Chapter 17
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
ELVIS GLANCED IN THE rearview mirror, noticing the fear that pinched Delaney’s features as she stared at the man on the porch. “He’s with us,” he assured her.
“You’re just full of surprises, aren’t you?” Donovan growled.
“Yeah, well, someone got to Roman with a hotel full of security,” Elvis said without apology.
“And I wasn’t planning on taking any chances.
” He gestured to the man on the porch. “His name’s Christopher Powers, Abe to his friends.
He’s also a SEAL we’ve worked with before, and he just happened to be in the area. ”
Abe stood at the edge of the porch, his stance relaxed, hands loose at his sides, weight shifted back on one heel like someone who knew how to wait without advertising it. The porch light caught the edge of the man’s jaw as a smile slipped across his face.
“Do you have any more of these… surprises for us?” Delaney asked with a sigh. “Because I’m about surprised out.”
Elvis chuckled. “For now, this is it. Come on. I’m sure you’re ready to get out of this car.”
He popped his door open and waved at the man on the porch. “Abe, good to see you.”
“You as well,” Abe said as the others slid out of the car. “Although I didn’t expect company when Callen let me borrow the place for some much needed R&R.”
Elvis glanced back toward Delaney as she eased out of the backseat, her hand still on the door.
She looked exhausted, but he could see the adrenaline keeping her going, using the door as a shield.
She appeared like the night might reach in and take her, and he didn’t blame her after everything that had happened that day.
“Did he give you a heads up about what’s going on?” Elvis asked as he stepped back to stand at Delaney’s side. Donovan closed his door and simply waited to see what to do next.
Abe nodded. “Yeah, he told me. Said to keep the coffee hot and the perimeter clear. And to make sure I didn’t drink all the good stuff.” His mouth tilted. “Also said you’d probably arrive wound tighter than piano wire.”
Elvis snorted under his breath. “Sounds like Callen.”
Abe’s gaze slid from Elvis toward Delaney, and his tone softened. “And I assume this is the lovely lady who’s had a terrible day?”
Elvis nodded as he glanced down at Delaney, wanting nothing more than to reach out and take her in his arms, wrapping her in his protection.
Abe said nothing else. That was the thing with genuine friends—you didn’t need explanations when the answers screamed from someone’s posture.
“Well, coffee’s on,” Abe said as he waved them inside. “Let’s get everyone out of the night and into the warmth of the cabin. There’s food, too, in case anyone’s hungry.”
Elvis placed his hand on the middle of Delaney’s back. “It’s all right. You’re safe here. Let’s get you some rest.”
She nodded and then let him escort her inside, the marshal bringing up the rear.
Inside, the cabin smelled faintly of cedar and old smoke, remnants of a hundred quiet weekends and probably a few badly kept secrets.
Abe gave them a quick rundown of the layout, pointed out the back exit, the narrow trail leading down toward the creek, and the ridgeline that offered visibility if anyone got too curious in the woods.
Elvis remembered what had happened there with Callen, Meaghan, and the kids in their care, how those looking to kill Meaghan had found the cabin and shot Callen, how Meaghan helped get him and the kids out of there and to another safe house Blaze had found for them.
However, that was a story for another time.
Delaney didn’t need to hear how one set of bad guys had found the place once already.
She needed to feel safe for a while so that she could relax and catch her breath.
Abe then left them to it, retreating to the spare room with the bunk beds on the far side of the cabin, with a promise to take second watch later.
Elvis locked the front door as he heard Abe’s door close. He then turned and stood there for a moment, allowing the silence to settle around him like a soothing balm.
Delaney set her bag down slowly, as if sudden movement might shatter whatever fragile balance was holding her together. Donavon, still having said nothing since they arrived, headed for the coffee.
“You okay?” Elvis asked her.
She nodded, though it looked more like habit than truth. “Just tired.”
He wanted to tell her rest was mandatory.
That she didn’t have to carry everything alone anymore because he was there to carry it for her.
Instead, he said, “There are clean towels in the bathroom in case you want to take a hot shower, and Abe stocked the fridge. It might be good to get something in your belly.”
She gave him a small smile. “You always take care of logistics first?”
He gave a weak shrug. “Force of habit. Sorry.”
She made a slow bob of her head. “I think I’ll take that shower first.”
She disappeared into the bathroom, and Elvis waited until he heard the lock click before he moved.
Old instincts took over, and he checked the windows to make sure they were locked and then tested the back door to make sure it was secure.
Donovan stood near the front door, jacket off, sleeves rolled up, posture rigid with the vigilance that someone in their line of work never shut off. The badge clipped to his belt caught the lamplight when he shifted, reminding Elvis why the man was even there.
“I’m going to take a walk around the perimeter,” Elvis said.
Donovan’s gaze lifted as he cocked a brow, his look assessing the situation. “You think they tracked us here?”
“I don’t know,” Elvis said. “But I always like to prepare for the worst and be thankful when it doesn’t arrive.”
That earned him the faintest nod before the marshal turned back to the fire. “I’ll stay inside,” the marshal told him. “Keep eyes on the doors.”
Elvis moved closer, lowering his voice out of instinct, rather than necessity. “If anything moves out there, I want to see it before it sees her. And just so you know, Callen and his father set up a bunch of traps out there. Some may still be operational, so be careful if you go wandering.”
Donovan studied him for a long moment, the weight of federal authority in his stare. “You actually care about her still.”
It wasn’t a question, and Elvis didn’t bother pretending otherwise. “Yeah, I do.”
