28. Big Bear
BIG BEAR
Jamie
Chocolate ice cream and a chocolate-brown, curly-haired teddy bear saved me a couple of hours ago.
Man, I loved chocolate. While I prepared for the hit, Enzo had stood in the line of a popular ice cream parlor on Pico.
Said the place had a million TikTok views.
The viral ice cream—which should’ve melted by the time I got into the car—became an alibi when the cops pulled us over.
Enzo had bought the cooler with dry ice for that very reason.
To keep our ice cream cold, as if we had just purchased it.
The lady even asked how much we liked it.
Should’ve gotten her badge number and reported her for wasting my time. I had to get to my girl.
A few miles away from the cabin, a sick feeling twisted my gut. “Enzo, floor it,” I ordered.
“I’m good. The ground is icy.”
“Drive. Faster.”
“ Okay .” His eyes rolled away, and he took the thirty-mile-per-hour winding roads like a pro. “You’re Mr. Protocol. All of a sudden, you wanna get there dead. You got the champagne. I’m sure she’ll wake up and celebrate?—”
“She’s in danger.”
“Your parents?—”
“Focus on the road.” Less than sixty seconds out—with the way the trees flashed in my periphery—I undid my botched Velcro work on Carly’s teddy bear, not caring that I’d pulled enough stuffing out of it that it was now unrecognizable.
Forty-five seconds out, I started to screw my rifle together. “That next turn on your right.”
Enzo twisted the wheel until the tires argued.
Fifteen seconds away, I had the fossil of my .408 CheyTac. No handle or cheek rest. I stared through the Nightforce scope.
“Jamie.” A gravelly tone entered Enzo’s voice.
Still working a round into the chamber, my eyes snapped to a scene that made my blood run cold.
He stopped the F250 just as a man forced himself on top of a girl.
My girl.
Don’t get angry. I opened the door.
Calm . Complete stillness was crucial, particularly given the half-constructed rifle. With a blink of my eyes, I peered through the lens. Exhaled. Took the shot.
The man jerked sideways.
My chest rose and fell. I tossed the rifle to Enzo, who was strolling around the front of my brother’s truck. I walked over wearily, shoving the corpse to the side, picked Jordyn up, and kissed her repeatedly. Each kiss sent shivers through me. “I’m sorry, JorJor. I’m so sorry.”
I expected her to hit me. To get angry. Really angry. And she had every right to. I left her with?—
Wait .
My family had some explaining to do .
“Who is that?” I asked.
“Rocket,” she murmured.
“Look at me.” I took her face in my hands. “You don’t have to be afraid of him anymore.”
Through trembling lips, she murmured, “I know.”
I glanced at the vehicle and the body. Crap . The job was unfinished.
“Take her inside, Jamie.” Enzo seemed to understand what tore me in half. Needing to console her and deal with Rocket.
With Jordyn quiet, cuddled against my chest, I rubbed her back. “Put Rocket in the trunk of his car for now. I’ve got plans for him. And my family. Evidently, they can’t protect one person.”
“Copy.”
As I carried Jordyn to the back deck, she murmured, “These plans, do they have anything to do with a meat tenderizer?”
A shell-shocked gaze I hadn’t seen since knee-deep in war flicked as I glanced down at her.
I’d wanted to break down the walls of Jordyn’s pride and dismantle the fear that lurked underneath when I stole her from Aleksandr Chelomey.
Apathy had shielded her then. Now, the barrier that protected her and kept her numb had broken.
Was this what I wanted? To see her so affected by the crap humans could do?
And what did she mean by a meat tenderizer?
I passed through the sliding glass door and up the stairs.
I shouldered the door to the primary suite open.
Navigating a path between blankets I’d folded on the floor and a smoldering fire in the hearth, I entered the bathroom.
I placed Jordyn on the counter. Her gorgeous dark brown face had lost the glow that had become my treasure once we broke through the barriers of her hatred for me.
Her body trembled—not from the cold, but the aftermath. Shock.
Wild panic didn’t light her eyes. Nothing did. I reached in, planted myself between her legs, and hugged her. Signs of life came from her when she hugged me back. Clung to me like a lifeline.
“My parents should’ve checked the perimeter. They should’ve …” I should’ve done better. For my girl. My girls …
Rebel ? Where was she? Somewhere hiding beneath the stairs? My Rottie wasn’t a people person. But I’d just set eyes on something that made me want to resurrect Rocket and shoot him again.
Blood.
A sticky, red trickle ran between a crack in Jordyn’s bottom lip.
