Page 192 of Without a Trace
He nodded once. “She’s not running away. She’s running toward it.”
I ran a hand through my hair, pacing across the floor. “He’s not going to welcome her with open arms.”
“She knows that.”
“She thinks she’s ready.”
Rhett sat on the edge of the couch, elbows on his knees. “She’s not ready. But she’s done waiting.”
My chest tightened. “She shouldn’t have gone alone.”
“She didn’t. Brielle went with her.”
“You think that makes me feel better?”
“No,” he said. “Didn’t think it would.”
I bit down hard, looked around one last time like something might magically appear and tell me how to fix this. But there was nothing left to find.
Just echoes of her.
“She’s walking into a storm,” I said. “And we lit the match.” I raked my hands down my face. “We find her. Even if she doesn’t want to be found.”
He met my eyes. Waiting. Grounded. Ready.
“She can hate me for it,” I said. “She can scream and burn the bridge. I don’t care. But I’ll be there—at the edge of whatever hell she just stepped into.”
A breath passed between us.
“She thinks the Order broke her,” I added, quieter now. “She hasn’t met the man who made her.”
Rhett’s gaze narrowed, voice quiet. “And if he tries to break her again?”
I looked away, my throat raw.
“Then I show him what it feels like to lose a daughter.”
I met his eyes. “We will.”
But now—
she was gone.
And all I could see was the man I used to be staring back at me—
the monster I swore I wouldn’t become again.
Scarlett
The hallway was too long. Too quiet. The walls waiting for me to scream.
Brielle walked ahead like she’d been here a hundred times. I kept waiting for her to turn around and smirk, or say something cruel just to twist the knife a little deeper. But she didn’t. And her silence unnerved me more than anything.
I kept my footsteps even. Controlled. But my hands wouldn’t stop shaking, even when I curled them into fists to hide it.
We reached the doors—tall, black, carved with the same veiled eye crest id seen on the gates. Only now I noticed the sword below it.
Brielle pushed them open without knocking.
