Chapter 42 REICH
REICH
Have you ever felt happiness slip through your fingers? Watched it turn to dust before your eyes? Felt that paralyzing helplessness— the clawing desperation to hold on, to salvage even a sliver of it—before it’s gone?
Before it’s too late?
That’s exactly how it felt.
That day.
The day they took her.
And I knew.
Long before I saw the wreckage. Long before I tasted the metallic bite of fear in the back of my throat.
I knew.
The second the power cut out—severing the camera feeds I had obsessively monitored for days.
Snuffing out my last tether to her.
A knot of dread coiled in my chest, thick and suffocating.
Each breath I took felt shallow, strained—like trying to breathe through smoke.
Because the house was silent, and Sage was alone.
And I wasn’t there.
I’d been sitting with Castor.
Talking about last night.
How it had been everything we’d ever dreamed of.
How, maybe…maybe breaking the rules wasn’t always a mistake.
The irony stung like a blade to the gut.
Because breaking the rules was exactly what had led to this.
I told myself it was nothing.
Just a power outage.
Just a glitch.
Just a moment of bad timing.
I told myself she was fine. That she was still curled up in the library, lost in her books. That she was waiting for me. Safe. Protected. Like I promised she would be.
But I knew better.
And the second my tires hit the driveway; I knew I wasn’t wrong.
The house loomed ahead—and everything inside me stilled.
Gravel scattered across the doorstep.
The front door open, like a silent scream, gaping wide.
The kind of stillness that meant something terrible had already happened.
And the worst was still to come.
My pulse roared as I stepped inside.
Each footfall echoing in the cavernous silence like gunshots.
The foyer was dark.
Too dark.
And cold.
Not from the temperature but from the absence.
Her absence.
And then I saw it.
Glass shards scattered like ice across the hardwood floors.
A picture frame smashed.
I picked up the broken pieces of it, glass biting into my skin.
Further in I saw strands of her hair tangled in the destruction.
Dark red streaks—blood—trailing across the floor.
From the library.
Out the door.
Gone.
And there, in the middle of it all, a notepad.
Her handwriting scrawled across the page.
Words that were just hers.
Words she would have never wanted anyone to see—and she’d written them here.
I picked it up, my hands trembling like they hadn’t in years.
She’d been sitting right there. Writing these lines. Feeling something.
Thinking she was safe. Thinking I was coming back.
My throat burned.
I pressed the page to my chest and closed my eyes. Just for a second. Just long enough to promise her I’d fix this.
And then I moved.
Fast. Instinct. Muscle memory.
I headed for my office, pulled up the security system.
But before I could touch the keyboard, I stopped.
Something was on my desk.
Dead center.
A memory card.
Placed there like a gift.
Or a curse.
Ice slicked down my spine.
My jaw locked so tight I felt my teeth grind hard against each other.
I picked it up, slotted it into the reader and hit play.
I should’ve braced myself.
I should’ve prepared.
But nothing could have prepared me for this.
The feed was grainy—low quality.
But it didn’t matter.
I knew what I was seeing.
Sage.
Standing in the center of a clearing in some woods.
Surrounded by five men.
My lungs seized.
My body locked up as realization punched through me continuously, until I was hollowed out.
This wasn’t now. This wasn’t today.
This was then.
The night she ran from Sanele. The night she became a ghost.
I watched them circle her like wolves.
I watched them speak to her.
And then I watched her break.
I should’ve looked away. Should’ve spared myself.
But I didn’t.
Because I needed to see.
I needed to understand exactly what they did to her.
So, I could make them pay. So, I could feed the fire that was already burning me alive.
By the time the footage ended, I was gutted and empty.
But my rage—my rage was alive and breathing. It was crawling beneath my skin like a storm that wouldn’t settle.
I had failed her. Once. Twice now.
And I wasn’t going to fail again.
I shoved away from the desk, stalking through the house like a man possessed.
Every corner, every shadow, every room—nothing.
No sign of her.
Think. Think. Retrace.
I pulled out my phone, fumbling for the last thing I had left.
The only surveillance feed still active.
The master bedroom.
I rewound.
Watched.
There I was.
Kissing her goodbye.
Telling her I wouldn’t be long.
And her smile.
Fuck, that smile.
Soft and easy.
Like she trusted me.
Completely unaware of the nightmare about to swallow her whole.
I clenched my teeth so hard I tasted blood.
Then—I saw it.
The moment she tucked the music device into her pocket.
My pulse kicked.
Had she taken it out before they took her?
I zoomed in.
Frame by frame.
It was still there.
I opened the app.
Tracked the signal.
And there it was.
A blinking dot. Not far but moving.
Adrenaline slammed through me like a hammer to the ribs.
I was already moving. Already dialing.
This wasn’t a solo job.
This wasn’t a quiet extraction.
This was war.
I hit the group call.
Two names. Two men who owed me everything and who I trusted to burn the world down if I asked them to.
Keenan answered on the first ring, his voice lazy. “Bro…. King of the fucking Reich. Look who it is.”
Nael wasn’t far behind. “No way. You alive or what?”
I didn’t answer.
Didn’t joke. Didn’t breathe.
“I need a favor.” My voice was gravel. A blade dragging across concrete.
The line went silent.
They knew.
They heard my tone.
“Where?” Keenan asked, his tone gone steel.
“I have a location.” I said.
A beat.
And then Nael, low and cold, “Then let’s go.”
And just like that—the hunt began.
And God help anyone in our way.