Chapter 30
MICAH
The gunshot echoed across the water, flat and final, swallowed almost immediately by the wind and waves.
Victoria crumpled.
Not gracefully. Not like the movies.
She just ... stopped. Her body folded, puppet strings cut, and hit the sand with a sound I'd heard too many times before.
Dad moved first.
He dropped to his knees beside her, hands reaching but not touching, like he couldn't quite bring himself to confirm what we both already knew.
She was gone.
I stood there, frozen, my hand still halfway to my sidearm—useless, too slow, too late.
The lantern flickered. The wind kept blowing. The marsh didn't care.
"Micah," Dad said, his voice hoarse. "Call it in."
I pulled my radio with numb fingers. "Dominion Hall actual, we need immediate evac. One ... one casualty. Non-hostile."
The response was immediate. Professional. No questions.
The helicopter arrived within minutes, rotors cutting through the night like judgment.
Two men disembarked with a body bag—black, heavy-duty, the kind that said this wasn't their first time.
They worked efficiently. Respectfully.
Dad watched every second of it, his face carved from stone, grief etched into every line.
I watched him.
Because for all the years I'd hated him, for all the resentment I'd carried like armor, I'd never seen him like this.
Broken.
Human.
When they zipped the bag closed, something in his expression crumpled and smoothed all at once—like he was closing a chapter he'd been trying to rewrite for thirty years.
We loaded into the helicopter in silence. Victoria between us. The weight of her small, ruined body pressing down on all of us in ways that had nothing to do with physics.
The flight back felt longer than it was.
I kept replaying it. Her hand moving. The gun appearing. The calm in her voice when she'd told me to take care of Joy.
I hope you're a better man than your father.
I glanced at Dad.
He stared out the window, jaw tight, hands folded in his lap like he was praying or trying not to fall apart.
I didn't know him well enough to tell the difference.
But tonight—tonight I'd gotten a deeper look into who he was. Who he'd been. Who he'd become.
Softer. More empathetic.
Still carrying the weight of choices made decades ago.
I didn't know yet if I could trust him.
But I understood him better.
And maybe that was enough for now.
When we touched down at Dominion Hall, the lawn was lit up like a command center.
People everywhere. My brothers. The Charleston Danes. Silas coordinating logistics with the kind of calm that said he'd done this before.
I didn't wait.
I went straight inside, searching.
Joy.
I found her in one of the sitting rooms, wrapped in a blanket, Portia beside her with a hand on her shoulder. Other women hovered nearby—faces I recognized from passing moments.
Joy looked up when I entered, her eyes red-rimmed but dry.
"Micah," she said, standing immediately.
I crossed to her, pulling her into my arms without thinking.
She went rigid for a second, then melted.
"I have to tell you something," I said quietly, my mouth against her hair.
She pulled back just enough to see my face. "What?"
"Victoria's dead."
The words came out flat. Factual.
Joy went still.
"How?" she asked.
Now was not the time to lie to the woman I loved.
"She ... she shot herself."
Joy's breath hitched once, sharp and small.
Then she nodded.
That was it. Just a nod.
I watched her carefully, searching for the breakdown, the collapse, the thing I'd seen in people before when grief hit.
But Joy just stood there, absorbing it like she'd absorbed everything else—quietly, internally, holding herself together through sheer will.
"Okay," she said finally.
"Joy—"
"I'm okay," she said, cutting me off gently. "I mean ... I'm not. But I will be."
I didn't believe her.
But I also knew from experience that stoicism now didn't mean peace later.
Grief had its own timeline.
"Stay with Portia," I said. "And the others. I need to—"
"Go," she said. "I know."
I kissed her forehead, lingering longer than I meant to, then forced myself to let go.
The war room was full.
Every Dane in the house had gathered—Montana boys on one side of the massive table, Charleston boys on the other. Silas stood near the door, arms crossed, expression grim.
The head seat at the table sat empty.
Waiting.
When Dad walked in, exhaustion carved into every line of his face, every eye turned to him.
He didn't go to the head of the table.
The symbolism wasn't lost on anyone.
Instead, he stopped at the foot, hands braced on the back of a chair, and looked at all of us.
"I've spoken to The Vanguard," he said without preamble. "Told them about Victoria's schemes, about why she did it. Explained that we—my sons, Dominion Hall—are not a threat."
He paused, swallowing hard.
