Page 1 of Hunter

Chapter 1

Hunter

Reality comes crashing down, settling in like the last shovel of dirt on a coffin. I've hit rock bottom. The only thing lower is six feet under, and tonight that option feels akin to mercy.

What the fuck do I have left to live for?

Nothing.

I killed the only person on this rotting planet I ever loved. That’s the simple truth. Everything else is just noise.

Nobody will miss me. Not really. They’ll say the right things at the station, pour a beer out for me, then go back to their wives and kids and pretend they didn’t see it coming.

I swallow. My mouth is dry as a desert. I tilt the bottle again—cheap tequila that stopped burning three swallows ago and now tastes like water. That should be my cue to stop.

Instead I drain the last of it, throat working until the bottle slips from my numb fingers and clatters across the floor, rolling to a stop under the futon as though it’s trying to hide from me too.

I shove upright. The room lurches hard. Or maybe that’s just me. Doesn’t matter. I shake my head once, twice, but the dizziness only digs its claws in deeper.

My eyes drift to the side table drawer. The gun is in there. Cold. Loaded. Waiting. One pull and this could all be over. No more smoke. No more waking up choking on a name I can’t stop saying in my sleep. Just blissful quiet.

Heat licks up my spine before I can reach for it.

Smoke.

I can smell it, thick, bitter, chemical. It coats the back of my throat and turns every breath into a war I’m losing. My lungs seize. I crash to my knees on the cheap carpet, palms slapping down hard enough to sting.

It’s not real.

It’s not fucking real.

But the agony in my chest says otherwise. And suddenly, he’s there, right behind my eyelids no matter how hard I squeeze them shut.

No. No. No. Go away. Let me black out instead. Please, if there is a God, just let me black out.

“Hunter!”

I spin toward him. Too slow. Always too goddamn slow.

Fire licks up the walls. When the hell did it get that bad? I don’t know. Can’t remember.

“Go!” he shouts over the roar. His voice is raw, cracking. “Get out!”

He’s too far back. I can barely see him through the black smoke—just the shape of him, gear charred and glistening, visor still down like that’ll save him.

“Get out, Hunter!”

“No.” I don’t know if I say it out loud or if the fire swallows it.

I step forward anyway, boots heavy, ready to drag his ass out if I have to. Coming back in for that recheck was stupid. The woman we pulled was half-dead and screaming about her son, but there was no kid. There never was.

The floor groans under me, soft and treacherous. A crack splits the air like a gunshot. Then the beam comes down—wood, metal, a waterfall of sparks and flame—slamming between us as though God himself decided I didn’t get to keep him.

The world caves in.

I’m thrown backward. Heat slams into me, searing through my gear like it’s tissue paper. Pain explodes across my shoulder, my arm. I hit the ground hard, and the darkness crashes over me.

“Hunter!”