Chapter 30 Calder
Calder
The wire sits heavy in my pocket as I pull up to the house.
I’ve spent the afternoon scrambling, burning through every contingency plan I had in place.
Agent Reese couldn’t move up the full operation.
No backup agents, no coordinated raid, nothing like what we’d planned for the ceremony.
All she could give me was a wire from a dead drop behind the feed store and a promise to be listening.
Agents on standby but definitely nowhere close enough if shit goes to hell. And it will. I can feel it.
It’s not enough. But it’s all I’ve got.
The sun is already sinking toward the mountains, painting the sky in shades of orange and red. Blood colors. I try not to read anything into that.
The porch light is on when I park, warm yellow against the evening shadows.
Saint must have heard the truck because she’s at the door before I reach it, her face pale, her eyes searching mine for answers I’m not sure I have.
She’s been alone all afternoon, waiting, wondering.
I can see it in the tight set of her shoulders, the way she’s holding herself like she might shatter.
“It’s time,” I say.
She nods. She already knows. And I’m glad I told her everything. Prepared her. Family dinner tonight. Bring your wife. The contempt in his voice when he said it still echoes in my head.
“I need to change.” She steps back to let me inside. “Give me fifteen minutes.”
“Take twenty. We can’t be early. Can’t look eager.”
She disappears upstairs, and I move through the house, checking windows and doors.
Habit. Paranoia. The knowledge that everything I’ve been building toward is about to collapse or come together, and I’m not sure which.
At least Kade did a decent job of cleaning up.
Not a speck of blood, only the soft scent of bleach lingers in the air.
The FBI was supposed to be in position. Recording equipment in the barn, agents stationed in the treeline, the whole plan hinged on Roman feeling safe and powerful during the ceremony, drunk on tradition and his own authority.
Not a family dinner. Not tonight. I’ll just have to get him there myself.
Bait him. Send him into a rage if I have to.
But I worry this change means he knows something. Or suspects something. Either way, I can’t walk into that house without insurance.
I pull the wire from my pocket and turn it over in my hands.
Small black box with adhesive backing and a battery that Reese said would last six hours.
It looks like nothing. Feels like everything.
My salvation or my death sentence, depending on how tonight goes.
Saint comes down the stairs twenty minutes later, and the sight of her stops me cold.
She’s wearing the deep red dress that makes her dark blue eyes pop, simple and elegant.
Her hair falls loose around her shoulders, catching the lamplight.
She’s put on makeup, subtle enough to look natural, enough to hide the exhaustion and fear around her eyes.
On her feet are low-heeled boots she can run in if she needs to.
Smart girl.
“You look beautiful,” I tell her.
“I look like I’m walking to my own execution.”
“That too.” I cross to her and cup her face in my hands. Her skin is cold despite the warmth of the house. “I need you to trust me tonight. Whatever happens, whatever he says, don’t react. Don’t give him anything he can use.”
“You’ve told me that before.”
“I’m telling you again.” I hold her gaze, willing her to understand how serious this is. “Roman’s dangerous when he’s in control. He’s worse when he thinks he’s losing it. And right now, I think he suspects he’s losing something.”
“The FBI?” Her voice drops to barely a whisper.
“Maybe. I don’t know what he knows.” The admission costs me. I’m supposed to have answers, supposed to be three steps ahead, supposed to protect her from exactly this kind of chaos. “But I’ll have the wire. Recording everything. If he says anything incriminating, we’ll have it documented.”
“And if he doesn’t? If this dinner is just dinner?”
“Then we eat, we smile, we go home.” I press a kiss to her forehead. “But it won’t be just dinner. Roman doesn’t do casual. There’s a reason he changed the plan.”
She’s quiet for a moment, then pulls back to look at me. “What if something goes wrong?”
“Then you stay behind me. No matter what.”
“Calder…”
“Promise me, Saint.”
She searches my face, and I see the moment she decides to trust me. Despite everything. Despite all the reasons she shouldn’t. “I promise.”
“Good.” I take her hand and lace our fingers together. Her skin is still cold, but her grip is firm. Stronger than it was weeks ago, when she was still learning how to survive in my world. “Let’s go.”
She stops me at the door, hand on my chest. “I love you,” she says. “Whatever happens tonight. Whatever he does. I need you to know that.”
The words hit me somewhere deep all over again. Somewhere I didn’t know could exist in someone like me.
