Chapter 4
Mia Thornton
The screaming had left my throat raw and burning. I could taste salt—tears and snot mixing—while my body wouldn’t stop shaking. Violent tremors that started in my chest and radiated outward until even my teeth chattered, the sound sharp in the sudden quiet of the room.
He held me. The man who’d just locked me in my worst nightmare held me like I was something precious, something that might shatter if he let go. His arms were steel bands wrapped in false gentleness, and I hated how perfectly they fit around me.
Six years since he’d held me. Six years, and my traitorous body still recognized the exact pressure of his embrace, the way his right hand splayed between my shoulder blades, how his left arm curved around my waist.
Ryan. Coop. I didn’t know who he was anymore. Maybe both. Maybe neither. Maybe a stranger wearing a familiar face.
My fingers had twisted into his shirt sometime during the panic, and now they wouldn’t let go.
The fabric was damp with my tears and probably snot, and God, I was pathetic.
A trembling, pathetic mess clinging to the person who’d traumatized me.
Who’d known exactly how small that closet was when he’d shoved me inside.
Who’d listened to me scream and counted the seconds before letting me out.
But I couldn’t pull away.
It was biology, nothing more. My nervous system seeking regulation from another human body. The primitive mammal brain that said safe when it felt arms around it, even if those arms had just proven they weren’t safe at all.
My body’s betrayal was complete—my lungs matching his breathing rhythm, my heart rate slowing to sync with his, every cell in my body leaning into comfort it shouldn’t want.
The confusion felt like static in my brain, white noise drowning out rational thought.
This was Ryan—my Ryan, who used to wake up at three a.m. when he had nightmares from deployment and I’d hold him until the shaking stopped, who’d learned to cook my grandmother’s soup recipe when I was sick, who’d talked about our future kids’ names over Sunday breakfast.
But he was also Coop, who’d grabbed me in the barn with hands that promised violence. Who’d let those men think I was his property, something to be used and discarded. Who’d learned about my claustrophobia and, within seconds, had figured out how to weaponize it against me.
This was not the Ryan I’d known or fallen in love with.
“I’m undercover.”
The words were barely audible, breathed against my hair like confession in a church. Or something that could get us both killed if the wrong person heard. They slipped between us, fragile as spun glass.
I went still. Even the shaking stopped. My mind struggled to process, to shift realities, to understand that the last few hours had been—what? Performance? Necessity?
“What?”
“Undercover. This whole thing—the Coop persona, these men, all of it. It’s a cover.”
Understanding came slowly, like ice melting in reverse.
Cold, then colder, then a different kind of numb.
The way he’d switched between roles suddenly made sense.
The desperation in his eyes even as he’d shoved me toward that closet—not pleasure in my fear but anguish at causing it.
The way he was holding me now, like he was trying to put back together something he’d broken with his own hands.
He was undercover. Of course he was. Nothing else made sense.
It helped, a little. Not enough to stop the phantom sensation of walls closing in or the memory of a gun pointed at me, but enough to make breathing easier.
Ryan had broken my heart when he’d left six years ago—right when I’d been sure a proposal was coming, when every conversation seemed to include when we’re married or our kids someday.
But even then, his sense of morality had been unshakable.
Black and white. Right and wrong. He’d rather die than become the monster he was pretending to be now.
At least, that’s how I remembered him. People change in six years.
God knew I had. The woman he’d known wouldn’t have clawed at her own skin like an animal in that closet.
Wouldn’t have frozen at the sight of a small bathroom.
Wouldn’t have needed to work alone, outside, away from anything that could trap her.
“Yo, Coop!” Diesel’s voice carried through the wall. “She’s got some lungs on her.”
“Told you he knew what he was doing,” the one with the normal name, Tom or whatever, echoed.
“Shut the fuck up.” Ryan’s voice transformed mid-sentence, ice and authority and barely contained violence. The change was so complete I felt it in his chest, the way his muscles coiled like he was ready to go through the wall. “I don’t need commentary from the dumbass peanut gallery.”
