CHAPTER 32 Declan
The absolute lack of fear in her voice hits me harder than any physical blow.
Let them come.
I stare down at her. Her hands are still resting against my chest, her fingers curled slightly into the fabric of my shirt.
She isn't trembling. The chaotic, defensive auditor who used sarcasm to mask her panic is completely gone.
In her place is a woman who has accepted the reality of my world, and more terrifyingly, accepted her place in it.
I reach up, wrapping my hands around her wrists. I don't pull her hands away. I just hold them, my thumbs pressing into her pulse points. Her heartbeat is steady.
"If they come," I say, my voice a low, rough rumble in the quiet room, "they will not send an extraction team. They will send an execution squad. They will burn this house to the ground to ensure there are no survivors."
"Then we don't let them reach the house," Maeve replies, her dark amber eyes holding mine without a single flinch. "You said this island is a fortress. You have an armory underground that looks like a military surplus store. You didn't buy all of that just to look at it."
I release her wrists, my hands sliding to her waist. I pull her flush against me. The heat of her body is a sharp, immediate anchor.
"I bought it for a contingency," I murmur, my mouth brushing the shell of her ear. "I did not plan on having a variable in the house that I could not afford to lose."
"I'm not a variable anymore, Declan. I'm the reason they're coming." She tilts her head, forcing me to look at her again. "How long do we have?"
I step back, breaking the physical contact before it entirely overrides my operational focus. The transition from the heavy, suffocating intimacy of the bedroom back to the cold logic of a tactical defense is jarring, but necessary.
"If Leo's assessment is accurate, the Russians tracked the ghost protocol back to the dummy LLCs holding the deeds for the island," I explain, walking out of the bedroom and down the hallway toward the living room.
"The cartel will need time to verify the coordinates and assemble a strike team.
They cannot use commercial flights or standard maritime routes without triggering federal radar. "
Maeve follows me, her bare feet silent on the slate floor. "So they have to come in under the radar. Like we did."
"Yes. Fast-movers on the water, or low-altitude helicopters." I stop at the secure terminal, hitting a sequence of keys to bring up the island's topographical map. "Given the distance from the Florida coast and the logistics of moving a heavily armed team, we have approximately forty-eight hours."
"Two days." She crosses her arms over her chest, staring at the glowing map on the screen. "That's enough time to set the trap."
"It is enough time to fortify the perimeter.
" I look at the map, tracing the single, narrow channel through the reef that allows access to the private dock.
"The reef system protects the eastern and southern shores.
The cliffs protect the west. The only viable approach for a maritime assault is the northern beach. "
"And if they come by air?"
"The jungle canopy is too dense for a helicopter to land anywhere except the primary airstrip or the clearing near the caretaker's compound."
I pull the heavy satellite phone from my pocket. I need to initiate the lockdown protocols. I need to arm the external sensors, verify the ammunition counts in the armory, and establish a secure line of sight from the high ground.
But as I look at the phone, a cold, heavy realization settles in the center of my chest.
I am preparing to fight a war on my own territory. I have the high ground. I have the weapons. I have the tactical advantage.
But I am only one man.
If the cartel sends a coordinated, multi-directional assault—a maritime breach on the north beach simultaneous with an airborne drop at the airstrip—I cannot cover both access points. I will be forced to choose which perimeter to defend, leaving the other completely exposed.
And if they breach the perimeter, they reach the house.
They reach her.
I set the phone down on the desk. The metallic clack echoes sharply in the quiet room.
"What's wrong?" Maeve asks, her eyes darting from the phone to my face. She reads the micro-expressions I usually keep buried. She knows when the math doesn't balance.
"The tactical spread is too wide," I state, my voice flat. "I cannot defend the beach and the airstrip simultaneously. If they split their forces, I will be outflanked."
"So we need more people."
"I burned the firm, Maeve. My operatives are scattered, their contracts voided. The only person I trust who is currently off the grid is Leo, and Leo is not a combat asset."
Maeve frowns, her brow furrowing as she stares at the topographical map. Her fingers tap a rapid, nervous rhythm against her arm. She is processing the variables, applying the same chaotic, brilliant logic she used to dismantle Evans's ledger.
"You said the caretaker's compound is fortified," she says slowly.
"It is a reinforced concrete bunker. It can withstand small arms fire and low-yield explosives."
"But it's located near the airstrip." She points to the map, highlighting the small clearing on the southern edge of the island. "If they land a helicopter there, the compound is the first thing they hit."
"Yes."
"So we don't defend the airstrip," she concludes, looking up at me. "We let them land."
I stare at her. "If we let them land, they establish a beachhead. They will have a staging area to coordinate the assault on the main house."
"Not if the staging area explodes."
The absolute, cold pragmatism in her voice is staggering. She isn't suggesting a tactical retreat. She is suggesting a massacre.
"You want to rig the airstrip," I say, the dark, violent logic of the plan clicking into place.
"You have C4 in the armory," Maeve points out, walking closer to the desk. "I saw the crates when we were down there. If we wire the clearing and the caretaker's compound, we can trigger the charges remotely from the main house. If they land a helicopter, we blow the entire southern grid."
"That eliminates the airborne threat," I agree, my mind already calculating the blast radius and the necessary wiring sequences. "It forces the surviving operatives to navigate the jungle on foot, slowing their advance and funneling them into a predictable choke point."
