Chapter Two
The gravel crunched beneath the tires of Eli’s Buick as he rolled through the gates and followed the winding drive deeper into the facility. What he’d expected was a makeshift compound, maybe some trailers and tents—the usual backwoods retreat aesthetic.
What he got instead was sleek, high-tech infrastructure humming with quiet efficiency. Buildings with clean lines, brushed steel panels, and smart glass. Training yards embedded with shock-absorbing turf. Antennae and satellite dishes bristling like thorns from one of the forward buildings.
It was the Ridge all right—Obsidian Ridge—but it wasn’t just military. It was precision. Design. Intent.
And nestled right at the base of a hulking, sheer rock face stood a massive house. An older structure, three stories tall, all warm timber and aged stone, looking every bit like a mansion transplanted from an upscale Colorado ski town. It anchored the facility, clearly the heart of the operation.
As he coasted past other buildings on site, Eli caught glimpses of people in uniform, some sparring on mats, others running drills with gear he’d only seen on black-ops reports. No one stopped to stare, but everyone noticed him. Like they were trained to.
The road curved and split near a large rectangular building. A faint smile tugged at his lips as he recognized the wide vents, dehumidifiers, and UV skylights built into the roof.
A pool. There was a pool.
Water meant control. Weightlessness. Breathing without pain. Escape.
He felt his shoulders drop half an inch, feeling a little less tense.
Ezra met him in front of a long nondescript building just past the Ridge House. “You’ll be staying here,” he said, waving him into a clean, steel-and-wood structure with Trainer’s Barracks written above the door.
Eli parked and slid out and followed Ezra into the building. They stopped at the first door on the left and Ezra opened it to reveal a compact but sleek studio—kitchenette, queen bed, built-in desk, wall-mounted TV, and a clean line of storage drawers. The lighting was soft, the furniture modern.
“Fifteen rooms in this block,” Ezra explained. “Trainers and specialty staff. Quiet. Close to Marsh’s lab in the innovation wing of the comms building. Or ‘lair,’ as some call it.”
Eli blinked. “Lair?”
Ezra smirked. “You’ll see.” He handed over a keycard. “You’re not the first therapist we’ve brought in. But you’re the first Marsh hasn’t actively run off in the first five minutes—win!”
Eli snorted. “So far.”
Ezra leaned against the doorframe, expression softening. “Dinner’s in a couple hours. My place. Me, Ricky, and Sophia are making pasta, garlic bread, and a kick ass salad. I want to introduce you to the rest of the Pathfinders.”
“Who are they?” Eli asked.
“Family. Pains in the ass sometimes. But they’d take a bullet for each other and have on more than one occasion.
If they like you, you’ll find yourself on that list .
.. they will protect you.” Ezra paused, tilted his head to the side and leveled a calculating look in Eli’s direction. “But only if you deserve it.”
Eli hesitated. “Sounds like you’re not entirely sure if I would.”
Ezra’s smile was all teeth. “Oh, I’m sure of you. It’s Marsh who isn’t. Yet.”
He turned to leave, then called back over his shoulder, “Just follow the path behind the Ridge House. You can’t miss it. White stone patio, raised garden beds, wind chimes shaped like butterflies Sophia insisted on.”
Eli stepped back into the room, exhaled, then turned toward the door.
“Hey,” he called. Ezra paused. “That pool...?”
Ezra grinned. “Help yourself. Just don’t drown before dinner.”
Alone again, Eli stood for a moment in the room that, for now, was his. Then he grabbed his swim gear from one of his bags and quickly got changed.
Water. A quick swim. Something to loosen the knots in his spine.
As he walked toward the building with the pool, his thoughts drifted back—uninvited—to Marsh.
That jaw. That mouth. That attitude.
God help him, this was going to be complicated.
The pool was just as pristine as he’d imagined. Olympic length, with underwater lights casting a shimmering lattice across the tiled floor. No one else was inside. The silence felt sacred.
Eli had come ready to swim, so after checking that he was alone, he stripped off his long sleeve t-shirt, muscles aching as he peeled it over his head, then stepped out of his slip-on shoes, dropped his towel and shirt on the bench against the wall.
Bruises bloomed across his ribs like ink spills.
He traced one absentmindedly, then shook his head and padded barefoot to the water’s edge.
He dove in cleanly, the cold snapping around his body like a reset switch. Down here, everything slowed. Everything quieted. Pain dulled. Thoughts receded.
Except one.
Marsh.
Why the hell did he keep replaying that moment in the truck?
