Every vibration from the aircraft overhead seemed to chip away at the illusion of safety Dorian had spent years constructing, stone by stone, ward by ward, until tonight, when the storm itself seemed to be conspiring against him.
Dakota had not moved from the window in over an hour.
She had counted every pass of every searchlight, memorized the rhythm of the rotors the way a sailor learns the rhythm of a tide, and somewhere beneath the counting, beneath the watching, a single thought had carved itself into the marrow of her bones: if I stop watching, I will stop believing she's still out there.
So she watched.
And when the door finally opened, her whole body turned toward it before her mind had caught up.
Dakota's attention was fixed on him the moment he stepped through the doorway.
The state he returned in told its own story before he uttered a single word.
Rainwater dripped steadily from the hem of his coat, leaving dark puddles across the polished wooden floor.
