Chapter 10
CALEB
The problem with calm was that it could make a man forget. Not all at once. It happened in small moments between the stress. Like a laugh that wasn’t forced or a deep breath that doesn’t feel borrowed. Or a morning spent sipping coffee without constantly counting exits and angles and blind spots.
The ranch had been doing that to me for three days.
It wasn’t that I’d stopped watching. I never stopped watching.
I walked the perimeter at dawn and again at dusk.
I checked gates, radios, and sightlines.
I watched trucks I didn’t recognize pass on the county road and logged the plates.
But routine had settled in around us, steady as a heartbeat.
Lucas had found a rhythm with the horses and the men who knew how to make him feel useful without making him feel small. He’d started smiling in a way that didn’t look like a defense mechanism.
Marisol had started studying on the porch with her laptop and a yellow legal pad.
She’d sit with her hair up and her face set in that stubborn, determined way that made me admire her and want to carry her back inside.
She was building a future in her mind… one that probably didn’t have a place for me.
I stood in the yard watching her do it, a quiet kind of pride settling in my chest that I didn’t have words for. That was the dangerous part. Hope made a man soft. Hope made me miss things.
So on the morning she told me she wanted to go into town to check out the hospital and the school, I didn’t argue. I didn’t try to talk her out of it. I didn’t pretend I could keep her locked behind a fence and call it protection. I just tightened the net.
She met me on the porch a little after eight, dressed in jeans and a plain button-down shirt that made her look younger than she was and tougher than anyone who didn’t know her would ever guess.
Her hair was down, shiny and loose, and she had her folder tucked under her arm like she was going to a normal appointment in a normal town.
She looked at me and lifted her chin. “I’m not changing my mind.”
“I’m not asking you to,” I said.
Her eyes narrowed, suspicious. “Okay.”
“You go. I go with you. We do what we need to do. Then we come home.”
“I can walk into a building by myself,” she said.
“You can,” I agreed. “And you will. I’m not sitting in the waiting room holding your hand.”
That earned me a flash of a smile, quick and reluctant. Then it faded. “Lucas…”
“He’s with Mae,” I said. “Owen’s staying close. He’ll be fine.”
She exhaled slowly, like she’d been holding that worry in her lungs all morning. “Okay.”
She started down the steps, and I caught her wrist gently, just enough to stop her. “Listen to me for a second.”
Her gaze lifted to mine.
“No wandering,” I said. “No detours. If I tell you to move, you move. If I tell you to get down, you get down. You don’t argue with me in the middle of a street.”
Her jaw tightened. “I’m not a child.”
“I know.” I let my thumb press once against the inside of her wrist, where her pulse fluttered fast and steady. “You’re also not bulletproof.”
Something shifted in her expression, softening into that look she got when reality slid past pride.
“All right,” she said quietly. “I hear you.”
Reluctantly, I released her wrist and led the way to the truck.
Outside the gate, Brody was already in his truck, posted on the road with the dog in the back seat.
He’d drive a separate tail, staying far enough back not to spook anyone, close enough to hit the gas if we needed him.
Kane was in town, staged near the school with eyes on the street. Mae knew the plan down to the minute.
I didn’t like taking Marisol off the ranch. Even though we’d already been into town once and didn’t have any trouble, I didn’t like taking her into a public place where I couldn’t control every variable. But I liked the idea of her building a life even less if it meant she had to do it alone.
We drove in silence for a while, the cab filled with the low hum of the tires and the wind against the window.
Marisol stared out at the fields and fence lines like she was trying to imagine a version of her life where this wasn’t happening.
A version of her life that didn’t include radios and patrols and men with scars.
She glanced at me. “You’ve done this before.”
“Yeah,” I said.
“Assignments,” she said, her voice careful. “Clients.”
“Assets,” I corrected automatically, then regretted it when I saw her flinch.
Her mouth pressed into a line. “Right.”
I gripped the wheel tighter. “I didn’t mean…”
“It’s fine,” she said quickly. Too quick. “I get it. It’s your job.”
It was. And it wasn’t. I wanted to tell her I’d never taken a job that lived in my chest the way she did.
I wanted to tell her she wasn’t a file on a laptop.
She wasn’t a case to be closed. She was a woman who made my blood run hot and my instincts go feral, and I’d been trying not to scare her with the truth of that since the day she opened her front door and offered me iced tea.
Instead, I said, “We’ll get this done.”