“Just saying—”
Ryan’s voice cut through cold and hard. “I’ve got my way of doing things.”
Silence from the other room. Then Diesel’s laugh. “Whatever you say, Coop.”
Their voices faded, moving away, back to whatever they did around here. Ryan’s hand resumed stroking my hair, the familiar gesture making my chest tight.
“They’re dealing weapons,” he said quietly, his voice Ryan again, not the Coop persona.
“I’ve been under six weeks trying to get to their leader.
Can’t call for backup—they are tracking all calls and messages in or out.
If I blow cover now, the whole operation falls apart, and a lot of people could die. ”
I tried to process that. He was undercover to stop weapons from being sold. Real weapons that would kill real people. It made what happened in the closet feel smaller somehow, even though my body was still shaking from it.
“What kind of weapons?”
“The kind that don’t belong outside a war zone. Automatic rifles, military-grade. The kind that turn a bad situation into a massacre.”
I pulled back slightly, enough to see his face in the dim light filtering through the grimy window. The movement made my arms sting, and I looked down. Red lines tracked up my forearms where I’d clawed at myself during the panic, some deep enough to bead with blood.
My neck hurt too—when I touched it, I found raised welts where I’d tried to tear at myself, trying to make space where there was none, trying to escape through my own skin if that’s what it took.
His eyes dropped to my arms, and something shifted in his expression—horror, guilt, both maybe.
“Christ, Mia.” His voice cracked on my name. “Let me clean those.”
He eased away from me, the loss of contact immediate and cold. His movements were careful, like I might shatter or bolt if he moved too fast. He disappeared into the bathroom, and I heard water running, his quiet cursing when something fell.
The loss of his warmth made me feel exposed, vulnerable. I pulled my knees to my chest, making myself smaller while he moved around the tiny bathroom. He came back with a wet cloth and a small first aid kit that looked military-issue, all efficiency and function.
“This’ll sting.”
His touch was unbearably gentle. Each dab of the cloth was careful, precise, like he was handling something infinitely breakable. The contrast made my head spin—this tenderness from hands that had shoved me into my worst nightmare.
The antiseptic burned, and I hissed through my teeth.
“I’m sorry.” The words carried more weight than just the sting. “God, Mia, I’m so fucking sorry.”
“Don’t.” I couldn’t handle his apologies. Not now. Maybe not ever.
He was finishing with the worst of my scratches when I saw his knuckles—split and swollen from punching the wall near my head. He’d hurt himself trying to scare me without actually hitting me. The blood had dried dark in the creases of his skin.
“Your hand.”
“It’s nothing.”
I took the cloth from him. Our fingers brushed, and that familiar electricity was still there, muted by trauma but not dead. Never dead, apparently, even after six years.
I cleaned the blood from his knuckles while he sat perfectly still, watching me with eyes that kept shifting between Ryan’s warmth and Coop’s calculation. This was who he was now—fractured, split between person and persona. I wondered if he even knew where one ended and the other began.
“You punch walls often in this line of work?”
“Only when I’m trying not to punch myself.”
The honesty of that sat between us, heavy and complicated.
This careful, tentative moment between us felt like handling broken glass—necessary but dangerous.
Each touch was a negotiation, a question and answer without words.
His hand turned slightly, palm up, and I traced the new scars there.
Rougher calluses than before. A thin white line across his palm that hadn’t been there six years ago.
“You should get some sleep,” he said quietly. “You’re exhausted.”
He started to get up from the bed. “I’ll take the floor. Give you some space. I’m sure I’m the last person you want lying by you in bed—”
He stopped mid-movement, glancing at the door, then shaking his head. “Shit. I can’t. If one of them comes in and sees me on the floor instead of…” He trailed off.
I understood. It would blow his cover. Make them suspicious. Probably get us both killed.
“Yeah,” I said quietly.
His jaw tightened. “I’ll stay on my side.”
We lay down with careful space between us, both staring at the ceiling like it might offer answers. My body felt like it weighed a thousand pounds, every muscle liquefied from the adrenaline crash.