“I love you too.” I press a kiss to her forehead, her hair, the corner of her mouth. “And I’m going to get us through this. Both of us. Together.”
She nods. Squares her shoulders. Lifts her chin like she’s preparing for battle.
Which, in a way, she is.
The drive to the main house takes ten minutes.
Ten minutes of silence, of Saint’s hand gripping mine across the seat, of the setting sun bleeding red across the mountains like a warning. I’ve made this drive a thousand times. Never dreaded it like this.
The main house rises against the evening sky like a fortress.
Three stories of timber and stone, built by my great-grandfather when he first claimed this land.
Every generation since has added to it, expanding the legacy and ensuring the house dominates the landscape, just as the family dominates the town.
I’ve walked through that front door thousands of times, but tonight, it feels different.
Tonight, it feels like walking into an ambush.
Sawyer’s SUV is already here. Kade’s mud-splattered pickup. Levi’s Jeep. All the brothers, summoned just like us. Family dinner after all.
“Stay close to me,” I tell Saint as I kill the engine. “Don’t speak unless he asks you a direct question. If things go wrong, you get behind me and stay there. Understood?”
She nods, face pale but steady. Braver than she should have to be.
We walk up the stone path together, her hand cold in mine. The front door opens before we reach it, and for one terrible moment, I expect Roman himself. But it’s only Elena, my mother, dressed in expensive cream and pearls, looking fragile as spun glass.
“Calder.” She tries to smile but fails. Her hands flutter at her sides before clasping together, a nervous gesture I recognize from childhood. “Everyone’s in the sitting room. Cocktails before dinner.”
“Since when does Roman do cocktails?”
Elena’s eyes flick to Saint, then back to me. Something passes across her face. Warning, maybe. Fear. The same look she used to give me before one of Roman’s “lessons” when I was a boy. Be careful. That’s what her eyes say. Whatever’s coming, be careful.
“Since tonight,” she says. “He’s been planning this for a while.”
Planning. The word sits wrong in my stomach.
“Mom.” I reach for her arm, keeping my voice low. “What’s going on?”
But she just shakes her head, pulls away. “Go. It’s okay. It’ll be okay.”
The sitting room is at the front of the house, a formal space we barely use. Heavy furniture, dark wood, windows overlooking the valley all dark now. My brothers are scattered around the room, drinks in hand, and I can read the tension in every line of their bodies.
Sawyer stands near the fireplace, posture rigid, one hand wrapped around a whiskey he hasn’t touched.
His laptop is nowhere in sight, which means he came here expecting trouble, not business.
Kade paces by the windows, restless energy barely contained, his broad frame casting shadows across the hardwood with each pass.
He looks ready to fight something. Anything.
Levi sits in a leather armchair, leg bouncing, fingers drumming on the armrest. He won’t meet my eyes.
None of them knows why they’re here.
None of them knows about the FBI.
That was always the plan. The less they knew, the safer they’d be if everything went sideways. I’d carry this alone, the way I’ve carried everything else Roman’s asked of me. Except this time, I’m not carrying it for him. I’m carrying it against him.
Looking at my brothers now, at the confusion and barely contained fear on their faces, I wonder if I made the right call. If I’ve just walked them all into a trap they can’t see coming.
“Brother.” Sawyer nods, voice careful. Controlled. “Interesting evening.”
“Know what this is about?”
“No idea.” His eyes cut toward the ceiling, toward Roman’s wing upstairs where the old man keeps his trophies, his secrets. “But he’s been in a mood all day. Whatever it is, it’s big.”
Kade stops pacing long enough to glare at me. “Finally decided to show up?”
“We’re on time.”
“You know how he gets when he has to wait.” His gaze flicks to Saint, dismissive and hostile. He’s never liked her. Never accepted her as family. To Kade, she’s still the witness, the loose end, the problem I should have solved with a bullet instead of a ring.
I don’t rise to the bait. Just guide Saint toward the drink cart, pour her a glass of water, and keep her tucked against my side where I can protect her if I need to. The wire sits heavy in my pocket, not yet applied. I’ll put it on before we go in to dinner.
Levi catches my eye from across the room. Something passes between us. A question. A plea. He’s been trying to get me to open up for weeks now, trying to understand why I’ve been acting strange, why I shut him down every time he asks about the ceremony. I’ve given him nothing.
The guilt of that sits heavy in my chest, right where the wire will soon be.