Page 5 of The Ashes of Summer

God, his face.

I have seen Jacob angry more times than I can count. I have seen him furious, cold, calculating, cruel, vicious in ways that left marks on my skin and on the parts of me that bruised without showing. I know his rage in all its forms. But what I saw through that glass was none of those things.

What I saw was a man coming apart.

Something unhinged. Something that didn't care what it destroyed or what it cost or what it left burning behind it, as long as it closed the distance. He moved like a man who had already made his decision—not just about Jackson Moore, not just about this night—but about everything. About what mattered. About what was worth burning the world down for.

Me.

He was burning the world down for me.

If I could have reached him—if there had been even half a second, even the smallest seam in what was happening—I would have jumped. I wouldn't have thought about the fall. Wouldn't have thought about the distance to the ground or the speed we were moving or the probability of survival. I would have taken the chance and let the consequences sort themselves out.

Because anything—anything—would have been better than watching him get smaller through that glass while Jackson Moore sat less than three feet away from me and felt nothing about it at all.

But there was no seam.

Jackson's grip doesn't leave room for seams.

Even now, strapped into this seat, the helicopter carrying me toward something I'm not ready to face, my body still reaches for him.

The helicopter jolts violently beneath me. The sudden drop tears me away from the window, my shoulder slamming into the cabin wall hard enough to make the breath explode from my lungs. The cold glass disappears beneath my fingertips as instinct takes over, my hands grabbing for anything solid while the aircraft steadies itself again.

"Getting gusty up here," the pilot says through the headset. Voice calm. Almost bored. The measured tone of someone reporting mild inconvenience. "Might feel some movement."

Reality crashes back into me.

The roar of the engine is deafening. The air is thick with the smell of aviation fuel and hot metal, every breath tasting sharp against the back of my throat. My pulse pounds so violently that it almost drowns out the blades overhead.

Jacob is gone. The fog swallowed him. And I'm still here.

A fresh wave of panic climbs my spine as I force myself to breathe through it, each inhale trembling so badly it catches halfway into my chest. My heart refuses to slow, battering against my ribs as though it can somehow break free and escape without me.

I lift my head. Jackson is watching me.

He hasn't said a word since we left the ground. He doesn't need to. His silence is somehow worse. More calculated. He sits opposite me with the same unnerving composure he'd worn inside the house, one arm draped lazily across the seat beside him as though this is nothing more than another journey. Another successful transaction.

The thought hits so suddenly it steals what little air I have left.

Mama. Papa.

Their faces rush into my mind with such brutal force that it feels as though someone's wrapped both hands around my throat. I see Mama smiling across the kitchen table, brushing a loose strand of hair behind her ear while she laughed at something Papa had said. I hear the familiar warmth in her voice, the way she always called my name when dinner was ready, the gentle teasing that made our house feel safe even on its hardest days.

Then Papa.

Standing in his office with his tie hanging loose around his neck after another late night, rubbing tiredness from his eyes before opening his arms for one of his impossible bear hugs. The kind that made me roll my eyes even as I hugged him back. The kind I always assumed I'd have forever.

My chest caves inward, because all I will ever have are memories. Fragments. Echoes. Ghosts.

Jackson didn't just kill them—he stole every tomorrow they were supposed to have.

Every birthday.

Every Christmas.

Every phone call I would've made when life became too heavy.

Every chance to tell them I loved them one more time.