Burn Patterns (First in Line #1)

21. James

Chapter twenty-one

James

T he morning air was crisp, cutting through my jacket as if it had teeth. A thin fog crawled along the ground, refusing to lift.

The hum of voices—athletes, coaches, volunteers—mingled with the occasional bark of a race official's command. The sound didn't blend; it crashed and collided—chaos with no rhythm and noise that crawled under my skin.

Thousands of athletes milled around the transition zones, bodies tense with pre-race jitters. Wetsuits hung halfway down as they stretched, adjusted goggles, and muttered last-minute affirmations. Bikes gleamed under the early light, racked in neat rows like soldiers waiting for orders. The sharp scent of body glide and sunscreen mixed with the faint metallic tang of lake water and adrenaline.

Marcus moved through it all with the easy confidence of someone who belonged there, adjusting his goggles and shaking out his arms. To everyone else, he looked like any other triathlete, but I saw the rigidity in his jaw and how his fingers flexed around the strap of his race belt—minor signs that the calm was an act. It was an effective one, but an act nonetheless.

At one point, he paused to talk with a pair of other athletes—casual, effortless conversation punctuated by easy smiles. His laughter came a second too late, like he'd pulled it from somewhere deep inside. They couldn't see it, but I could. The tension was there, coiled tightly beneath the surface.

Michael stood beside me, scanning the crowd. His stance was firm, arms crossed, and jaw clenched. He hadn't spoken much since we left the hotel, but his body language screamed everything he wasn't saying.

I tried to focus on Marcus, but the noise wouldn't fade. It lodged in my skull, constantly buzzing like a hornet trapped inside. My jaw ached—I realized I'd been grinding it so hard my teeth throbbed.

Every muscle in me wanted to drag him away from the race and into something I could control.

Michael shifted beside me, his eyes narrowing as he scanned the perimeter of the transition area.

"Security's a joke," he muttered under his breath, voice tight with frustration.

I followed his gaze. Volunteers in neon vests stood at key checkpoints, their attention divided between the crowd and their clipboards. There were no metal detectors or thorough bag checks—only cursory glances and indifferent nods. Too many people meant too many blind spots.

"Not designed for threats. Just logistics," I replied, my mind recording every flaw and oversight.

Michael snorted. "Logistics get people killed."

The words hung between us, heavy and unspoken. He wasn't only talking about today. We both knew that.

A gust of wind swept across the transition zone, flapping race banners and sending a ripple through the line of competitors preparing for the swim. The crowd was dense—families waving signs, volunteers shouting directions, and athletes weaving through the hubbub with focused determination.

Michael's concentration never wavered, his eyes sharp, dissecting the crowd.

"You're tense," I said, trying to keep my voice light.

Michael's lip curled, and he stepped toward me. "You think this is me tense?" His chest brushed mine, with enough pressure to make it deliberate. "You haven't seen tense."

I exhaled, suppressing the urge to snap back. "We can't control everything. You know that."

Michael turned. "Doesn't mean we don't try."

An edge in his voice scraped against something vulnerable in me.

"Trying doesn't mean pushing until you break."

He took another step closer with his jaw clenched. "And what, you think overanalyzing every detail is going to save him?"

"I think understanding the threat is the only reason he's still alive." My voice was low and tight.

Michael glared for a beat longer, then shifted his gaze back to the crowd, his silence saying more than words could.

I watched Marcus again and how he moved, the practiced ease of it. Still, I saw the cracks. I curled my fingers into fists, forcing myself to stay grounded. This wasn't about me. It was about keeping him safe.

The crowd swelled, and the noise grew louder. I could nearly taste the blend of excitement and anxiety in the air. Michael's presence beside me was like a live wire, tension radiating from him in waves.

"You need to get your head in the game," Michael snapped suddenly.

I turned toward him. "I'm not the one pacing like a goddamn guard dog."

"At least a guard dog knows when to bite."

Michael edged closer, the space between us charged with something volatile. "Biting doesn't make you smart. It only means you've got teeth and nothing better to do with them."

A muscle twitched near his temple. "Yeah? And overthinking doesn't make you a genius. It just makes you slow when it counts."

I laughed—sharp and humorless. "Is that why you froze in Tacoma?"

