"Constantine." Krista jostled his shoulder.
Cole surfaced hard.
Eyes snapped open. Breath tore into his lungs too fast, too sharp. He didn't know where he was for three frantic heartbeats.
The SUV.
The cold. Hands at his throat. Mouths on his skin—ceiling tiles replaced the sky. Fluorescent lights hummed overhead. Keyboard clatter. Printer whine. Someone laughed down the hall.
Air dragged in again, slower this time.
Krista's face came into focus on him, all soft concern and smudged mascara, tawny curls slipping out of their clip. Behind her, Bryce and Chase hovered near the breakroom door, caught between amusement and unease.
"Hey," Krista said, keeping her voice low. "You're okay. You were dreaming."
His tongue felt thick. "Yeah. Sorry."
The words rasped out of him.
Bryce popped a chip into his mouth. "We were taking bets on whether you'd start screaming like a final girl."
"Bryce," Krista hissed.
"What? He didn't. I lost five bucks."
Cole scrubbed a hand over his face and pushed himself upright on the breakroom couch. His shirt clung to his back. Sweat dampened his hair at the temples. The cheap cushion springs complained under his weight.
"God," he muttered. "How long was I out?"
"Twenty-five minutes," Krista said. "I was coming to wake you at the usual twenty, but you started doing that thing with your breathing."
"What thing?"
"Like you were being strangled by invisible debt collectors," Bryce said.
Chase leaned in the doorway with his coffee. "You were mumbling too."
Krista nodded. "And twitching. And your face went really pale. Paler than usual, I mean."
A weak smile tugged at his mouth. "Luxury nap. Ten out of ten. Would not recommend."
Their chuckles eased the air a little.
Lunch-hour crashes on the couch had become a bad habit. Nights ran worse lately—tossing, turning, waking with his heart sprinting. Morning coffee and momentum got him through a few hours, but by midday exhaustion always dragged him down.
The Gazette didn't care how he spent his break as long as he sat back at his desk on time. His coworkers had quietly adopted nap-guardian status. Krista promised to wake him five minutes early so he could splash his face and pretend to function.
Kindness like that still surprised him.
Nightmare static clung to his nerves, sour and electric. The dream felt like a warning—one day he'd cross paths with something worse than any restless dead he had ever met. Something that didn't just want attention.
Something that wanted to unmake him.
"Okay." Krista stepped back and smoothed her blouse. "Drink some water. Take a few deep breaths. Then back to the grind."
"Bossy," he said.
"You'd sleep through an apocalypse if I let you."
"Rude."
Chase tipped his chin toward the hall. "We've got three minutes before Nicholas starts passive-aggressively clearing his throat."
Bryce grinned. "I love when he does that. It's like being judged by an irritated librarian."
They filed out together.
Cole paused at the sink, cupped cold water in his hands, and splashed his face. Droplets ran down his neck. The spotted mirror reflected a man with shadows under his eyes and a faintly haunted tilt to his expression.
He pressed his fingertips to his throat. No bruises. No marks. The phantom ache still felt real.
"Get it together," he told the mirror quietly.
Paper towel edges rasped against his skin as he dried off. He tossed it, straightened, and stepped back into the newsroom.
A loose square defined the Gazette's main floor. Desks formed islands. Cords sprawled. Paper stacks loomed. Burned coffee and printer toner scented the air. The old building creaked in the wind as if it had opinions.
Krista dropped into the chair at the nearest desk, curls settling around her shoulders. Bryce rolled his chair backward until it bumped Cole's. Chase slid onto his stool at the design table. Nicholas occupied his neat workstation, fingers poised above the keyboard like a court stenographer about to condemn copy.
"Welcome back, Sleeping Beauty," Bryce said.
"Do I get a tiara?" Cole asked, sinking into his chair.
"You get a workload."
Nicholas nodded toward his monitor. "Janet dropped another assignment in your inbox."
The email subject glared from the screen: CITY HALL FEATURE—DRAFT DUE FRIDAY.
A sigh slipped out. "Because of course she did."
Krista leaned over the divider, smelling faintly of vanilla and highlighters. "If you're nice, I'll proofread for dangling modifiers."
"You're an angel."
"Yeah, yeah," Bryce muttered. "We all know Krista is the favorite."
"Because Krista does her job," Nicholas said without looking up. "Unlike some people."
"Wow," Bryce replied. "Tell me how you really feel, Abercrombie."
Nicholas glared over his glasses. "Stop calling me that."
Their bickering rose and fell around him. Noise like this helped. The world here still obeyed human rules. People complained about deadlines, parking, and jammed printers, not invisible hands closing around their throats.
His fingers found the keyboard. The clack of keys anchored him. He opened his half-finished article and skimmed the lede.
A shadow of motion tugged at the edge of his awareness, warmer than the cold that haunted his dreams.
He didn't need to look up to know who it was.
Amber's footsteps always had a particular rhythm on the carpet—light, purposeful. She walked into their corner of the newsroom carrying a file box against one hip, dark hair twisted into a loose knot that never contained all of it. Stray strands already brushed her jaw.
