Chapter 7
SEVEN
CREWE
The lab doesn’t look like a lab anymore.
It looks like a crime scene dressed up in fluorescent lighting—yellow tape, boot prints, broken screens, and Riley’s life scattered across the floor like someone shook her world until all the pieces fell out.
She stands in the middle of it with her arms wrapped around herself, eyes tracking every smashed corner like she’s trying to reassemble the room by force of will.
Her face is calm, but her body gives her away—shoulders tight, breaths shallow, the kind of stillness that comes right before a person either breaks or burns the whole place down.
I stay close.
Not hovering. Not smothering.
Just… there. Between her and the door. Between her and anyone who thinks they can step into her space and take another piece.
Military police finish up their photos and questions and leave us with the worst kind of answer—no leads, no suspects, no clean direction. Just a hard truth: whoever did this knew what they were doing.
Riley tries to act like it’s fine. Like she’s not rattled. Like she’s not scared.
But I saw her hands shake when she picked up a shattered piece of glass with her own reflection in it.
I saw her swallow the panic like it was a pill she’s learned to live on.
I don’t like it.
And I don’t like the way the lab feels… violated.
It’s quiet for a minute.
Then the door opens.
A man steps inside fast, like he ran from wherever he was the second he heard.
He’s in his fifties, tall but not imposing, hair more gray than not, his face lined with the kind of stress that doesn’t come from age—it comes from responsibility.
He looks left. Right. Takes in the destruction with a sharp inhale.
Then his eyes land on Riley.
“Riley.”
Her breath catches. Her whole posture changes like someone loosened a knot inside her. “Dr. Hammond,” she says, and the way her voice softens tells me everything I need to know about who he is to her.
He crosses the room in three strides and pulls her into a hug like he’s been holding his breath all day. Riley melts into it for a second—just one second—before she straightens, embarrassed by the show of emotion.
I clock that too.
Not because it’s wrong.
Because it matters.
“Jesus,” Hammond murmurs, looking at her hair, her face, checking her like she’s a kid who scraped her knees. “Are you hurt?”
“I’m fine,” she says automatically.
He pulls back and takes in the wreckage again, jaw flexing. “This is insane. This is… this is targeted.”
“It was,” Riley says quietly. “They weren’t trying to steal laptops. They were looking for my work.”
Hammond’s eyes flick to me—quick, assessing. “And you are?”
“Sergeant Crewe Hawthorne,” I say. “Pararescue.”
Recognition flashes in his expression. He’s heard the debrief. He knows what happened on that mountainside.
His gaze returns to Riley. “Where are you staying tonight?”
Riley opens her mouth.
I cut in before she can get the words out. “With me.”
The air shifts.
Riley blinks, surprised. Hammond’s brows pull together, but not in anger—concern. Interest. The kind of man who thinks he’s earned the right to know things because he cares.
Maybe he has.
I still don’t like it.
Hammond looks between us. “With you… where?”
Riley glances at me, like she wants to explain, like she’s trying to prove she’s fine. Like she’s trying to keep the people around her calm so nobody panics.
That instinct will get her killed.
I keep my voice polite. Controlled. “Secure location. Command-approved.”
Hammond doesn’t love that answer. I can tell. But he watches my stance, the way I’m positioned between Riley and the world, and he reads the truth anyway.
Riley’s hand slips into Hammond’s again, a reflex. “He’s keeping me safe,” she says softly.
My chest tightens at the way she says it.
Like she trusts it.
Hammond squeezes her fingers. “Good.” His voice roughens. “Because I have a very bad feeling about this.”
Riley swallows. “Me too.”
Hammond’s eyes sweep the room again, then sharpen. “Did they take anything? Drives? Paper copies?”
“No,” Riley says. “They trashed things. They went through everything. They wanted access. Or…” She hesitates, voice thinning. “Or they wanted to scare me.”
Hammond’s face shifts—something like guilt flashes there. Or fear. Hard to tell.
He reaches out and tucks a piece of her hair behind her ear like it’s a habit. “Riley… this program is bigger than anyone wants to admit. Bigger than your lab. Bigger than Ridgeway.”
Riley’s lips part, and for a second she looks like she might fall apart.
Then she leans forward and hugs him again, quick and tight. “I don’t know what’s happening,” she whispers. “I don’t know why they’d want—”
Hammond wraps her up like he can shield her from the whole damn world. “You don’t have to figure it out alone,” he murmurs.
I stand there, watching, and the protective part of me doesn’t ease.
It sharpens.
Because he cares about her. That’s clear.
But caring doesn’t make you safe.
It doesn’t make you clean.
It doesn’t mean you’re not desperate enough to do something stupid.
