Chapter 19
CHAPTER NINETEEN
THE CALL CAME THROUGH just after noon, after Elvis received a text telling him to expect it. He had been standing near the cabin’s front windows, watching Delaney move slowly across the small clearing while Abe cleaned up breakfast inside and Donovan paced the porch like a caged animal.
Elvis stepped out beside him, closing the door softly behind him. “You know you don’t have to stay, right? I can have one of ours come get you. Get you back to your people; maybe go help her family.”
Donovan stopped pacing long enough to look at him.
Up close, the marshal carried exhaustion the way some men carried scars—quietly and layered with deep beneath discipline.
“She’s my responsibility,” Donovan said. There was no heat in his words, no posturing. It was a simple statement of fact. “That didn’t change because someone smeared her name on a mirror or because you showed up.”
Elvis nodded once. “I get that.”
Donovan’s jaw tightened. “Do you? Because we seem to keep having this conversation.”
Elvis held his gaze, his back stiffening. “Yeah, I do.”
The marshal leaned back against the porch rail, folding his arms across his chest. “I don’t walk away from people under my protection, no matter how hard it gets,” the marshal continued.
“I brought her into this system, helped her learn to deal with disappearing and not drowning in the void she left behind. I’m not handing her off now because it got messy. ”
Elvis exhaled through his nose. “Fair enough. But I think we’re the best chance she has right now.”
The marshal cocked a brow. “Which is the only reason I haven’t pulled her away from you.”
He turned his gaze back out to Delaney, thinking the marshal didn’t have enough manpower to pull her away from him this time. However, he kept that to himself.
For now, anyway.
Delaney had her arms folded tight against her ribs, curls pulled back into a loose knot, and her boots tracing idle patterns in the dirt while she stared at nothing in particular. She looked like someone trying to breathe through history.
Elvis turned when Dane’s face appeared on his phone screen. He looked tired, like he’d been up all night, and with the way things stood, Elvis imagined the man had. When one of them were in trouble, there were no naps.
“Everything there all right?” he asked as soon as the connection went live.
Elvis nodded. “As all right as they can be considering. There?”
Dane ran a powerful hand over his face. “Roman’s airborne and heading back to Obsidian Analytics. I sent Hawk with him just to make sure there were no more surprises. We also gave him a cover story about where Delaney went and why she wasn’t with him.”
He glanced up at Delaney, who had heard Dane’s voice and moved to join him on the porch. When she heard the news about Roman, she exhaled visibly, bobbing her head as she crossed her arms over her chest.
He smiled at her, knowing she needed to hear that bit of good news.
Levi Silvers leaned into the screen. “The summit wrapped up, and boy, that man Raymond was more than eager to have us all out of his hotel.”
“What are you doing with Dane?” Elvis asked. “I thought you’d be back in New Orleans by now.”
“Nah. My brothers went home, but I hung back to harass that sister of mine and Parker before Dane here sent them away on some other case.” Levi shrugged. “The rest will turn around in a heartbeat, though, if we need them.”
Elvis nodded. “Much appreciated.”
The door to the cabin opened, and Abe appeared, wiping his hands with a towel. He must have heard the talking and came to investigate. He moved closer to them, hands on his hips.
Elvis glanced back to Dane. “Blaze called earlier about Serrano’s son. Any updates there?”
Dane shook his head. “Nothing new. He hasn’t surfaced again yet.
However, Blaze finished his digging into what we’re facing and what Carmela Moretti testified against. Or rather who.
” He shook his head. “These people remind me of some criminals we’ve gone up against overseas.
Even with the father in prison, he runs the show and not with a gentle hand.
His son finding the woman who sent him to jail would go a long way to earn him credit in Daddy’s eyes. ”
Delaney stepped closer, and by the intensity on her face, Elvis knew she hadn’t even realized she had moved.
“However, there’s a rumor that Alberto Serrano might have a chance of getting out within the next two years,” Dane said. “Which is probably why the son is trying to earn points.”
Delaney went still, staring at the screen, and Elvis wanted to reach out and reassure her.
“There’s no way that bastard will get out,” Donovan hissed. “There was too much stacked against him.”
“I don’t know what to tell you,” Dane said. “Write your congressman. All I know is what we’ve dug up. And the son is trying to earn extra points while he can.”
Elvis closed his eyes for half a breath. “So they’re wanting Carmela’s head on a pike.”
Dane nodded. “And Son’s running point. Leon works for him now, although I think he might still be in contact with Serrano himself. The son’s been consolidating assets and clearing liabilities. Your second ping wasn’t curiosity; it was verification.”
Delaney swallowed, rubbing her upper arms. “My mother toppled his empire. Didn’t exactly make him a cheerful man.”
Donovan looked over at her. “Don’t worry. Miles is with your family now. They’re secure. They’ll never find them.”
“Good,” Elvis said, looking at Delaney.
Abe finally spoke. “So, it sounds like Serrano wasn’t looking for them, but his son was.”
Dane nodded. “That’s what it looks like. Serrano’s got it made where he’s at. He can call the shots and he owns the prison. The man has it cushy, from what we’ve heard. And Elvis…”
“Yeah?” He felt his brow furrow.