Eli surfaced, gasping, and kicked into a gentle breaststroke. The memory circled back like a persistent tide. That scowl. That cocky lilt when he asked, “So, you think I’m hot, huh?”
Eli rolled his eyes at the ceiling and muttered, “Of course I do, you walking complication.”
He moved through all four strokes, changing into them seamlessly as he swam lap after lap, pushing his body to that fine edge between soreness and relief. The water moved with him, buoying his limbs, keeping him steady where land made him falter.
And still—Marsh. That line. That look. The quiet blink of confusion when Eli shut the flirtation down.
He didn’t mean to snap. It wasn’t Marsh’s fault. But the ghost of the Colonel still hovered, sneering about softness, about weakness. Flirting had consequences.
But damn if it didn’t feel good for a second.
He flipped and kicked off the wall, slicing through the water, feeling lighter than he had in weeks.
Again, that sense that he was exactly where he needed to be flooded through him, followed quickly by Ezra’s comment that Marsh didn’t think he belonged here. Yet. But ... maybe he could belong here.
He had two hours to figure out how to act normal before dinner.
Two hours to forget the way Marsh’s grin had tugged at something deep in his chest.
Good luck with that.
****
From the lab’s second-story window, Marsh could see almost everything. His perch gave him a clear view of the training grounds, the paths winding between buildings, and the sleek new trainer barracks Ezra had insisted on last year. It was too close to his lab for comfort.
It was also where Eli had disappeared into.
Marsh gritted his teeth, watching the door click shut behind the man. His jaw ached from the tension.
This was a mistake.
Ezra had chewed him out loudly and thoroughly, just a week earlier. Told him he couldn’t keep burning through staff like they were disposable. That the Ridge needed Marsh to be functional—not hostile and feral.
“You’ve got to stop sending them away, Marsh,” Ezra had said, voice low but tight with barely restrained frustration. “One more, just one. If you hate this one, then we’ll send him away and I will let you rot in this lair with your bad moods. Therapy is not that bad!”
Marsh had scoffed. “Like you can just keep throwing fixers at me and I’m supposed to smile and spill my feelings? Screw that.”
Ezra hadn’t budged. “He’s different. I think he can help you. And I think you’ll listen to him.”
Marsh shot him a pointed look. “Why in the hell would I do that?”
“Because it seems to me that he needs to be here as much as you need him to be.” Ezra had looked at him for a long moment. “And because I believe that you won’t know how to walk away from him.”
Then he left.
Marsh had hated that line the moment he heard it. What in the hell was it supposed to mean? Marsh could walk away, he had done it countless times.
And now here he was. Sitting in his lab, fuming, while the guy Ezra believed in strutted around like he belonged. Tight jeans. Sass. And that mouth.
Marsh muttered under his breath, “Need to get that guy out of here.”
Movement outside caught his eye. Marsh leaned forward, narrowing his eyes.
Eli was walking again. Towel slung over one shoulder. Heading toward the pool.
Figures the guy would be a swimmer. Built for it. Everything about him was sleek and efficient in motion, like a panther wearing boards shorts, a long-sleeved t-shirt, and slip on sandals.
Feeling a little ridiculous—and more than a little stalkerish—Marsh wheeled himself away from the window and over to his security interface. One of his own designs. State-of-the-art, facially intelligent, encrypted beyond standard military grade.
He tapped into the pool camera.
The feed popped up. And for a moment, Marsh forgot how to breathe.
Eli peeled off his long-sleeved shirt. The light above him glinted off bruises. Dozens. Some fresh, others in sickly stages of healing. Purple, yellow, brown. Spilled across ribs, shoulders, arms.
Marsh leaned closer, fury and something else rising in equal measure.
Then, Eli turned and Marsh turned the air blue in his lab with inventive curses.
Scars. Faint but unmistakable. Straight, parallel, cruel. Cane marks. He’d seen them before—in places no one talked about.
Eli dove into the water with a grace Marsh had never seen up close. No hesitation. No wasted motion. Just clean, pure movement.
And then he swam.
It was like watching poetry. Which made no fucking sense, but was apt on this occasion as far as he was concerned.
Eli cycled through all four strokes—breaststroke, freestyle, backstroke, butterfly—with an ease that spoke of years, and thousands of hours of training.
He cut through the water like he belonged there.
Marsh watched, riveted, as lap after lap went by. Eli never faltered. Never slowed. He just continued to swim. Marsh lost track of time, lost himself in the seamless way the man cut through the water, and was startled a little when Eli suddenly startled in the water.
Marsh’s gaze darted to another camera. Someone had entered the pool building.