"Delivery for the favorite," she announced, setting the box on Krista's desk.
Krista beamed. "You know me so well."
Amber smiled back, then glanced toward Cole. The warmth in her eyes shifted—softened, just a fraction.
"Hey," she said. "How was lunch, Constantine?"
He took a beat to steady his voice. "Restful."
A small twitch pulled at her mouth. "Must be nice."
Krista made a strangled little sound and turned it into a cough behind her hand.
Cole shot her a warning look.
Amber perched on the edge of Krista's desk, resting her weight on her hands. "Janet says if any of you miss your deadlines this week, she's feeding us to the ad department."
"Barbaric," Bryce said. "I'm delicate."
"Delicate," Nicholas repeated under his breath, dry as dust.
Amber's gaze slipped back to Cole. "You're on the city hall piece, right?"
"Apparently," he said.
"You'll do fine. You're good with people who lie for a living."
A snort escaped before he could stop it. "Is that a compliment?"
"From me? Obviously."
Teasing edged her tone, but underneath lived the echo of late-night conversations in Alexandria. That stupid, soft week when they'd leaned on each other more than they should have.
Brady's cousin.
His best friend's family.
"Free later?" he asked. "Might need a second set of eyes."
"On the article or your life choices?" she asked.
"Article first."
"We'll see about the rest." She stood and lifted the box again. "Ping me."
The office watched her retreat with varying degrees of subtlety.
Bryce sighed like a man admiring a masterpiece. "Lord, grant me the confidence of Amber's hips."
A paperclip bounced off his head. "Stop being gross," Krista said.
"What? I'm being respectful."
Nicholas muttered, "That is not what respectful looks like."
Chase hid a smirk behind his coffee cup.
Bryce swiveled toward Cole. "So. You and Amber."
Keys kept moving. "What about me and Amber?"
"You're doing that thing again," Bryce said. "The thing where you pretend you're not radiating mutual pining."
Krista nodded emphatically. "You are absolutely radiating something."
"Static," Cole said. "We all carry a charge this time of year."
"Sure," Bryce said. "Static. That's why she looks at you like you're her favorite crime documentary."
Chase tapped his pencil on the edge of his sketchbook. "To be fair, she helped get you this job."
"That's true," Krista added. "She talked Janet into reading your portfolio. That counts for at least a coffee date."
His chest tightened.
Memory replayed the late-night call from Amber, back when Purgatory was nothing but a name on a brochure.
You need out, she'd said.
Come here. Start over somewhere small. I'll help.
She had.
She always did.
"Brady would murder me," he whispered.
Bryce shrugged. "Worth it."
"Also, she's not…" Words jammed in his throat. "She's not a rebound."
Krista's features softened. "No one said she was."
"You didn't have to."
His marriage rarely came up. When people asked, he offered the sanitized version. They drifted. Wanted different things. Reached a mutual decision. Life moved on.
Truth had sharper teeth—late nights alone, missed calls, a woman he loved looking at him like the cost of doing the right thing had been her happiness, and she wasn't sure the trade counted as fair.
He forced his gaze back to the screen. The cursor still blinked at the top of his draft.
"Drop it," he breathed. "Please."
Krista reached over the divider and squeezed his wrist once. "Okay."
Bryce's usual comeback died on his tongue. "Yeah. All right."
The moment slipped by. Noise rose to fill the space.
Work pulled him under. Keys rattled. Paper rustled. Someone swore when the program froze at the worst possible time.
An hour slid by.
Chase eventually stood and wandered over with a layout proof. "Think this works?" he asked, spreading the mockup across Cole's desk.
Photos and text lined up to form a story. "Move the farmer shot up," Cole said. "Give the headline more room. The piece is about people, not crops. Let the faces carry it."
Chase studied the page, then nodded. "Yeah, tracks." A pause. "Also… you know you can talk about it, right?"
"About what."
"The way you woke up in there." He jerked his chin toward the breakroom. "Looked like more than a bad sandwich."
The proof held Cole's gaze for another beat. When he met Chase's eyes, they were steady, not prying—just present.
"I'm fine," Cole said.
"That's not what I asked."
"I know." His shoulders shifted. "It's still the answer."
Chase weighed that, then shrugged. "All right. Just remember we're not made of glass. You won't shatter us by letting us see you when you're cracked."
He gathered the layout pages and walked back to the design table.
Tension eased a fraction.
The people here didn't resemble the sharks of Alexandria. Ambition existed, but without the constant edge of hunger. They cared about their work. They cared about each other—and somehow, about him.
He still didn't quite know where to put that.
Afternoon slid toward that strange hour where everyone felt equally tired and wired. Overhead lights hummed. Snow flurries drifted past the windows, faint and half-hearted.
Amber reappeared carrying a mug that smelled far better than anything in the breakroom pot. She set it gently on his desk.
"Peace offering," she said. "You looked like you needed something that isn't tar."
Steam curled from the rim. "What is it?"
"Cinnamon latte. Extra foam." She tapped the side. "Nutmeg on top because you always look like someone with complicated feelings about Christmas."
