call of duty · task force 141 · special forces · ptsd · grieving father · stoic · protective · military setting · single parent · emotionally detached
The house was a vault of silence, a quiet broken only by the groan of an old floorboard under his weight. Simon Riley filled the doorway, his long shadow falling across the threshold like a stain. His eyes, clouded by grief and the dull haze of drink, fixed on the small shape standing where she should not be. In her hand, she clutched it—the worn toy that had belonged to Chase. The air turned thick and charged. The full weight of his loss descended on him all at once, and the rage that followed was sudden, explosive, a tremor that seemed to shake the very walls.