Page 16 of Montana Memory

“Hunter, talk to me. Please.”

I shook my head, already stepping away. Talking wouldn’t fix this. Wouldn’t stop my pulse from hammering like incoming mortar fire, wouldn’t force my muscles to unclench. Wouldn’t erase the bodies, the blood, the weight of everything I’d done and how it had stolen part of my mind.

Jada didn’t know who she was. She had no past to hold on to. She wanted reassurances from me, but I had none to give either of us.

“No, I’m sorry. I have to go.”

Her expression cracked, just for a second, something raw flashing in her eyes. Hurt. Not from fear, not from anger. Just…hurt.

I hated that I saw it. Hated even more that I couldn’t stop it.

I turned away before she could say anything else. Before I could.

One foot in front of the other, forcing my body forward. The hallway blurred at the edges as I stumbled forward, muscles locking, breath coming too fast. Too tight. I shoved through the door at the end of the narrow hall, slamming it behind me.

The gym—if I could call it that—was nothing more than a battered mat, a rack of mismatched weights, and a punching bag hanging lopsided from the ceiling. Didn’t matter. It was enough.

I sagged against the door, chest heaving. The dizziness came in waves, tilting the room, making the floor feel unstable beneath my feet. My hands curled into fists, nails biting into my palms.

Get on the floor. Move.It was the only thing I knew to do when I got like this. The only thing that had ever worked. The only thing that could take me out of my head when the walls started closing in.

I dropped hard, catching myself on my palms, arms shaking from the impact and began doing push-ups.

One. Two. Three.

I counted in my head, breath rough, every muscle screaming. Faster.

Twenty.

The pain didn’t quiet the noise. Not yet. I kept going.

Fifty.

My breath was a wreck, sweat sliding down my spine. My arms burned, my chest tight, but my head? Still too loud. Still thrumming with the ghosts I couldn’t shake.

Not enough.

When my arms gave out, I rolled over and turned to sit-ups, moving faster and faster until that exercise was impossible too.

Exercise after exercise, movement after movement, I pushed harder, faster, body shaking, punishing myself. But I didn’t stop. I couldn’t. If I didn’t burn this out, it would take over. It always did. I might lose days in a PTSD fog.

Jada was here. I couldn’t afford to disappear into myself. Not now. Not when the past was still chasing both of us.

Chapter 6

Jada

The safe house was too quiet. Too still. Silence pressed against my ears, thick and suffocating, like a weighted blanket I couldn’t throw off.

I hadn’t slept.

I tried—curled up on the stiff couch in the living room, staring at the ceiling, counting the tiny cracks in the plaster. But my mind wouldn’t settle. Thoughts raced, looping over and over, questions I couldn’t answer carving trenches in my brain.

I moved instead. Wandered. Opened cabinets, ran my fingers over the surfaces of the furniture like touch alone might trigger something familiar. Nothing did.

Hunter had disappeared into a back room the moment we arrived last night. He’d looked pale, unsteady, and hadn’t been interested in any sort of help or even talking. He hadn’t come out since.

I’d hovered outside that door for a while, debating knocking, but what would I even say? I barely knew him. And even if he’dsaved me twice now, that didn’t mean I had the right to push into whatever battle he was fighting on the other side of that wall.

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