“I know she cared about you back then,” Donovan told him, his tone shifting from official to personal. “I saw the file. High school sweethearts, talks of marriage. Clean kid. Good grades. Football and shop class. She wrote about you once in a psych eval when they first placed her family.”
That stopped Elvis cold. “She what?”
Donovan simply nodded as he slipped his hands to his hips. “She said you were the only thing she hated leaving.”
The words landed like a fist to his heart.
“But here’s the thing,” Donovan continued. “My responsibility is to keep her breathing. That’s my job, and I’ve done it for fifteen years. I don’t intend to lose her now because she lets her emotions make the decisions.”
Elvis stepped closer, not confrontational, but firm enough that the air shifted between them. He cast a quick glance to the bathroom door and then looked back to the marshal. “With respect, your job is paperwork and procedure and moving her when things get loud.”
Donovan’s eyes narrowed, a menacing expression pinching his face.
“My job,” Elvis continued before the man could say anything, voice steady and low, “is making sure nothing gets close enough to get loud in the first place.”
A moment of silence passed as they stared at each other.
“You think you can do that better than the U.S. Marshals?” Donovan asked.
“I think I’ll do whatever it takes, whereas you have lines you can’t cross.”
Donovan searched his face, looking for bravado, for recklessness.
He would find neither. Just grim determination.
“It might be your job,” Elvis whispered, “but she’s my heart. I don’t care what badge you carry. If someone comes for her, I’ll step in between them and make it their worst fucking day.”
The words weren’t dramatic. They were simple facts.
Donovan held his gaze for a long second, then gave a slow, measured nod. “Just don’t get in my way.”
Elvis’s mouth twitched without humor. “Wouldn’t dream of it.”
He stepped outside, the night air cool against his skin, the weight of what he’d just admitted settling deeper in his chest.
Then he moved off the porch to walk the perimeter of the property, his steps quiet and his senses sharp.
As he walked, he cataloged shadows, memorized sightlines, and marked places where sound traveled differently beneath his boots.
He hadn’t lied to the marshal when he told him of Callen’s traps, but the men who went after Callen and Meaghan had triggered most of them.
And now that he knew the rest were there, he knew what to keep an eye out for.
The forest pressed close around the cabin, dense and watchful, branches knitting overhead like ribs. Somewhere in the distance, something rustled through underbrush, and Elvis paused long enough to determine it was an animal and not human.
Satisfied that everything was all right, he headed back toward the cabin, but just as he reached the porch steps, his phone vibrated in his pocket. He paused long enough to pull his phone out, noticed Blaze’s name on the screen, and swiped to answer.
“What’s up, Hound Dog?”
“Please tell me you weren’t asleep,” the younger man said, voice low but charged with an energy that told Elvis the kid was probably on his third energy drink. “I forgot you all are an hour ahead of us when I called.”
“Well, if I was, you just ruined it. I take it you have something for me?”
A soft exhale crackled through the line, followed by the faint clicking of Blaze tapping on his computer. “I’ve been running patterns off the Gulf Coast chatter since you left Biloxi, looking into things tied to Serrano’s shell accounts. It’s messy, but there’s movement.”
“Define movement.”
“Mobile. Gulfport. Pensacola. Small cells. Two, maybe three at a time. Nothing loud, mind you. No big plays to mention. It’s more just positioning, getting things ready, digging into the search. And it all lines up with the pings on her name. They know she’s here. Or at least that she was.”
“So he’s casting a wider net, hoping to turn up something.”
“Looks that way. The good news is they don’t know where she is yet, only that she’s resurfaced.”
Elvis dragged a hand across his jaw, eyes tracing the tree line again. The cabin sat quiet behind him, Delaney probably still in the shower, Abe asleep, and the marshal watching the doors and probably still staring at the fire.
He sighed as he leaned on the porch railing. “So now that they’ve found her, they won’t stop.”
“I wouldn’t bet on it. If anything, they’ll dig even deeper.”
“All right. Keep digging. Let me know if anything changes or if you hear chatter showing they’ve picked up our trail.”
“You got it. I’m also creating some false trails. Dropping hints that she went northwest. See if that’ll buy you some time.”
“You always were my favorite genius,” Elvis said with a chuckle.
“I won’t let Tex know you said that. Talk soon.” And then the line went dead.
When he finally stepped back inside, Delaney was already asleep, curled on the right side of the bed with her knees drawn up, one hand tucked beneath her cheek, and her dark hair spilling across the pillow.
The lamp beside the bed cast a soft light over her face, and for a moment he just stood there, chest tightening at the sight of her.
Fifteen years.
Fifteen years of not knowing if she was even alive.
Of imagining her in crowds, in passing cars, in dreams that ended the same way every time—with her turning away just before he could reach her.
He shook his head and pulled the door closed, returning to the main room where Donovan had found the whiskey bottle and had already poured a glass.
“If you want, take one of the other beds in the room with Abe,” he told the marshal. “I’ll take first watch and wake you when it’s your turn.”
“You sure?”
Elvis nodded. “Yeah. Kind of too wired to sleep right now, anyway.”
The marshal nodded and then made his way to the second bedroom. “Don’t forget to wake me.” And then he was gone.
Elvis moved to stoke the fire a little, just to have something to do, and then he glanced over his shoulder at the door to Delaney’s room, a soft smile toying at his lips.
And for the first time since she had vanished, the world felt solid beneath him.
As he turned back to the fire, he accepted something with quiet certainty.
If Serrano came for her or if anyone attempted to take her from him again, he would burn the world down around them just to keep her safe.
And he wouldn’t hesitate.