Chapter 57
Brooke
My body doesn't know what to do with what just happened.
I want to scream, to sob until my throat shreds itself, to grab something heavy and throw it hard enough to break, but none of that comes out, because it all stays locked inside my chest, burning and building with nowhere to go.
Seth doesn't move.
The television still glows across the room, the image frozen on a smear of red that has no right to exist outside of a nightmare, yet it fills the space, like it has not just carried the last seconds of his mother’s life into this room while we stand there and watch it happen.
His eyes are open, but he's gone, not looking at anything in front of him, not tracking movement, not reacting, because they stay fixed somewhere past all of us, somewhere I can't reach no matter how hard I try.
“Oh God,” I whisper, and then I am already moving before the sound has fully left my mouth.
I drop to my knees in front of him and bring my hands up to cup his face, feeling the coldness of his skin under my palms, the unnatural stillness of him as my thumbs drag along his cheekbones in a grounding motion that I hope will pull him back into his body and remind him that he's still here and not alone.
“Seth,” I say, my voice shaking despite everything in me trying to hold it together. “Seth, baby.”
Nothing.
The absence of a response heightens my anxiety.
I swallow hard and force myself to try again, louder this time, pushing the words through the tightness in my throat. “Look at me.”
His pupils don't shift toward me, and his breathing stays shallow and incomplete, like his body has forgotten how to draw air deep enough to keep him alive.
Beau is at my side almost immediately, dropping into a crouch with a controlled urgency that contrasts sharply with the chaos inside my chest, his eyes moving over Seth’s face with precise focus as he assesses what's happening.
“Hey, man,” Beau says. “Seth. Stay with us.”
Behind me, Travis swears under his breath before the words unravel into something louder and more frantic, his hands dragging through his hair as panic takes over. “Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck. He’s catatonic. Jesus Christ.”
I tighten my grip on Seth’s face, my heart slamming hard enough against my ribs that it makes me feel sick, and I force myself to stay anchored to him instead of the rising panic.
“Seth,” I say again, steadying my tone even as everything inside me shakes.
“You’re here. You’re with me. I need you to look at me. ”
For a long second, nothing changes, and that nothing threatens to crush me.
Then his jaw tightens just slightly, a faint shift that would be easy to miss if I hadn't been watching him this closely.
Beau catches it. “That’s it,” the encouragement clear in his tone. “Good. Stay there. Stay on him.”
Travis is already moving, pacing once before rushing toward his laptop, flipping it open with shaking hands as his fingers fly over the keys. “I’m finding that fucker right now.”
I lean closer to Seth until my forehead presses against his, forcing my breathing to slow, so he can follow if he can hear me at all. “Breathe,” I murmur over and over, refusing to let the word lose its meaning. “I’m right here. You hear me? I’m not going anywhere.”
His eyes flicker faintly, the smallest sign of movement that still feels like everything.
I drag my thumbs beneath his eyes, wiping away the tears that have gathered there without him seeming to notice them. “Come back to me,” I whisper, the plea slipping out before I can stop it. “Please.”
His breath hitches once, then again, slightly deeper the second time, and the change is enough to keep me from falling apart.
Beau nods beside me, his focus locked on Seth. “That’s it. Stay there.”
I hold his face like it's the only thing keeping him from breaking apart completely, like letting go would mean losing him for good.
“Seth,” I repeat, stronger this time. “Breathe with me.”
I exaggerate every inhale and every exhale, pressing my forehead against his chest so I can feel what his lungs are doing, searching for any sign that he is still fighting his way back.
For a moment, there is nothing.
Then I feel a faint hitch beneath my skin, barely there but real enough to catch onto.
“There,” I whisper, my voice breaking anyway. “Do that again.”
His jaw flexes, and a muscle ticks beneath my fingers, the smallest shift that still manages to crack through the fear that has locked me in place.
I slide one hand down to his wrist, then to his hand, finding his fingers loose and unresponsive in mine, warm but disconnected, like they belong to someone else.
“Come on,” I murmur.
I guide him toward the bedroom one slow step at a time, moving carefully so he can follow, and he does, his body responding to my movement without resistance, without hesitation, without awareness, which feels worse than if he had fought me because it means he is not choosing this at all.
His shoulder brushes against the doorframe as we move through it, and he doesn't react in any way that suggests he feels it.
“Easy.” My voice comes out quiet, even though I'm the one barely holding myself together.
I sit him on the edge of the bed and drop down in front of him again, my knees pressing into the carpet as my hands come back to his face, firmer this time, anchoring him in place so he can't drift away from me again.
“Hey,” I tighten my hold, forcing his attention to me. “You’re here.”
There is no immediate response, and the silence stretches too long.
“I need you here,” my voice cracking despite every attempt to control it. “With me.”
His eyes flicker again, just slightly, like something inside him is trying to reconnect, and then they finally focus, slowly settling on my face.
My breath catches in my chest.
“Brooke,” he says.
The word comes out flat and hollow, stripped of everything that sounds like him, but it is still him.
