Fighting For You (Veterans of Silver Ridge #4)

Chapter 1

CHAPTER ONE

Jess

A n ember of rage smoldered in my belly. I gritted my teeth against the rising fury and maintained my neutral face because I could see where this was heading and any attempt to change it would be an attempt to stop a runaway train with a high five.

The meeting had started normally enough—a recap of all assignments each Saint Security employee had been tasked with and looking ahead at the rest of the final quarter of the year in broad strokes. But quickly enough, we’d arrived here… to the doom.

And the only other person in the room who should be as infuriated as I was stood coolly in the corner like an inert Goliath with a case of resting jerk face.

“There’s not much wiggle room here while Eddie’s travel starts Thursday. Cookie’s down for at least another seventy-two hours with the flu, Tristan’s out of town, and we’ve got just about everyone else tasked. So Pop and Beast, you two will head to Snowberry Resort and run the op for Ms. Halter.”

The buzzing in my mind went quiet when Bruce’s words hit the room. Or maybe that was the pin-drop silence shrouding the conference table. Could’ve been the feeling of every person in attendance shifting their attention not-so-subtly to me.

Adam cleared his throat lightly and spoke up. “Are we sure there’s no?—”

“No. It’s the plan we’ve got. Beast has agreed to the out-of-town assignment.” Bruce’s gaze flicked up to meet Beast’s, who grunted with arms crossed. “And that’s what we’re going with so we can get this place vetted.”

He set his hands on his hips and exhaled, waiting a beat before taking us all in. Eight of us sat around the conference table in the Saint Security main office, and he stood at the far end in front of the screen where he’d been clicking through his all-hands brief.

We did this every Monday morning, and mostly, it served to get us all on the same page. They kept it short since we all had work to do. Today felt like a particularly quick one compared to last week’s when they’d doled out assignments not only for the next few weeks, but who we’d be tasked with guarding during the upcoming Silver Ridge film fest.

Typically, these meetings didn’t elicit the feeling of acid burning my trachea. Generally, I didn’t experience much in the way of emotions here beyond interest or light satisfaction with an assignment.

Unless he was here, hulking and grunting in a corner.

He always stood. He was six foot six-but-might’ve-been- a-thousand inches of disgruntled man-child who refused to behave like a normal human and speak in complete sentences. And yes, some people did have legitimate reasons for limited speech. But I’d met Jude Rawlins aka Beast a decade ago and he hadn’t had a problem stringing together a few phrases to say what he needed then.

Somehow, while the rest of us were growing and changing and rolling with the punches of life, Jude had devolved into a literal brute of a human being… at least when it came to me.

Actually, no. He made sounds of agreement or refusal rather than speak words in meetings or with his friends… it wasn’t just me.

Bruce had moved on to review assignments for the film fest, checking in with those who’d teleconferenced in from Europe and Asia, but my mind circled the situation he’d just shoved me into.

“If anyone needs anything, I’ve got a half hour in my office before I have another meeting. Otherwise, have a great week and see anyone who can make it for drinks on Friday.”

He double-tapped the conference table between where Kenny and Eddie sat at the far end, then gathered his notebook and coffee mug and exited the room as everyone else slowly stood and stretched.

Wilder left right after him, and I didn’t bother pretending I wasn’t crawling out of my skin to speak with them.

“Can I talk with you?” I asked, jogging to catch up with the two men—my fellow former EMU soldiers and now my bosses.

Wilder sent me an inspecting glance, then notched his head toward Bruce’s office. I followed them in and shut the door. Bruce took a seat behind his desk, and Wilder leaned against the file cabinet to the left. I stood behind the seat I should’ve taken but didn’t, given how I didn’t want to feel like the smallest or shortest person in the room about now.

Eddie and I were, by far, the shortest people in the office. A few others fell under six feet, but somehow, every man here had ended up drinking from the tall guy well.

“Go ahead, Pop,” Bruce urged, his voice pleasant and measured as always.

I hadn’t thought about what I would say, but I wouldn’t let the fury that’d built a little pyre in my chest explode. I had self-control, and I would use it.

“I think you both know why I’m here.”

Bruce nodded immediately, and Wilder dipped his chin.

Dang it, I’d hoped they’d give me a little more… something. A hint about alternatives, something.

Since I’d signed on with them a little over a year ago, I’d made clear I couldn’t work with Beast. We had too much ugliness in our past, and though I hated to admit it, I genuinely couldn’t stand to be around him. He’d also made clear he felt the same way, never backing down, dropping snide comments, and generally acting like the beast he was named after whenever we were near each other.

But he’d signed with them first. So when I got my contract, they’d made sure I understood he was already employed, and he didn’t plan to travel. I hadn’t fully absorbed this until last spring when I got sent on a five-month assignment overseas after telling them I couldn’t be near Beast.

Problem was, I didn’t want to keep getting sent away. I’d discovered a love for this town, and I had friends here—real, actual female friends who loved me. Me .

They weren’t brothers and sisters in arms who cared about me the way these men did—out of a shared history of duty and honor. No, these women were my friends because we had interests in common and by now, we’d been through a few things together. We’d chosen each other instead of being assigned, and I didn’t want to leave that again—at least not for months at a time.

So I’d decided to play ball—to suck it up and not complain about Beast.