My blow hit its target. Michael's face darkened, and before I could blink, his hand was on my jacket, shoving me backward. I stumbled, my heel catching on uneven pavement, but I caught myself before hitting the ground. His chest heaved, eyes wild, pupils blown wide with fury.

"Say that again," he growled.

"You froze."

"You don't know shit about Tacoma."

"Oh, I know enough. I've read the reports." I leaned in, my voice sharp like the edge of a knife. "You hesitated. Two seconds too long, and your partner bled out in the time it took you to make up your mind."

Michael's eyes flashed, blind anger breaking through his controlled exterior. "You read about it. I lived it."

"Yeah, and a man died because of it."

I stepped forward, slamming my shoulder into his as I passed like I was daring him to hit me. Michael spun, grabbing my arm and yanking me back. Our faces were inches apart, and both of us were breathing hard.

"You think reading a report makes you an expert? You weren't there," he hissed, his grip iron-tight on my sleeve.

My expression flickered, bitterness seeping through. "I was there once. Sarajevo. Thought I could fix things with facts and logic. You know how that ended? A six-year-old bled out in front of me because I didn't pull the trigger fast enough."

Michael stared, chest heaving, his fists slowly unclenching like it hurt to let go. A red mark bloomed on my forearm where he'd grabbed me, the outline of his fingers like bruises waiting to happen. I didn't care because I felt the same inside—already bruised.

My voice dropped, brittle and soft. "So yeah. I know what hesitation costs."

Michael's jaw remained tight, but his shoulders sagged—like the fight had drained from him in a single breath. He didn't look at me, his gaze fixed somewhere beyond the crowd, past the noise, like he was staring at a ghost only he could see.

"When it happened," he muttered, voice rough as gravel, "I thought if I moved fast enough after, it'd be like I never froze. Like I could undo it."

His Adam's apple bobbed with the effort to swallow something thick and bitter. "But you can't outrun it. It's there when you wake up. It's there when you blink. Doesn't matter how many times you pull the trigger after—it's the one time you didn't that sticks."

He rubbed the back of his neck. Neither of us spoke for a long moment. The noise of the crowd returned like a wave crashing back in, distant and irrelevant.

Michael finally muttered. "Don't screw this up."

I nodded once, tight and controlled. "You, too."

Michael stared at me for a long moment. Then, without another word, he turned back to the crowd, his eyes scanning again.

It wasn't peace, but it was an understanding. We were on the same side.

The crowd near the swim start surged, and the rhythmic sound of waves brushing the shore blended with announcements blaring from loudspeakers. I scanned the dense mix of faces, searching not for familiarity but for anomalies—the person who didn't belong, whose posture was too controlled, and whose attention focused in all the wrong places.

My gaze snagged on a figure about forty yards out, standing near a cluster of vendor tents. Gray jacket. He wasn't watching the swimmers or even the crowd. He was staring at Marcus.

At first, I couldn't be sure. Then, I noticed the subtle markers—the unnatural stillness and the faint curl at the corner of his mouth that wasn't a smile. It was too deliberate and too calculated. My stomach knotted, cold and tight.

The air thickened, and every breath became a struggle as if my lungs had forgotten how to function. My mind spiraled into a loop of images I couldn't escape—fire, smoke, Marcus's blood on his sleeve, and the burnt wreckage of what should have been safe spaces.

I wanted to move. Needed to. But my legs were rooted, paralyzed by the weight of recognition. Elliot. It was the ghost that haunted us everywhere.

His face wasn't clear, shadowed by the hood, but I didn't need to see it. I felt the gnawing familiarity, like a splinter you can't dig out.

Panic surged inside me, sharp and metallic, flooding my mouth with the taste of fear. Not only fear for Marcus. Fear for me.

Elliot wasn't only watching him. He was watching us. He knew how to get inside my head and tear me apart without lifting a finger.

"Michael," I muttered, sharp and low. "Near the blue tent. Gray jacket. He's watching Marcus."

Elliot's head turned slightly—not toward Marcus, but toward me. His eyes met mine for a second, and the recognition was sharp. He smiled. Not wide or theatrical—only a thin curl of his lips.

