CHAPTER 1
COLE
This never should have happened.
When I took this job, it was because I thought I could make a difference.
Just because I wasn’t helping people as a Green Beret anymore, it didn’t mean I couldn’t protect them another way.
Newly separated from the Army, the transition to police officer made sense. It was like the recruiter said, “We actively look for former military to join the force. With your experience and skills, you’d be a huge asset to us. And we can provide great benefits—four day workweeks, competitive pay, opportunities for promotion… you can see your family more often. Have a life outside your job.”
My family is gone, but I do have friends around the country that I want to visit. And the appeal of using my skills to still help people was too great to ignore. Plus, I liked the idea of moving someplace new. Maybe building a new life here in San Antonio, finding a house, and if the stars align, maybe even a relationship one day.
So I packed up my stuff and left the only life I’d known for over a decade. Left my teammates. Left the security of a career I was good at to try something completely new.
Was I nervous about it? Of course. How could I not be? But after everything that happened in Afghanistan, it was clear my time in the Army was over. Without the teammates who’d become like family, it would have been too hard. Without Finn, and Rylan, and Nora… How could I go on when half my team couldn’t?
After we got back to Fort Campbell following that terrible mission, it wasn’t a surprise that Leo and Zane left, too. Their hearts weren’t in it any more than mine.
So my team fractured, my six closest friends scattering around the country, all trying to deal with the repercussions of that mission the best they could. Leo went to New York City, Zane to Virginia, Rylan continued his rehab in upstate New York, Finn took off to Colorado, and Nora retreated to her mother’s place in California.
I miss them.
But when I came here, I had hopes that keeping busy with my new job would help dull the pain. And in the beginning, it did, a little. I met my new partner, who’s become a close friend, and I got to know the city. I explored Texas, taking solo trips to Austin and Dallas and Houston, and during one long stretch of days off, I even headed all the way up to Amarillo.
I hoped this would be enough to fill the gaping hole left behind.
I didn’t expect the new friends I made—other first responders working in San Antonio—to replace my teammates, but I hoped to build a life I could enjoy.
Some of it came true. I’ve grown to like it here—the warm winters, the people, the apartment with a bit of yard just bigenough to sit out and grill, and the feeling of accomplishment when I help a victim in need.
But I worry it’s never going to be enough. Not when the people I love like my own family are so far away, still trying to cope with their own struggles.
And today.
I don’t know how to process the emotions running through me.
I haven’t been this upset—
Shit.
Since I got home, I haven’t stopped pacing. My body is vibrating with tension, but there’s nowhere for it to go. There’s nothing that’s going to take away the frustration, the anger, and the sorrow about what just happened.
About what could have been stopped, if not for those damn rules.
The fucking red tape.
The bureaucratic bullshit that kept me and my partner from helping a woman in terrible danger.
As I keep circling my living room, the walls feel like they’re closing in on me.
Impotent rage bubbles up in my chest. Pain shoots through my jaw and down my neck. I nearly crack a molar trying to keep everything in.
This never should have happened.
Dana should still be alive.
Her body shouldn’t be at the coroner’s, awaiting an autopsy to determine her exact cause of death.