"Which leaves you free to defend the northern beach," she finishes.
I look at her. The oversized t-shirt is slipping off her shoulder again. She looks soft, exhausted, and entirely out of place in a conversation about high-yield explosives. But the fierce, uncompromising intelligence in her eyes is the sharpest weapon in this house.
"It is a viable strategy," I murmur, reaching out to pull the collar of the shirt back up over her shoulder. My knuckles brush against her warm skin, a brief, grounding contact. "But it requires me to spend the next twelve hours wiring the southern grid. You will be alone in the house."
"I'll lock the doors. I'll monitor the thermal cameras." She steps into my space, her hands resting flat against my chest. "I'm not going to break, Declan."
"I know you aren't."
I lean down, pressing a hard, brief kiss to her mouth. It is a seal. A confirmation of the partnership.
I pull back, grabbing the satellite phone off the desk.
"Lock the doors behind me," I instruct, turning toward the hallway leading to the armory stairs. "Do not open them for any reason until you see my face on the camera feed."
"Declan."
I stop at the edge of the hallway, looking back over my shoulder.
She is standing by the desk, her arms crossed over her chest. The morning sun catches the dark amber of her eyes.
"Don't blow yourself up," she says, her voice lacking its usual sarcastic edge. It is a genuine plea.
"I'll be careful," I promise.
I walk down the stone steps into the armory. The heavy steel door clicks shut behind me, the biometric lock engaging automatically.
The armory is cold, smelling of gun oil and old dust. I walk past the racks of rifles and handguns, heading directly for the heavy, olive-green crates stacked against the back wall.
I pry the lid off the first crate. Inside, packed in dense foam, are blocks of C4 plastic explosive and a spool of electronic detonator wire.
I spend the next hour prepping the charges, attaching the blasting caps and calculating the necessary yield to level the caretaker's compound and crater the airstrip.
The mechanical, repetitive work is a relief.
It requires absolute focus, leaving no room for the suffocating, possessive panic that spikes every time I think about the cartel reaching her.
I load the charges into a heavy tactical backpack, sling it over my uninjured shoulder, and leave the armory through the secondary tunnel that connects directly to the jungle path.
The heat outside is brutal. The humidity clings to my skin, soaking my t-shirt within minutes. I navigate the dense foliage quickly, my boots silent on the damp earth.
It takes twenty minutes to reach the southern clearing.
The airstrip is a long, narrow stretch of cracked asphalt, surrounded by towering palm trees. At the far end, the caretaker's compound sits silent and dark.
I drop the backpack near the edge of the tarmac and get to work.
I plant the first series of charges along the centerline of the runway, burying the C4 in the deep cracks in the asphalt and running the detonator wire into the thick undergrowth. If a helicopter touches down, the blast will shatter the landing skids and ignite the fuel tanks instantly.
I move to the compound. I wire the heavy iron gate, the concrete support pillars, and the diesel generator shed.
The work is tedious and physically demanding. My left shoulder throbs, a dull, persistent ache that radiates down my bicep, but I ignore it. I run the primary detonator line back into the jungle, burying it beneath a layer of dead leaves and dirt, tracing it all the way back to the main house.
By the time I finish, the sun is beginning to set, casting long, bloody streaks of orange and red across the sky.
I connect the final wire to a secure, remote detonator box hidden beneath the wooden deck of the main house. I flip the safety switch. The small LED light glows green.
The southern grid is live.
I walk up the wooden steps to the glass doors. I look up at the small security camera mounted under the eaves.
A second later, the heavy deadbolts click open.
I slide the glass door open and step into the air-conditioned cool of the living room.
Maeve is sitting at the terminal. The screens are displaying the live feeds from the island's thermal cameras. She looks up as I walk in, her eyes dropping immediately to the dirt and sweat covering my clothes.
"It's done," I say, dropping the heavy backpack onto the floor. "The airstrip and the compound are wired. If they land on the south side, they die."
She lets out a long, slow breath, leaning back in the leather chair. "The thermal grid is clean. No boats on the horizon. No low-altitude aircraft."
"They won't come tonight," I state, walking toward the kitchen to wash the dirt off my hands. "They need time to mobilize. Tomorrow night is the most probable window."
I turn the tap on, scrubbing my hands with harsh soap.
"So we have twenty-four hours," Maeve says from the living room.
I turn the water off and dry my hands on a towel. I walk back into the living room, stopping behind her chair. I look at the thermal feeds on the monitor. The island is completely dark, a solitary black mass surrounded by the cold blue of the ocean.
"Yes," I murmur, my hands resting on her shoulders. "We have twenty-four hours."
She leans her head back against my stomach, looking up at me upside down. The exhaustion is back in her eyes, but the fear is gone. She trusts the trap we built. She trusts me.
"What do we do until then?" she asks softly.
I slide my hands down her arms, my fingers wrapping around her wrists. I pull her gently out of the chair, turning her around to face me.
The adrenaline of the day—the explosives, the tactical planning, the sheer physical exertion—fades instantly, replaced by the heavy, suffocating gravity of her presence.
"We wait," I say, my voice dropping to a rough whisper.
I lean down, kissing her. The taste of her completely overrides the smell of dirt and C4. She wraps her arms around my neck, pulling me closer, her body pressing flush against mine.
We have twenty-four hours before the world burns.
And I intend to spend every single second of it reminding her exactly what we are fighting for.
**