A rough laugh slipped out. "You're not wrong."
"Drink," she ordered.
"Yes, ma'am."
The first cautious sip sent heat spreading through his chest. Knots unwound in places he hadn't noticed until they loosened. His eyes closed briefly.
"Good?"
"Too good," he said. "I'm going to imprint on you like a baby duck now."
Her mouth curved. "That implies you haven't already."
Krista's latest cough sounded suspiciously like, oh my God.
Amber lifted her own mug in a tiny salute, pretending not to hear. "Janet wants your first draft outline by tomorrow," she added. "Consider this a bribe."
"You work for the enemy," he said.
"I work for the woman who signs your paychecks."
"Ouch."
"You like it here," she whispered—low enough that only he heard it.
His gaze warmed. "Yeah. I do."
"You look better too," Amber said. "Since you moved. Less… jagged."
Anyone else might've turned that into a line. From her, it landed like a small bandage over an old wound.
"Naps on my lunch break say otherwise," he said.
"Oh, the horror."
"Krista uses it as an excuse to bully me."
"I nurture him," Krista said, hand to her chest. "Feed him, water him, wake him before Janet walks by."
"You're all enabling me," Cole said.
Bryce raised his soda can. "To enable."
Cups, cans, and mugs clinked together in a crooked toast.
For a few seconds, the morning's nightmare slid to the far edges. Ghost hands, cold teeth, whispered laughter—everything went distant. His biggest problems shrank to one city hall feature and the way Amber's eyes lingered half a second too long on his mouth when he smiled.
"Back to work," Nicholas said dryly. "Some of us are productive."
"Love you too, Nick," Bryce said.
"Do not," Nicholas replied, "ever call me Nick."
Laughter rolled again.
Evening crept closer. People peeled away as their shifts ended. Krista left first, waving and reminding him to eat something solid. Chase packed up his pens. Nicholas muttered about page counts and vanished into Janet's office. Bryce lingered long enough to lean back in his chair with his hands laced behind his head.
"You good if I take off?" Bryce asked.
"Yeah," Cole said. "I'll finish this paragraph and then head out."
"Don't fall asleep at your desk again," Bryce warned. "If Janet finds you drooling on her budget notes, I'm not bailing you out."
"Coward."
"Realist." Bryce rose, clapped him on the shoulder. "Night, man."
"Night."
The newsroom thinned until only the heater's hum and the occasional click of Amber's keyboard remained. Her desk lamp cast a soft glow, haloing her bent head.
Quitting time had come and gone twenty minutes ago.
He saved his document, shut down his computer, and stood to stretch. His spine popped.
"Old man noises," Amber said, not looking up.
"You could have pretended not to hear that," he replied.
"Could have. Chose not to."
Hands slid into his pockets as he wandered over. "Planning on sleeping here, or…?"
Her eyes stayed on the screen. "Just finishing the ad feature. If I don't, I'll obsess about it all night."
"Perfectionism," he said. "Tragic curse."
"Says the man who rewrites his ledes twelve times."
"Cannot confirm, cannot deny."
She finally leaned back and looked up. Lamplight carved soft gold through her hair. With the rest of the office dark, the quiet felt like it had leaned in to listen.
"You really okay?" she asked.
This time, the question wasn't casual. She had seen his face when Krista woke him.
A lie waited on his tongue. Fine. Just tired. No big deal.
"Bad dream," he said instead. "Been having a lot of those lately."
Her gaze searched his. "Same kind of bad as before?"
"Same," he said. "Different flavor."
Her chair creaked as she settled back. "You know there's no shame in talking to someone about it, right?"
"I am talking to someone."
"Professionally."
A smirk almost formed. "You think I need therapy."
"I think most people need therapy," she said. "You more than most."
A quiet laugh slipped out. "I'll put it on the to-do list."
"Do more than that," she said. "Make the call."
Amber never flinched at his broken edges. She catalogued them. Accepted them. Occasionally poked them with a stick.
"I'll… think about it," he said.
"Uh huh."
Silence settled between them—heavy, not hostile.
"You heading home?" she asked.
"Eventually," he said. Other words crowded behind his teeth—Thank you. I wouldn't be here without you. Whatever this is scares me in better ways than the dead ever did.
None of them made it out.
"Good night, Amber," he said.
"Night, Constantine."
His coat went on in practiced motions. Wind howled faintly at the windows, cold and impatient. Purgatory's streets would lie quiet, dusted with snow. From a distance, the town looked peaceful—quaint, small, harmless.
Experience told a different story.
Peace lied for a living.
The hallway felt cooler when he stepped into it. Nightmare fragments flickered at the edge of his mind—hands, teeth, whispered laughter curling around his name.
He pushed the images back where they belonged.
For now, he had a sister to annoy. Friends who cared if he showed up tomorrow. A town that didn't yet realize it sat on the edge of something stranger than gossip and small elections.
Cold met him as he stepped outside. The Gazette's lights dimmed behind his back.
Somewhere in the thinning quiet, the dead drifted farther away.
For the moment, the living were loud enough.