Her fingers tightened around her folder. “Good.”
Broken Bend was already awake when we rolled in. Flowers hung outside the café with the faded sign. The grocery store windows advertised a sale on ground beef. The same little square of downtown looked harmless to anyone who didn’t know better.
I parked across from the hospital.
Marisol got out and smoothed her hand over her shirt like she was trying to iron out her nerves. She turned to me, her eyes steady. “You’re not coming in.”
“No,” I said. “I’ll be right here.”
She held my gaze for a beat longer than necessary, then nodded and walked toward the entrance.
I watched her go, my attention tracking her the way it always did. Head up. Steps measured. Shoulders squared even when her nerves pulled tight. She was brave in a way that didn’t announce itself. Brave in a way that looked like showing up anyway.
My phone buzzed.
Brody: I’m in position. All clear.
Kane: I’m two blocks out. No tails.
I replied without looking down for long.
Me: Copy. Stay sharp.
Then I sat and watched the doors.
Twenty-seven minutes later, Marisol came out. The way she moved was different. Lighter. Her shoulders were still tense, but her mouth was relaxed, and her eyes had a spark I hadn’t seen in weeks.
She climbed into the truck and shut the door. “They have an opening.”
I kept my voice even. “Yeah?”
“It’s not guaranteed yet,” she said quickly, as if she didn’t want to jinx it. “But she told me to apply and said they’re moving fast. It would include benefits and regular hours. Not…” She swallowed. “Not just surviving.”
Something tight in my chest eased. “That’s good.”
“It is,” she breathed, and for a second she looked so relieved I wanted to pull her across the console and kiss her until she forgot what fear felt like.
Instead, I started the truck. “School’s next.”
We parked near the high school, a low brick building with a flag out front and a handful of cars in the lot. Marisol’s hands shook as she gathered her folder.
“This is the part that scares me,” she admitted.
I looked at her. “Why?”
“Because it makes it real,” she said. “If I register him here, I’m not just hiding. I’m choosing.”
I nodded once. “Good.”
Her gaze flicked to mine. “That’s all you’ve got?”
“That’s all you need,” I said. “Go.”
She got out and walked toward the front office. I waited, eyes on the doors, scanning the lot, the street, the parked cars. Brody’s truck sat a block down, angled like a man waiting for somebody. Kane’s tail was somewhere behind us. I didn’t know where, and that was the point.
Ten minutes passed. Then fifteen. Then twenty.
My phone buzzed again, and my thumb hovered over the screen.
Brody: Saw a dark gray pickup circle twice. Could be nothing. Could be our guy. Keep eyes up.
Ice seeped into my veins.
Me: Plate?
A second later, he replied.
Brody: TX JPL-8724
I didn’t recognize it, but that didn’t mean it meant nothing. I lifted my gaze back to the school entrance just as Marisol stepped out, papers in hand. She was smiling.
She headed toward the truck, moving fast like she couldn’t wait to tell me whatever good news she’d just gotten. And that’s when I saw the dark gray pickup on the street… engine idling… driver’s side window down. A man sat behind the wheel pretending to look at his phone while his gaze tracked her.
Brody’s voice crackled in my earpiece. “Caleb. You see him?”
“Yeah,” I said under my breath. “I see him.”
Marisol reached the curb. The passenger door was still ten feet away. The truck door swung open and the man stepped out. He crossed the street like he’d been waiting for this moment.
My body moved before my brain finished the thought. “Marisol,” I snapped.
Her head turned, startled.
The man reached her, his hand closing around her arm.
She gasped and tried to yank free.
“Hey,” he barked, voice low and vicious. “Come on.”
The sound that tore out of her wasn’t a scream. It was a raw, terrified noise that hit something feral in my chest. I was out of the truck in two strides.
The man saw me and tightened his grip, jerking her toward the pickup. The driver’s seat was empty now, door hanging open. A second person was inside, shifting in the passenger seat, ready to move.
I didn’t give them time.
I hit the man hard, my fist landing in his jaw with a crack I felt all the way up my arm. He stumbled, still holding her. I grabbed his wrist and wrenched it back until he let go with a curse.
Marisol staggered toward me, shaking, her eyes wide.
I put myself between her and the man automatically, one hand on her shoulder, anchoring her behind me.
Brody’s truck screeched to a stop, blocking the pickup’s front end. He jumped out, weapon drawn but angled down, not waving it around like a man trying to start a war in the middle of a school zone.