a notepad, scrawling: "FIND HIM" and shove it at Colt. He's already moving, laptop in his arms, fingers flying across the keyboard as he disappears into the hallway to find Wolf.

Levi hasn't moved, hasn't blinked. His face is a tortured mask of pure anguish as we listen to Sunny's breathing turn ragged, to Garrett's low murmurs that fill me with disgust. Every protective instinct in my body screams to speak, to let her know we're here, we're coming for her. But one word, one sound from us and we may never find her.

The sound of another sharp slap crackles through the speaker, followed immediately by a loud cry. The sound of her pain—so raw, so helpless—cuts through to the center of both of us.

I watch something die in Levi's eyes, only to have something else ignite.

He lunges for the phone with a strangled sound that's barely human, but I'm faster. I catch him around the waist, force him across the room and slam him back against the wall hard enough to rattle the windows. His eyes are wild, feral. He's completely checked out.

"Not yet," I growl against his ear, praying the phone won't pick it up. "We lose this connection, we lose her. Think."

He fights me for a moment—pure animal desperation—before the logic of what I've said sinks in. The fight drains from him slowly, his body going slack against the wall. What replacesit is deeper than rage, deeper than sadness. It's soul-breaking grief.

I've known Levi for almost seven years. I've seen him take a bullet like it was nothing, watched him take hits that would take other men out, seen him stare down death more times than I can count without blinking. But, I've never seen him cry.

Until now.

---