Forcefully, I snatched her face towel from the rack, waited for the water to warm, then rang out the towel.
I pressed the cloth gently to her scraped chin, wiping away the blood with reverence.
Made a silent vow always to keep Jordyn safe and submitted it to heaven.
I then tugged her shirt from over her head and pulled off her pajama pants. Goosebumps ran over her flesh. I hurried to grab another pair of clothes, not wet with snow or soiled with dirt.
“Let’s get you warm.” I took the greatest care of dressing her, then held her close as I carried her into the bedroom.
The dim orange glow flickered across the wooden walls. I placed Jordyn in the bed. Shot Enzo a quick text.
ME
Make yourself at home, bro. Know you’re always hungry, so the kitchen’s all yours. If you find an empty bedroom, take it. If you don’t, my bad.
ENZO
Don’t worry about a bed, fra. If I can’t find blankets, then we’ve got a problem.
Jordyn hadn’t spoken another word. The last thing she mumbled had something to do with a meat tender … At least, that was what I thought she’d said when her voice trailed off mid-sentence. Then it hit me. We had standard and custom weaponry in the military. Mam had her own devices .
I stood in the doorway, torn.
Every part of me needed a shower. Grit lined my skin like a memory—remnants of violence and justice against Hagarty. But I couldn’t make myself leave her.
Not like this.
She lay on the far side of the bed, facing the wall, curled around a pillow like it was the only thing keeping her from unraveling. Her silence screamed louder than any sob. Grief without sound. Wounds without fresh blood.
I tugged into flannel pajamas and hovered awkwardly at the foot of the bed.
Sand. Mud. Concrete. That was where I slept. Where I belonged. Even here, in the comfort of a cabin, I hadn’t claimed a mattress since I was a kid. The Marine warred in me—a true operator denies himself comfort. That still held rank over the rest of me.
Until her voice broke through the stillness.
“Please …”
The sound of that single word cracked something open in my chest.
Her voice was soft. Hollow with the sound of tears.
“I already feel dirty when—when stuff like this happens. I understand I can’t have you until we get married.
I respect that.” Jordyn inhaled shakily as if the next words cost her more than she had to give.
“But if you don’t hold me … that will break me even more than I already am. ”
I didn’t move. Not at first. Jordyn’s words struck deeper than I could brace for.
Because she didn’t ask me to fix anything.
Make the pain go away—truly. Maybe I thought I could do that all this time.
Make the pain go away. She didn’t ask me to prove something.
She asked me to be here. To bear the weight of this moment beside her.
This was true intimacy. The kind no one had taught us when we were trying to survive.
She’d just cracked open the disconnect between us.
The place where she reached for physical reassurances, and I hesitated—not from a lack of love, but from a lifetime of guarding it.
She had learned to equate touch with proof.
With safety. With value. And here I was, loving her with restraint when what she needed most was not distance.
She was trying. Trying so hard to unlearn what others had weaponized against her. And I needed to meet her there without fear of breaking my own vow of celibacy to God.
For the first time in years—since war zones—I, Jamie MacKenzie, slipped beneath the covers. Not as a Marine. Not as her protector.
As her man.
I pulled her into my arms from behind, holding her close. Jordyn’s body responded like a taut thread that finally had a reprieve. She let out a broken breath and curled closer.
She was alive. Safe. In front of me. Right where she belonged. Something in my soul—long dead and probably just as cold as she’d perceived over the past five months—stirred. Awake.
“Thanks. Didn’t mean to be so dramatic.” Her voice was hardly above a whisper. “I dunno. I’m supposed to be used to … this.”
“No!” The side of my fist slammed against the headboard. “No, you’re not supposed to be used to a man trying to rape you! And I’m not supposed to allow this to happen to you, JorJor. It shouldn’t happen.”
Jordyn didn’t speak, but the grip she had on my forearm seemed to say, I know .
“Unfortunately, some truly awful people exist in this world. And I can’t erase them all, but I’ll be damned if I don’t erase the ones who try to take you from me.”
I angled my body just enough to kiss her ear and then whispered, “I will never leave you. I won’t take from you. Listen, stop me if this is the wrong time to say this, but please, don’t confuse my restraint with disinterest.”
“I’m trying not to,” she murmured, burrowing her body against mine. “I’m listening.”
“You already have everything I am, Jordyn. My heart. Loyalty. A promise of a future. I just want to give it to you the right way.”
She turned in my arms, cheeks damp with tears. “I don’t want to ruin this by wanting too much.”
“You’re not ruining anything.”