Chapter 32
I make it as far as the paddock fence, when I stop. I grip the top rail with one hand and stand in the fading afternoon light, the mountains going amber at the edges, the horses moving slowly in the far paddock.
I should keep walking and get to the offices, but I can’t.
What just happened with Delilah sinks into me like lead. I grip the wood, hoping it grounds me.
I have to shake it off.
There are things to do. Luther might come tomorrow. I should be in there helping Ava and Enzo, making a plan with the boys, but I feel like someone reached inside my ribcage and hollowed it out.
My chest is painfully tight, and I brace myself on the rail, letting my head drop to breathe through it.
She offered to go back to him.
I keep turning that over. The fact that she sat there with those emerald eyes steady on mine and offered herself up. She called it logic. Called it the only play. As if her safety was a reasonable thing to bargain with. As if it wasn't the only thing in the room that actually mattered to me.
I’m the one who protects. That's been my job. My purpose. I’ve felt that way since I was born, and it only got stronger when Mom died. It’s my identity.
And I realize now, it’s hers, too.
I don't have words for what that does to me.
With my head still hung, I lean back, trying to stretch myself; my muscles are tense.
Delilah is my equal. She’s the only person I've ever met who protects the way I protect — not because someone told her to, but because she couldn't do it any other way.
Looking back on those first days together, it seems foolish that I tried to keep her at bay. Falling for her was inevitable. She burned through all my defenses without even trying.
Until I'm in the grave.
I said that. I meant every word. I can’t live without her now, and I have to find a way through this because now I’ve promised to obliterate Luther’s power by outing myself.
It’s so obvious I need to not only protect her, but also that if anyone should pay for Luther being anywhere near Monarch Hills, it’s me. I signed a deal with the devil.
But if tomorrow Luther comes and I hand myself over, deny him any right to GhostEye or me?
The whole thing is a vicious circle. If I save Delilah by doing the right thing, I can’t have her. I’ll be ruined. Likely jailed for fraud.
Life with Delilah after that isn’t the one I want for her. She’s young. She has her whole life ahead of her.
Footsteps arrive behind me. I know the gait before I turn. It’s Gabriel, coming up from the direction of the houses, heading toward the offices on the path adjacent, but he catches my eye and changes course without breaking stride to stand beside me at the fence.
He doesn't say anything for a moment. He just looks out at the paddock with me.
“Anton texted he’s on his way,” he says.
I don’t answer.
“What’s on your mind, hermano?’
What’s on my mind is how much I care for Delilah. How what my mom told me once is true. When you meet your person, you know. She just left the part out that said you can’t always have them.
But having that conversation with Gabriel right now is a waste of time. We have higher priorities.
“We might have problems here tomorrow,” I say.
Gabriel stares at me steadily, but I’m sure he has a million questions. War has never come to our gates before.
“We’ll figure it out,” he answers, both because he’s a competent ex-Navy SEAL and because he can probably read on my features that I need to hear it. “When Anton gets here, we’ll get a plan in place. She’s not going anywhere she doesn’t want to.”
I open my mouth to answer. Perimeter. Response. Contingency. The words are right there.
But my mind drifts to the last time I fought with a woman, stubborn and fierce like Delilah, also from that world.
Mariana.
She and I argued once about what was right, what was safe, and what came next. Not unlike what just happened with Delilah.
And just like with Delilah, I walked away from Mariana thinking morning would bring clarity.
Morning never came for her at all.
For years I carried guilt about my last moments with Mari and wondered if we hadn’t argued, if I hadn’t let her leave angry, if maybe she’d be somewhere running a vacation rental like she always wanted to.
I let go of the rail and start heading back to my house.
"Go up to the office," I say. "Wait for me there." I'm already ten paces down the path. "I'm gonna grab Delilah so we can plan together.”
Gabriel nods. No questions.
I jog back.
A few minutes later, my house comes into view.
The porch is empty.
I slow my steps without meaning to. There’s a wrongness in the air. My marrow tells me a storm is coming.
Vance should be on that porch. I left explicit instructions before I left — she doesn't go anywhere without you. Those were my exact words.
I take the front steps two at a time and push through the front door.
"Delilah?”
I call her name into the open-plan space, waiting for the sound of her voice to come back and tell me I'm being irrational.
Silence.
Tina's nails click on the stairs — frantic, skittering — and she appears at the bottom of them and launches herself toward me. She's whining, high and insistent, jumping at my leg with a desperation that turns something cold in my chest.
I pick her up, and she’s shaking. Even in my arms, she can't calm down.
Delilah never leaves Tina alone.
She went somewhere she couldn't take Tina. And she didn’t want anyone on this ranch knowing she was leaving.
Fuck.
Fuck.
Fuck.
She went back to Sacramento.
But where the hell is Va…
Just then, my cell buzzes, and as if reading my mind, it’s the absentee bodyguard.
I put Tina down and answer it. “Vance, tell me you have Delilah with you.”
“I…”
The hesitation in his voice spills ice into my veins.
“She wanted a drive and fresh air, and she… left. Like, she ran away.”
Dickhead. You fucking stupid ass, dickhead.
I want to scream at him, but don’t. I need details.
I’ll fire him later.
“Where are you? How long has she been gone?” I bite.
“The gas station on the Five.”
The location confirms my worst fears. That’s the highway out to Sacramento.
I left the house maybe twenty-five minutes ago. I need to give Gabriel and Anton at least ten minutes to suit up.
Luther’s house is on our side of Sacramento. Probably an hour and a half. I’ll need speed and a lot of luck to catch up to her.
I hang up without another word and dial again.
Gabriel picks up before the first ring finishes.
"I need you and Anton in a car. Three firearms, bring vests.” I command. "Front gate. Now."
"What happened?" I hear the gravel crunching beneath his feet; he’s already running.
"She went back to Luther’s.”
"Moving,” he replies. “I see Anton on the path to the office. I’ll grab him.”
I call Enzo next.
"She's gone," I say the second he picks up.
"What?"
"Delilah. She went back to Sacramento." I'm running toward the front gate. “Call Murdock immediately — whatever it takes, whatever she needs. We need to get her moving on that warrant for Marcus’ arrest. Offer whatever she wants from GhostEye for it. Make a deal.”
He starts. “Wait. Tell me what’s…”
"Just do it.”
I hang up.
The front gate is ahead of me, the sun dips behind the mountain now, and the grounds of Monarch Hills are going dark and quiet around me.
Everything I built. Everything I fought for.
Every wall and paddock and outbuilding and carefully constructed piece of the life I made after the one I left behind.
She walked out of it.
For me.
I stop at the gate and wait for the longest seven minutes of my life for Gabriel's truck’s headlights to appear on the path. Anton is in the passenger seat, jacket on, jaw set. Gabriel doesn't speak when I get in the back. He drives.
I look out the window at the dark road ahead and think about the impossible math of it.
She went back to save me. To save GhostEye. To save two women she doesn’t really know. She made herself the instrument of all of it because she couldn't find another way and she trusts me enough to believe I'll finish it all while she waits with the devil himself.
Gabriel and Anton are in this car because they can pull her out. But pulling her out might blow everything she walked in there to do. Delilah is smart. She has a plan.
If I storm Luther’s castle, it might cost the women. Might cost the case. Might cost everything she decided was worth more than her own safety.
She made her choice.
I just can't live with it.