“How long have you been in law enforcement?” I finally whispered. “Did you become some sort of agent as soon as you got out of the Marines?”
“I’m not actually law enforcement. I work for a private tactical company called Warrior Security.
We were approached by a multiagency task force for this mission since the man behind it is known to recruit veterans who are disillusioned with the government.
I fit the bill pretty easily. Plus, using me gives the law enforcement agencies deniability if needed. ”
None of that surprised me.
“We’re waiting for a call,” he said into the darkness.
“From Julian Oliver—he’s the militia leader.
I haven’t met him yet—he’s the next step in this case.
When he calls, the guys and I will move to a separate location where the weapons buy is happening.
Oliver is…particular about things. Smart.
Paranoid. If he suspects anything’s off, people die. ”
“What about me?”
“I’m going to get you out of here before that. The guys here—Diesel, Snake, Tommy—they’re small-time. They get bored and want to go into the nearest town a couple times a week to drink and find women. I’ll make sure we go soon, and that you have a way to escape while we’re there.”
The promise hung between us. He’d get me out. Then he’d continue pretending to be a monster. Continue being Coop, who laughed at violence and treated women like objects. I wondered how much of himself he lost each time he put on that persona.
“I’ll replace your camera.” The words came unexpectedly. “The whole setup. Whatever it costs.”
I’d forgotten about my camera. Thousands of dollars in equipment destroyed in that barn. My livelihood.
“That camera was my independence,” I said quietly. “The only thing that was really mine.”
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’ll replace it.”
We lay in silence for a moment before he spoke again.
“You doing photography full time now?”
“Yeah.” My voice sounded hollow. “Real estate, mostly. Some nature work. Things that let me be outside.”
Away from walls. Away from small spaces. Away from anything that could trap me. Though I didn’t say that part.
“You were studying graphic design before.”
Before he left. Before everything changed. “That was a long time ago.”
“Six years isn’t—”
“It’s a lifetime.” The words came out sharper than intended. “You don’t get to act like you know me anymore.”
“You’re right.” He shifted slightly, the mattress creaking. “The claustrophobia—when did that happen?”
My whole body tensed. I didn’t want to remember.
Didn’t want to think about that night. January, everything covered in ice.
I’d been photographing winter landscapes, trying to build a portfolio, trying to become someone other than the abandoned girlfriend.
The road had looked fine. Black ice is invisible until you’re sliding.
The embankment. The rolling. The way the car crushed in on itself, roof pressing against my skull, dashboard ripping into my legs. Four hours trapped in twisted metal before they cut me out. The scars on my legs were nothing compared to what it had done to my mind related to small spaces.
“Four months after you left. Car accident.”
“Mia—”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
He didn’t push. We lay in silence again, two people who used to know everything about each other now strangers separated by six years of damage.
We’d both changed. Him into someone who could convincingly play a monster.
Me into someone who couldn’t exist in small spaces without feeling like death was pressing in.
Maybe we were both ghosts of who we used to be.
The exhaustion hit like a wall. My eyes burned. My body felt disconnected, floating. I’d been kidnapped at gunpoint, nearly murdered, locked in a closet until I’d screamed myself raw, held by the man I used to love while he explained he was undercover. Every cell in my body was done.
“Try to sleep,” he said finally. “Please. Your body needs rest.”
I wanted to argue, but the words wouldn’t come. Despite everything, despite not trusting him anymore—not fully, maybe not at all—my body was shutting down.
I curled slightly toward his warmth, hating myself for the weakness. But survival was stronger than pride. Some primal part of my brain recognized him as safety even though my logical mind screamed otherwise.
Sleep dragged me under like drowning, dark and inevitable.
The last thing I felt was the bed shifting as he turned to watch the door, standing guard over someone he’d already broken once today.
The last thing I heard was his breathing, steady but not quite stable, like he was fighting his own battle with whatever ghosts Coop had created.
Tomorrow, I’d have to pretend to be his property. Tonight, I was just trying to survive being in the same bed with someone I used to trust with my life.