We’d avoided each other quite effectively the last while. But now?

“I don’t understand how this happened,” I tried, wishing they’d clarify how they’d assigned me and the one person I couldn’t work with on a TDY trip together.

Wilder simply waited while Bruce explained.

“We’ve been over the scheduling issue. You were supposed to take this one with Cookie, but he’s sick, and he’s really sick, so we’re not going to task him with a weekend trip when he’s barely recovered.”

“Sure, that’s fine. But him?” They knew who I meant. “I thought he didn’t travel.”

Wilder’s eyes flicked to Bruce, then back to me. “His circumstances have changed, and he was available this weekend.”

I ground my teeth together, my jaw aching. “And he can’t switch with… anyone? Adam? Kenny? No one has flexibility?”

Bruce took a beat, assessing me in that way he did when he meant business. Bruce was all charm and charisma and nice guy boss, but when you got down to it, he was a trained killer with excellent managerial skills. This expression—the origin of his nickname, Jaws, and the dead-eyed shark look—meant I was unlikely to love what came next .

“Gotta tell you, we need you to roll with us on this. We’ve done everything we can to respect your boundaries, but we’ve arrived at a point where we need you to both handle your issues and function as a part of the team.”

Something sharp jabbed at me, but I stayed quiet as he continued.

“You have history—we know this. Don’t know all the details and frankly, we don’t need to. What we do want is for Saint Security to do what we are contracted to do—and in this case, it means sending a couple undercover to vet this resort before we take our A-list client, who has been severely harassed at similar locations recently, and expose her to a bad situation. After reviewing the schedule, this is the way we can make it work. If you’re telling us you can’t or won’t do this, we will take that under consideration. But we are asking you, as a professional, to please keep in mind we are trying to run a business and take care of our people, and this is what we came up with.”

My heart sank low, low, low. Bruce and Wilder weren’t all that much older than me, but they’d felt like older brothers for a long time now. Their disappointment stitched into me, a needle puncturing in and reemerging, the thread pulling through the small wound at the hint of pleading in his words.

Was this an ultimatum? Were they really saying that if I didn’t go pretend to be Beast’s wife on this mission, I wasn’t a team player? They deeply valued the quality. Were they hinting at the end of my time here if this caused more trouble than it was worth?

Every strong, independent part of me shriveled up at the thought. All my justifications and anger fled, and I caved in seconds. “No. I’m not saying I can’ t. Or won’t. I’m just… I just wanted to make sure there were no alternatives.”

The clocks on Bruce’s walls showing different cities around the world tick-tick-ticked.

“Not this time.”

I nodded, accepting it. “Okay, then. I’m in. And I’ll… we’ll handle it.”

“Good.”

I nodded again and slipped out, hating the crush of embarrassment coating my insides, instantly replacing the anger I’d felt so righteously earlier.

Maybe they weren’t giving me an ultimatum, but they needed me to step up. And wasn’t it time I got my crap together and stopped acting like Jude Rawlins had any say in my life? Was I going to let his grunting bad attitude jeopardize my place at a job I loved with a group of people who’d become like family to me?

Absolutely not.

I pushed down the hallway, encountering the thorn in my side in question as I went. He towered in my path—an actual beast of a man looking like he should be flipping giant tires for a living—and stared at me through his dark eyes. His hair had grown out lately and he looked, well, now that I’d actually taken in his face, he looked remarkably disheveled.

Typically, I avoided looking in his direction because his massive form only sent me into a rage spiral, but when I’d glanced at him, he typically had buzzed hair, or at least cut very short. Now, it’d grown unruly over his ears and flopped into his eyes. His usual close-trimmed stubble had become a full-on beard.

Still, it didn’t hide the cruel twitch of his lips. Never a smile or anything civil like it. Just a little speck of movement holding back criticism or judgement or plans to eat babies—whatever to-dos misanthropic giants made in their spare time.

The fury that’d bloomed during the meeting and withered in the face of my bosses jumped right back to the front lines, burning a literal path from my chest right up my throat. “Are you seriously going to block me right now?”

Inevitably, he grunted—in response? In greeting? In protest of my existence?

Something sizzled in my gut, the low smolder turning to a flame of anger. He was the problem. All the bad feelings between us? They came from his choices and his way of handling things in the past.

But that’s where they’d stay. I wasn’t going to open up our history and let those memories suck me in, even if they did try nightly these days. I huffed audibly, out of words or the ability to express myself.

Maybe I should try grunting.

He dropped one of his gigantic hands and gestured like I was welcome to move past him, but there was sarcasm in the movement, impossible though it might sound.

I’d never know what he meant by it, and such was the problem with grunting as a first line of communication. Not that I actually wanted to know what he thought or would say when he deigned to open his mouth. Though there’d been a time…

No.

Today, now, I didn’t want anything from him.

I slipped past him without touching, breathing through the overwhelming urge to scream into a pillow.

Back in my office, I shut the door and leaned against it, closing my eyes against the world. The smooth wood panel met my shoulder blades. My grapefruit candle I never burned still gave off the fresh scent. The beat of my heart pulsed in my ears.

I can handle Jude Rawlins, grunts and all.

I would prove it to myself and everyone here.

Beast though he may be, at his heart, he was just another man.