Page 5 of Heat Unwritten
And now, this unknown woman was defying me. There was no way she was my Tessa, even if I wished she was. It was just a coincidence.
"She has an hour," I said, my voice hardening, retreating behind the wall of professionalism. I pushed the memories down, locking them in the vault where I kept my failures. "The audio team is billing us regardless of whether they record. I'm not letting this project capsize because the author is having a mood swing."
"Maybe cut her some slack?" Daniel suggested, his voice low. "The storm is bad, Anders. The power grid out here is spotty."
"The deadline is absolute," I said. "Generosity doesn't get product shipped."
I opened the email client. The cursor blinked, waiting. A rhythmic demand.
I needed to be the shark. I needed to be the barrier. If I pushed her, she would deliver. She always did. And if she hated me for it, fine. I was used to being the villain in the story. It was better than being the coward in the background.
I typed the subject line, the keys clacking loudly in the quiet house.
URGENT: FINAL PAGES / ASSET PRODUCTION
I didn't ask if she was okay. I didn't ask if the storm was scaring her or if the memories of the scene she was writing were tearing her apart. I channeled every ounce of my frustration, my control, and my desperate need for things to gorightinto the text.
Do not make me explain to the studio executives why the "Invisible Queen of Omegaverse" missed a deadline.
I hovered over the send button. Outside, thunder cracked, shaking the floor beneath my feet. For a second, hesitation flared.
Protect her.
The instinct rose up, unbidden, primal and stupid.
Push her,my logic countered, icy and familiar.Make her successful. Be the shield that ensures her royalty checks clear, even if she never sees your face.
I hit send.
"Done," I said, closing the laptop with a definitive snap. "Now we wait."
Simon turned from the window, his charcoal smudge of a drawing looking like a darker, more chaotic version of the storm outside. "I hope you know what you're doing, Svinton."
"I always know what I'm doing," I lied, smoothing my tie.
I checked my watch again. Fifty-nine minutes left.
THREE
Tessa
The color red was a violation.
It pulsed from my wrist in a harsh, stroboscopic rhythm, illuminating the darkened glass of the floor-to-ceiling window in time with the thumping misery trying to cleave my skull in two. It wasn’t a glow; it was a scream made of light.
Critical. Critical. Critical.
"Stop it," I gasped, the air hitching in my throat as I clawed at the clasp of the biometric band. My fingernails scraped against metal, frantic and clumsy. My fingers were slick with cold, terrible sweat, fumbling uselessly against the sleek polymer casing. "Stop looking at me."
The band didn't listen. It was a tattle-tale, a piece of invasive jewelry hardwired directly to Dr. Mathieu’s private server in Seattle. It was designed to scream for help when my endocrine system decided to self-immolate, to summon the cavalry when my vitals dropped into the kill zone. But the cavalry wasn’t coming. Help was hours away, separated by miles of winding coastal road and a bridge that shuddered in the wind. Help was a helicopter that wouldn’t dare fly in weather that was currently tearing the sky apart.
Outside, the world ended.
It didn't sound like thunder. It sounded like the earth snapping a bone, a deep, tectonic fracture that bypassed my ears straight up through the soles of my feet. The grinding roar tore through the cliffside, vibrating up through the reinforced steel pilings of the house and rattling my teeth in their sockets.
Above me, the recessed track lighting flared white-hot, buzzing loud and angry like a swarm of hornets disturbed in their nest.
Then, they died.