“We got this,” Dane said. “This isn’t a job. It’s family.”
Elvis glanced at Delaney as she stood beside him, chin lifted, her fear still present but no longer leading her. He’d crossed harder lines for worse reasons, but this time, he would cross them for her.
“Understood,” was all he could say back to his boss and friend, emotions clogging his throat.
A heavy silence settled over the porch as Dane finished up the call and Elvis shoved his phone back into his pocket.
Delaney turned away first, her arms still over her chest, aggravation pinching her features.
Elvis watched her as she stepped back down off the porch, tracking her movement like instinct. She walked to the edge of the clearing near where Callen had a fire pit, her boots crunching softly over pine needles. He could see the tightness in her shoulders even through her shirt.
“I’ll be back,” he told the others as he stepped off the porch to follow her.
They walked until the trees swallowed the cabin and the air grew cooler beneath the canopy. Delaney’s gaze remained on the path ahead of her, her silence loud in the quiet forest.
He matched her pace, every sense still scanning his surroundings even as his focus remained on the woman beside him. He didn’t speak, allowing her to think through whatever thoughts churned inside; he merely waited, giving her time while offering his presence.
Eventually, she broke the silence. “Anna took to our having to leave better than I did. I think she was too young to understand why she couldn’t say goodbye to her friends. Too old not to notice when we simply stepped out into the night, leaving almost everything behind.”
She wrapped her arms tighter around herself.
“She lives in Arizona now. Has two kids. Teaches yoga. She still keeps a low profile, even though her husband and kids don’t know it.
They’re happy with their simple, quiet life.
” She shook her head. “I’ve never been that person.
I wanted more, which is why I started my company. ”
Elvis said nothing, simply kept pace with her, his hands in his pockets.
“My parents made an enjoyable life for themselves, staying behind the scenes, enjoying their lives, but I can see how small their world has gotten. My mother still has a fear of sitting near windows, always choosing places near the back.
Her voice cracked as she took a stuttering breath and then steadied.
“I used to think surviving meant adapting.” She stopped walking and turned to face him. “Now, however, I think it just means enduring.”
Elvis reached for her without thinking, his hands settling on her arms as he stared into her eyes. “You’re more than endurance, Delaney,” he said. “You’re still standing. Hell, you’ve even thrived with your business and what you’ve accomplished.”
She searched his face, and he could see the tears pooling at the bottom of her eyes. “You ever tire of fighting?”
He made a slow bob of his head. “All the time.”
Her lips curved faintly. “But you don’t stop.”
“No, because what I fight for is too important to quit.”
She leaned into him then, resting her forehead against his chest. He could feel her breath warming the fabric of his shirt as he wrapped his arms around her.
Closing his eyes, he pulled her closer until there was no space left between them, her body fitting against his like it remembered the shape of him.
Like fifteen years hadn’t passed. Like she hadn’t vanished in the middle of his life and left him standing on a quiet Mississippi sidewalk with a ring burning a hole in his pocket.
The wind moved through the trees, carrying the scent of pine and damp earth, lifting strands of her hair and brushing them across his jaw. He tilted his head, pressing his mouth to her temple first, then to her cheek, slow and deliberate, letting himself relearn the feel of her skin.
She made a soft sound in her throat and turned her face toward him.
Their lips met gently at first. Not rushed or desperate, but more of a quiet, searching kiss that deepened as recognition settled in.
She slid her hands up his chest, curling her fingers into the back of his jacket, pulling him closer as if afraid he might fade if she didn’t anchor him there.
Elvis answered by shifting them back against the rough bark of the nearest tree, one arm braced beside her shoulder, the other wrapped securely around her waist.
He kissed her again, slower this time, pouring every unsaid thing into it: every night he’d wondered where she was, every mile he’d put between himself and memory, the promises he’d never gotten to keep that haunted his memories.
Her body softened against his as her breath shuddered.
When they finally pulled apart, she stayed close, her forehead resting against his, their noses brushing. He could feel her heartbeat through her jacket. It matched his own.
They took her from him once, and there was no way he would lose her again.
“I promise you,” he whispered, his voice threading through the trees, steady even as something fierce rose in his chest. “You’re going to make it through this.”
Her fingers tightened on his jacket. “And after?”
He leaned back, lifting one hand to her hair and smoothing it back from her face, letting his thumb trace the line of her cheek. He couldn’t take his eyes off her as he took in a slow breath. “After, we figure out how to live.”
Her eyes searched his.
He stared back, determination filling him. “You’re not disappearing on me again.”
It wasn’t a question, but more of a promise.
She exhaled, slow and shaky, then tucked herself back into his arms, her face against his collarbone.
Elvis held her there, rocking slightly, breathing her in, memorizing the weight of her, the warmth of her, the quiet courage in the way she pressed herself into him like she’d finally stopped running.
He stood there with her beneath the whispering trees, and the world narrowed to the woman in his arms, already knowing that whatever came next, he would meet it head-on. There was no other choice. He would do it for her. For them. Always.