Page 83 of Brawler
Flash’s stomach lurched.Christ. The Civil War.1860s America ripped in two, nearly broken forever.
Then, through the haze, a tall figure appeared. Regal, gaunt, a stovepipe hat crowning his head. Lincoln. He stood above the chaos like a pillar carved from resolve itself, words thundering into the smoke.
“Chaos, you will not prevail here. You and your minions shall not take this nation. A house divided cannot stand but we will stand. We will bleed, we will break, but we will endure. By God, we will endure.”
Light flared from him, a glow Flash now recognized, the light of a guardian. It blazed through the battlefield, shoving the shadows back even as they slithered between the ranks, feeding hatred, stoking the slaughter.
Lincoln’s face turned toward him and shifted. Became…his dad. He swallowed hard, then Lincoln looked directly at him. “What are you fighting for, son?”
His heart clenched, his gut turned over. He fell to his knees. “Dad…I wanted to make a difference. You taught me that. You taught me that just because I’m one man, I can turn the tide, be the catalyst, do the impossible. Dad!”
“I’m so proud of you, Jae, my baby boy…trust in yourself…trust in your instincts. Feel the power of your past, the connection you have. Nothing can take that away. They walk among you, guardians, protectors, men and women who embody both the Veil and Reality.Shadowguard.”
Flash looked down at himself. Light flashed so bright, it hurt his eyes, and he folded to the ground, lost in his father’s words, lost in the meaning that was hammering at him. He wasn’t being forced…he was being…chosen. Could that be, or was he really going insane?
The scene twisted. The field dissolved into something bloodier, more senseless, Bull Run, maybe Vicksburg. Smoke and slaughter, mud sucking at boots, bodies piled in trenches. Chaos thicker here, shadows fattened on division.
Flash stumbled, rifle in hand, and came face-to-face with another figure. A Confederate. His weapon snapped up by instinct?—
Froze.
Twister.
Dressed in butternut gray, his face sweat streaked, his hands working desperately not to kill but to save, binding a wound on a Union soldier at his knees. Blood soaked the dirt. The enemy at his side, dying, and Twister’s hands steady on him anyway.
Flash’s throat closed. He couldn’t fire. Couldn’t even lift the weapon.
Twister’s gaze cut up, locking with his. His voice came steady, solemn. “A nation divided cannot stand. We stand together. We are the vow. We are the oath.”
The tendril connecting them glowed hot, taut as steel cable. Flash lowered the rifle, chest heaving, realization crashing through him. He could never harm his brother. Not in any war. Not on any side.
The shadows writhed, Chaos howling in frustration.
Flash’s mind blew out, imploded inward, and instead of more lessons, more war, he simply winked out, like the last light of the sun as it disappeared below the horizon.
Emily letherself into the apartment, the key stiff in the lock. Her advisor’s voice still circled her head, sharp questions that cut at the thin spots in her final section. Why had Sombra and the cubs deviated so far from her mapped corridor? Why were her data points sparse in a region once rich with prey? She had no way to explain it. Not fully. Not without talking about wreckage, about men with rifles, about the reasons she had been running for her life instead of recording jaguar paths. Her only answer had been silence. She couldn’t elaborate. She couldn’t even tell him why she couldn’t.
He'd told her he couldn’t approve a defense with this lack of data.
Her chest was still tight when she pushed the door open.
Two men stood in the kitchen.
Ben, polished in his button-down, sleeves rolled and collar open, the same careful, curated look he’d always worn like armor. Dark hair trimmed neat, jaw clean-shaven, every line of him sharp with ambition and the tidy precision of a man alreadyhalfway out the door to London. His gym-honed body looked good on paper, lean muscle crafted by mirrors and measured reps. Once, she’d thought that control was attractive, that predictability meant safety. But now, staring at him, all she felt was distance.
Then there was Brawler. Her Neanderthal, SEAL, man, brother in a band and in blood.
He filled the room like a force of nature, battle-hardened muscle packed on his frame, the kind that came from carrying weight through mud, from collisions that left bruises instead of bragging rights. His stance was wide, shoulders squared, every inch of him radiating the quiet menace of a man who’d fought and bled and survived. Sun-browned skin, stubble roughening his jaw, eyes locked on her with a heat that made her pulse trip, nipples tight, and instantly wet.
Ben looked like the life she had once tried to fit herself into. Brawler looked like he had ruined her for anyone but him.
The breath rushed out of her. “Christian,” she whispered. Her bag slid from her shoulder, forgotten, and she ran to him.
He caught her easily as she jumped, her legs locking around his waist, her arms around his neck. God, the scent of him. Familiar, deliciously male, that warm mix of sweat and steel and something uniquely him. It clung to her memory, threaded through her dreams, and now it wrapped around her again. She couldn’t get it out of her mind, out of her nostrils. Desperate for more, for skin to skin, to have him inside her, surrounding her. The need was so primal she almost wanted to growl. His mouth crushed down on hers, rough and desperate, and she kissed him back like she had been holding her breath since the jungle. All the tension of her defense, the weight of her advisor’s unanswerable questions, melted away under his hands hauling her tight against him.
When she finally broke for air, she turned her head and met Ben’s stunned stare.
“Jesus, Emily.” His voice was a mix of disbelief and bitterness. “Where did you meet this guy? In the fucking jungle? It’s barely been a week since you’ve been gone.”