And right now, every person who asks Riley a question goes into my mental file under Potential Problem.
Riley pulls away, wiping her eyes like she’s angry at herself for having them.
Hammond looks at me again. “I’d like to speak with Major Chen.”
“She’s aware,” I say.
Hammond nods, then lowers his voice. “Crewe. Off the record. Keep her close. Someone doesn’t just wreck a base lab unless they’re running out of time.”
I hold his stare. “That’s the plan.”
He gives Riley one more long look—like he wants to imprint her face into his mind—and then he turns and walks out, shoulders tense.
As soon as the door shuts, Riley exhales.
“That was Lyle,” she says, as if I didn’t feel his presence the second he walked in. “He’s… he’s always looked out for me.”
“I can see that.”
She studies me, eyes searching. “You didn’t let me answer.”
“No.”
Her brows lift. “You think he’s involved?”
“I think I don’t trust anyone who isn’t you,” I say simply.
A flicker of something warm moves over her face—surprise, maybe. Or something softer.
Then she looks away, because this isn’t the time to melt into anything.
We’re standing in a broken room with enemies we can’t see.
I pull my phone out and text the brothers’ thread.
ME: lab got ransacked. not a random break-in. they’re after Willow’s program. MPs got nothing.
It lights up instantly.
MACK: names.
SIN: any security footage?
BANKS: is she okay??
JACE: you need backup?
COLT: keep her off-grid. treat everyone as a suspect until proven otherwise.
I don’t answer yet. My eyes are on Riley as she carefully picks up a ruined notebook, fingertips brushing the bent cover like it’s a wounded animal.
She looks small for the first time since I met her.
That doesn’t sit right with me.
My phone buzzes again.
Not a text.
A call.
Nash.
I answer. “What’s up?”
“Crewe,” Nash says, voice tighter than usual. Less joking. More serious. “You got a minute?”
“Make it quick.”
There’s a pause. Then: “I took a job.”
I frown. “What kind of job?”
“Security,” he says. “Private.”
My shoulders go rigid. “Why?”
“Because they came to me,” he says, voice low. “And because they’re going after Dad.”
The world narrows.
Riley glances over at me, immediately reading the shift in my face.
“Dad’s dead,” I say automatically. It’s not a denial. It’s the truth I’ve lived with for years.
“That’s what we thought,” Nash replies. “But Maddox Security thinks… he might not be.”
My grip tightens on the phone. “Say that again. Maddox Security?”
“They’ve got intel,” Nash says. “Something old. Something that didn’t add up back then. They think he’s alive, Crewe. And in trouble.”
Every muscle in my body goes still.
Maddox Security. I’ve heard the name. Enough to know they don’t chase ghosts without reason.
“What are you talking about?” I ask, keeping my voice level because Riley’s watching and I won’t bleed this into her panic.
Nash exhales. “I’m saying… I’m in. They’re forming a team. They want me because of what I know, and because I’ve got a reason to care.”
I stare at the shattered lab and feel the ground tilt under my feet.
Because suddenly, everything feels connected in the way bad things connect—threads you don’t see until they tighten around your throat.
Riley’s program. The sabotage. The threats. A shadow organization. And now my brother telling me Dad might still be alive?
“Where are you?” I ask.
“Can’t say on an open line,” Nash replies. “But I needed you to know.”
I swallow, forcing air into my lungs. “We’ll talk when I get Riley secured back at the safe house.”
“Yeah?” Nash says, voice softer. “You staying with her?”
My eyes flick to Riley. She’s watching me carefully now, worry sharpening her features. She’s trying not to ask.
I lower my voice. “I’m keeping her alive.”
Nash huffs a quiet laugh. “That’s not what I asked, brother.”
“Later,” I say. “I’m serious. Later.”
“Fine,” Nash replies. “But, Crewe?”
“Yeah.”
“Be careful. If this is bigger than her lab… it’s bigger than you think.”
The line goes dead.
I stand there for a beat, phone still against my ear, jaw clenched.
Riley steps closer, her voice soft. “What happened?”
I turn to her, and for a second I let myself just look.
She’s brave. Bright. Terrified and trying not to be.
And someone out there is playing a game with all of us.
“I’ll tell you when we’re out of here,” I say, keeping my tone steady. “Right now, we’re going back to the safe house.”
Her throat bobs. “Crewe…”
I step in, close enough that she can feel the promise in my body language even before my words land. “I’ve got you,” I say. “And I don’t care who’s behind this—nobody gets to take you.”
Her eyes soften, and she nods once. Then she whispers, barely audible, “Okay.”
And in that single word, I feel the weight of everything.
The mission. The woman. The threat.
And the growing suspicion that whatever is coming next is going to hit harder than any storm I’ve ever jumped into.