"They're satisfied. I think for good."
Marcus, one of the Charleston Danes, leaned back in his chair. "So, the Eye of Sauron has finally moved on."
No one laughed.
I couldn't contain it anymore.
The question had been burning in my chest since Victoria said the words on that sandbar.
"What is Project Trueborn?" I asked.
The room went silent.
Dad winced. Visibly.
Then he sighed, long and heavy, and sank into the chair he'd been gripping.
"Project Trueborn," he began slowly, "started as a dream. Or maybe as a madman's idea. Either way, it became a reality."
I braced for impact.
"It was developed by Department 77," he continued. "Originally, it was supposed to be a super soldier breeding program."
Several of my brothers shifted uncomfortably.
"They tried labs. Test tubes. Taking poor male children and training them from birth."
His voice went flat.
"It didn't work. The subjects never fully developed into what they were supposed to be. They were ... broken. Damaged."
He looked down at his hands.
"That all changed with a single interview."
I felt my stomach tighten.
"It was me," Dad said quietly. "A decorated soldier.
A man of integrity. Raised by loving parents.
I mentioned in passing that maybe what super soldiers needed wasn't labs and violence from birth.
Maybe they needed loving parents. A tough but fair upbringing.
Training that looked like life lessons, not guns in your hands at age two. "
Silence.
"Two weeks later, I was called into a small room in the middle of Charleston. Three men. Very pointed questions."
He rubbed his face.
"At first, I didn't understand where the questioning was going. Mostly things about how to raise a boy. How to make a man a man. That sort of thing."
His jaw tightened.
"After an hour, they got to the point. They wanted me to spearhead Project Trueborn. Operationally."
Ethan leaned forward. "What does that mean?"
Dad met his eyes. "It meant I was to be one of its subjects."
My blood ran cold.
"They wanted me to find a suitable wife," Dad continued. "Someone who could help raise boys to be exactly what I'd just described. We would both be genetically predisposed to have male children."
Lucas laughed once, sharp and disbelieving. "That's science fiction."
"I thought so, too," Dad said. "At first."
He paused.
"I asked questions. They gave answers. They started making more and more sense. The American family in decline. Birthrates plunging. What if we could seed the future differently? Give it a chance?"
Caleb's hands clenched into fists on the table.
"I wasn't convinced at first," Dad admitted. "It took days. But when I spent time with Victoria, I thought I could see us doing it. I asked if I could pick the woman."
His voice cracked slightly.
"They said yes. Of course. That would be best."
Gideon exhaled slowly. "You told her."
"I did," Dad said. "And to my surprise, she didn't back away. She was intrigued. Started making plans. Coming up with baby names."
He looked at me.
"That's when the cracks started showing. She had episodes. She was damaged."
I felt sick.
"So, Victoria wasn't chosen," Dad continued. "Caroline, the mother of the Charleston boys was picked, instead."
He gestured vaguely toward Silas and his brothers.
"And it went well from the beginning. My superiors were eager. So, they found another."
His gaze swept over the Montana Danes.
"Your mother. Lila."
The air left the room.
"In my youth and excitement," Dad said quietly, "I saw little wrong with what we were doing. Each woman knew what she was getting into. And I fell in love with each one of them. And they with me."
His voice broke.
"And more importantly, I fell in love with my sons the moment they were born."
Complete silence.
I couldn't move. Couldn't breathe.
Truly, this sounded like science fiction.
But the proof was sitting right here.
Fourteen sons. Two families. One father.
All of us planned for, engineered.
Dad stood slowly, pushing the chair back with a scrape that sounded too loud.
"For now," he said, "there are loose ends I need to tie up. Messes I made."
He nudged the chair and pointed to the head of the table.
"I don't deserve to lead this family," he said. "Maybe I never will."
His voice was thick now, emotional but still strong.
"Because the men in this room—my boys—have proved themselves ten times the men I am."
He pulled a folded piece of paper from his pocket and laid it on the table.
"Boys," he said. "Help them. And I promise I'll be back."
No one moved.
No one spoke.
Dad walked to the door, opened it, and left.
The door clicked shut behind him.
For a long moment, no one said anything.
Then I leaned forward and picked up the paper.
Unfolded it.
My eyes went wide.
The paper said: Valentine, Texas. Look for the Danes.
I looked up at my brothers. At Silas. At every man in the room.
"There's more of us," I said.