Page 15 of Out for Blood
If I was going to be the man she needed, steady, reliable, and unshakeable, then I couldn’t afford to come apart.
The anger came with it, and it hasn’t faded. If anything, it’s intensified.
At my father, the man I believed him to be. At Alpha Chi. At everything connected to it.
Questions I still don’t have the answers to and probably never will.
I’ll never understand it because I would never do it.
I must make peace with that, and one day I will, but that isn’t today.
I used to think I had control over my life, and everything revolved around me, like the world worked the way I wanted it to.
Now I know better, I’ve seen what’s out there.
What people are capable of.
What monsters look like up close, and one of them used to tuck me in at night as a boy.
Then the gym happened for Cassidy.
Hours turned into routine. Routine turned into discipline.
And discipline turned into something else entirely.
I didn’t stop her; in fact, I encouraged it.
While she rebuilt herself to be stronger, faster, harder, I trained right beside her, working on my own goals.
Different battlefields. Same war. Both of us are armed with different weapons with the same goal.
Coding turned into something more; it became access, entry points, and patterns.
The kind of places people think are hidden.
You just have to know where to look, and once I found them, I haven’t stopped.
Trafficking rings. Networks. Movement. Names.
I track down the traffickers, map them out, and break them down bit by bit.
Turks and Caicos is just the start, preparing us for what comes next.
The dismantling of a system that thinks it’s untouchable and, ultimately, Cassidy getting her revenge.
I wish I could say I learned anatomy from a classroom. Instead, I learned it while navigating the worst parts of the internet. Years of tracking traffickers, reviewing evidence, and following digital trails exposed me to things most people have never seen, forcing me to understand the human body in ways I never wanted to.
The machine hisses softly, pulling me back to the present.
I grab the cup, but my mind drifts back down the stairs, to my wife.
Always her.
Because none of this means a damn thing if she doesn’t make it through the other side.
Soft footsteps sound behind me.
I don’t turn because I don’t have to.