Relief hits so hard that my hands start to shake.
“I’m here,” I lean closer like he might disappear if I give him any space. “I’m right here. I’m not going anywhere.”
His shoulders drop, not in relief but in collapse, like whatever has been holding him upright has finally given out, and he nods once.
I ease him back onto the bed, moving carefully so I don't jolt him, and he lets me guide him, lets me pull the covers over him, lets me climb in beside him while his body stays tense under my arm, his muscles locked even in stillness.
I curl into his side and press my ear against his chest, needing to hear his heartbeat to reassure myself that he's still here.
His pulse races beneath my cheek, uneven and erratic, stumbling and surging in a way that makes my chest tighten, but it is there, and that is enough for now.
I close my eyes and match my breathing to his, forcing my body into a slower rhythm, refusing to let myself break while he needs me like this.
Samantha’s face keeps cutting through the dark behind my eyes, replaying over and over again, her voice echoing in my head, her last words pressing into me.
I had only seen her twice, and somehow that had been enough to understand how much she loved him, enough to hear the truth in her voice when she spoke about regret and loss, enough to feel the impact of her absence already settling into the space around us.
Her arms around me on that porch replayed without warning, the way she held on, the way her voice cracked when she whispered that she was grateful I loved her son, and the memory hit me hard enough that my heart sank all over again.
A tear slips free before I can stop it, and I wipe it away quickly and quietly, because I don't have the luxury of falling apart right now.
He needs me present, steady, holding him together in a way I'm not sure I can maintain for long.
Outside the room, voices rise and clash, breaking through the fragile quiet I am trying to hold onto.
“We go now,” Travis demands, his voice tight with fury. “We find Grant before he disappears.”
“That is exactly what he wants,” Beau fires back. “He wants us reactive and sloppy. You want to get Seth killed on a night like this?”
“He just executed his mother on live,” Travis snaps. “You want to sit on that?”
“I want us alive,” Beau replies. “I want Seth alive. Running out there like that gets us all buried.”
Their argument circles in repetitive bursts, but I force myself to tune it out, keeping my attention where it needs to be.
On Seth. On the way his jaw tightens when their voices rise. On the subtle shift in his breathing when Travis swears. On the tension that still lives in his body even as he lies there.
The adrenaline that has carried me this far begins to drain out of my system, leaving behind a heavy exhaustion that settles into my limbs and makes everything feel harder to hold together.
My arms ache, my legs feel heavy, and my head throbs with the aftershock of everything that has just happened.
I whisper his name under my breath, repeating it quietly, just enough to keep him tethered to me.
Time passes.
Then his voice breaks through the quiet again.
“I’m okay.”
The words are quiet and flat, but they are real.
My heart stutters in response.
Seth's throat works before he speaks again.
“I just need a minute.”
I lift my head slowly, searching his face, taking in the way his eyes have closed and his breathing has deepened slightly.
“Okay,” I whisper. “I’m here.”
I settle back against him, letting my body finally give in to the exhaustion as I focus on the steady rhythm of his breathing and the sound of his heart beneath my ear.
When his breathing evens out, mine follows. Sleep comes quietly, pulling me under before I can fight it.
I fall asleep holding him, because letting go feels like it will break everything.
My arm slides across the bed and meets cold sheets.
I sit up immediately, my heart already racing, and for one brief second I try to convince myself that he has only gone to the bathroom and that I have barely been asleep.
The clock on the nightstand tells me otherwise.
An hour has passed.
Panic climbs up my spine.
“Seth,” I whisper as I push myself out of bed.
The bathroom is empty, the light off, the door standing open with nothing inside.
I move down the hallway barefoot, checking every room with quick, panicked movements, but the living room is empty, and there is no sign that he has been there at all.
I knock on Travis’s door.
He opens it almost immediately, his expression shifting the second he sees my face. “What’s wrong?”
“Have you seen Seth?” I ask, the words coming out too fast. “He’s not in the room.”
Travis’s face tightens. “No.”
That is all it takes.
We move at the same time, heading down the hall to Beau’s door. Travis knocks once, and Beau yanks it open, already half dressed.
“Have you seen Seth?” I ask, my voice unsteady now.
“No,” Beau’s eyes flick past us down the hallway, and I can see the moment he understands. “Fuck.”
We don't say anything else. We run.
Cold air hits my face as we rush outside, and my eyes go straight to the driveway.
One car is missing.
My stomach drops hard enough that it feels like falling.
“No,” I breathe. “No, no, no.”
He didn’t wake me. He didn’t leave anything behind. He didn’t take his phone.
He just left.
Alone.
My hands start to shake as everything clicks into place at once, the manhunt, his face everywhere, every cop and every federal agent looking for him.
And he has walked straight into it.
“He’s going after Grant.” The certainty settles into me immediately. “By himself.”
Travis swears under his breath, and Beau drags a hand down his face, his expression tightening with a look of dread.
I stand there staring at the empty space where his car should have been, knowing exactly what this means.
Whatever restraint he had left died with his mother on that screen.