Michael's head snapped in the direction I indicated. He saw it, too. His jaw stiffened, agitation radiating off him as we pushed through the crowd.

We moved fast, weaving between clusters of spectators, dodging volunteers with clipboards. The crowd parted just enough to let us slip through, but as we closed the distance, the man moved, too—not running, but disappearing. He faded into the bodies around him like a puff of smoke.

We picked up speed, but by the time we reached where he'd stood, he was gone. Not merely out of sight—erased.

Michael cursed under his breath, his eyes scanning frantically, but it was useless. Elliot had blended back into the commotion, leaving nothing behind but the echo of his presence.

My adrenaline didn't fade. It curdled, thick and sour in my veins. We stood there for a beat too long, breathing hard, trying to see a shadow that was already gone.

The race didn't stop. The crowd surged, indifferent to the fact that a nightmare had brushed past them.

A whistle blew, sharp and jarring, snapping me back into the present. Marcus was already moving toward the water, oblivious to the fact that Elliot had been close enough to touch.

The crowd swallowed him as he jogged to the edge of the lake, sleek in his wetsuit, blending into a sea of athletes diving headlong into the churning water. His form grew smaller with each step until he was another body indistinguishable from the rest.

The earth tilted beneath me.

The noise rushed back in, a tidal wave of cheers, whistles, and the splashing, churning water. It was too much. Too loud. Too bright. My chest tightened, a fist squeezing around my ribs. I couldn't catch my breath. It was shallow and forced, like sucking air through a straw that kept collapsing.

I stumbled back from the barricade, weaving through the crowd until I found a narrow space between two vendor tents. My legs gave out the second I hit the shadowed gap. I crouched, hands on my knees, forehead nearly touching the gritty pavement.

Breathe. Just fucking breathe.

My body didn't listen. My heart pounded against my ribs with pure, unadulterated fear. It wasn't the sharp, focused fear present in me when watching a firefight. It was closer to the helpless, drowning kind.

I pressed the heels of my hands into my eyes until I saw stars, trying to force it all back into a box. The static in my head wouldn't clear. Elliot's face—half-glimpsed, half-remembered—burned behind my eyelids like an afterimage I couldn't blink away.

Footsteps.

I flinched before I looked up.

Michael loomed over me, his shadow sharp in the morning light. His face was tight, the usual scowl softened just enough to make it worse. He didn't say anything at first—merely stood there, like he wasn't sure if he was supposed to pull me up or leave me in the dirt.

But it wasn't Michael who broke the silence.

"Hey." Marcus's voice.

I snapped my head up.

He was supposed to be swimming.

But there he was—dripping wet, his wetsuit peeled down to his waist, water streaming from his hair in rivulets. He must've doubled back, slipping out of the crowd of athletes unnoticed. His chest heaved from the effort, but his eyes locked on me with laser focus, cutting through everything else.

I tried to stand. My legs didn't cooperate. He didn't wait. Marcus crouched beside me, his hand gripping the back of my neck—not gentle, but grounding. Solid.

"Breathe," he said, his voice low, steady. It wasn't a suggestion. It was an order.

I did. I don't know how, but I did. My lungs burned as the air rushed in, shaky and uneven, but it was there.

His thumb pressed into the base of my skull, firm enough to anchor me.

After a beat, when my breathing wasn't jagged anymore, Marcus pulled back to look me in the eye.

"You're okay," he said softly.

I wasn't, but I nodded anyway.

He hesitated for a fraction of a second, then added, "I'm out of the official standings. Leaving the course like this disqualifies me." He shrugged like it didn't matter—because it didn't. "I don't care, but I've got to go. I want to finish."

There was no bitterness in his voice. No regret. Only the steady resolve of someone who knew precisely what mattered and what didn't.

I swallowed hard, grabbing his wrist before he could stand, fingers digging into wet skin. I didn't plan the words—they slipped out like blood from an open wound.

"Don't die today."

Marcus's expression didn't change.

"Not planning on it," he replied, his voice steady, like he wasn't afraid of anything.

Then he was gone again, sprinting back toward the water, blending into the tide of bodies without looking back.

I stayed there for another minute, my pulse finally slowing, with the echo of his touch still warm against my neck.

Michael didn't say a word.

He didn't need to.