Chapter 2
Nate
“Most people lie with their words. Some lie with their smiles. Greta? She just lied with silence.”
I’m sitting in my truck across from the diner, hands on the wheel, engine off, the kind of stillness most people can’t sit in. But I’m not most people.
Never have been.
Greta Pine, as her apron name tag says in a curvy little font—waved me off with that bright smile of hers like everything was just peach pie and sunshine.
But something changed.
She was laughing with me one second—hell, I made her laugh, which is not an everyday win—and then she went to bus a table and came back looking like she’d seen a ghost. Skin pale, eyes too wide, shoulders tense in a way that screamed fight or flight—and knowing Greta, she'd rather fight.
I know what that looks like.
I’ve been that.
She tried to cover it. But I don’t miss much, and I never miss that.
So here I sit, windows fogging slightly as the last customers trickle out of Sugar Pine Diner, and Greta locks the front door behind them with that tired little tug she does when she thinks no one's watching.
I’m watching.
And I’m starting to think maybe I should’ve never stopped.
The truth is—I like her.
More than I should. More than I’ve let on. More than I’ve admitted, even to myself. It snuck up on me. Her laugh. Her sass. That gentle way she always adds an extra spoonful of sugar to my coffee like she’s trying to win me over one mug at a time.
Greta’s… soft. Not weak. But warm. Sweet. She’s got curves that make me forget how to breathe some days and eyes that could talk a man into laying down his weapons. But it’s not just her looks that have me watching her now like she might slip through my fingers.
It’s the way she cares. The way she remembers Mr. Canter’s fake nut allergy just so he feels seen. The way she keeps Band-Aids in her apron for the dish boy who’s clumsy as hell. The way she always, always smiles first—even when I know for a fact the world hasn’t always been kind to her.
Which is why it’s bothering me so damn much that something scared her just now—and she won’t say what.
I pull out my phone.
Micah Hunt is one of my oldest contacts. War-brother, tracker, stubborn bastard. If anyone can help me make sense of this… it’s him.
He picks up on the second ring, voice a little gravel, like he was chopping wood and only half cares who’s calling.
“Bishop.”
“Micah,” I say. “I’ve got a favor.”
A pause. “Trouble?”
“Maybe.”
He exhales. “Hit me.”
“It’s Greta Pine. You know she’s been living in Timber Creek for a bit, and always happy. Smiling. Perfect. But today, something shifted. Like someone pulled the rug out from under her. One minute she’s all smiles and sarcasm, the next, she looks like she’s bracing for impact.”
Micah’s quiet. Then, “You think she’s hiding something?”
“I don’t know.” I press my thumb against the wheel. “But I need to. Can you run her?”
“I’ll see what I can dig up. Send me her full name, birthday if you got it.”
“I’ve got her file from when she signed up to volunteer at the center last winter.”
Micah grunts in approval. “Send it. Give me ten.”
We hang up.
I glance back at the diner. Lights still on. Greta’s behind the counter now, wiping something with more focus than necessary. Like scrubbing hard enough might erase whatever just scared her.
I shoot the info over to Micah and wait, tension knotting in my gut.
Exactly eleven minutes later, the phone buzzes.
“Got nothing,” Micah says.
I blink. “What?”
“I mean nothing, nothing. No social under Greta Pine. No address history before Timber Creek. No credit. No old job records, no driver’s license, no car registration, not even a library card. She doesn’t exist. Not under that name.”
“She forged everything?”
“Maybe. Or she got help. But that name’s paper-thin. I can poke deeper, but if she’s running… she had help disappearing.”
I lean my head back against the seat. My instincts were right. She is running.
“Thanks,” I say.
“You think she’s dangerous?”
“No,” I say immediately. “I think someone else is.”
Micah goes quiet again. Then, in that dry way of his, “You like her?”
“Micah—”
“Don’t lie. I can smell it over the phone.”
I sigh. “Yeah. I like her.”
“Then don’t waste time,” he says. “She’s either gonna bolt—or she’s gonna break. You wanna stop either of those, you better get ahead of whatever’s chasing her.”
He hangs up before I can say anything else.
I sit there, phone still in my hand, and stare across the street.
Greta’s framed in the diner window like something out of a snow globe. Warm light. Red lips. Curvy hips that haunt my damn sleep. And eyes—big and brown and guarded—that tell me whatever she’s carrying didn’t start today.
I slide the phone into my jacket and step out of the truck, boots crunching against the thin layer of frost on the pavement.
Whatever’s after her, whoever she’s running from… they’re gonna have to get through me now.
And that?
That’s not gonna happen.