Chapter 94 Harper
Harper
The hours stretched like chains.
I sat at the kitchen table, my hands wrapped around a mug gone cold, staring at the clock until the numbers blurred. Every tick was another reminder: Carter was out there, and I was here. Waiting.
I’d never hated waiting more in my life.
I tried pacing. I tried tidying the same counter three times. I even tried to sleep, but the moment I closed my eyes, gunfire filled the dark and I jolted awake with a gasp.
It wasn’t just fear—it was knowing this wasn’t some random mission halfway across the world. This was because of me. My name on a list. My face in the wrong hands. My life turned into bait.
And yet, even with that truth clawing at me, I knew one thing with absolute certainty: Carter wouldn’t stop. Not until he got back to me. Not until this was over.
I pressed the mug to my chest, whispering into the quiet, “You promised, Carter. Always.”
The fire popped in the hearth, but the cabin still felt too big, too empty without him in it. My eyes drifted toward the window again, to the treeline where fog curled low like smoke.
Every sound outside made my heart leap—an engine, a branch snapping, even the hoot of an owl. But none of it was him.
Still, I held on to that vow like it was oxygen.
Because I had to believe the next sound I heard would be his boots on the steps, his voice calling my name.
And when it came, I’d never let go.