Chapter Seventeen
~ Cruz ~
I’d been rehearsing this conversation since before dawn, running the words in my head while I made coffee, while I stood at the kitchen window watching the greenhouse grow lights click off on their timer.
None of the rehearsals helped.
When Jackson sat down across from me with his hands wrapped around his mug, I put my coffee down and said it plainly, no softening, no preamble.
“I have to leave.”
The words landed between us like a stone—not quite physical, but present enough that I had to look down at my coffee to hide whatever had just happened to my face.
“Sterling has a job that requires me specifically. It will be three weeks at minimum, possibly longer.” I kept my eyes on Jackson’s face, watching the way his expression didn’t change.
“I swear I’ll be back before the baby comes.
I’ll text every day and call when the mission allows it.
I’m not walking away from this—not from you, not from our child, not from the life we’ve been building here. ”
I meant every word. Said it with my voice level and my eyes on Jackson’s face the whole time, letting him see what wasn’t in the statement: that this wasn’t a choice, that the job required my specific skill set, that I would rather stay but couldn’t—not with a network still out there looking to hurt people I’d promised to protect.
Jackson looked at me across the table with that flat calm he used when he had already processed something and decided not to perform a reaction about it—the same expression he’d worn after the first attack, after his father’s car disappeared down the gravel drive.
He gave me a wan smile and said, “I know.”
Two words. Not “I understand” or “Do what you have to” or any of the other things people said when the world went sideways. Just “I know,” delivered with by a man who measured his promises in actions rather than words.
I held his gaze for a beat, then another, and neither of us said anything else about it. The kitchen was warm around us, the grow lights outside the window clicking off one by one on their timer. I picked my coffee back up and took a long sip, tasting nothing.
Jackson reached for the plate of toast in the center of the table, selected a piece with careful attention, and spread butter across it.
He didn’t look up while he did it. Didn’t ask where I was going or how dangerous it was or what kind of skills Sterling needed that couldn’t wait two months for a baby to be born.
Just ate his toast in the same methodical way he did everything—bite, chew, swallow, repeat—while the silence between us grew from absence into something with edges and weight.
“Nguyen will come check the perimeter twice a day,” I said, breaking the quiet because I couldn’t stand it anymore. “Diaz is bringing a second motion detector for the north pasture. I’ve already talked to Rawley about rotating the team to make sure someone’s always on the property.”
Jackson nodded once, slow. “We’ll be fine,” he said, the words coming out level despite the tightness I could see around his eyes. “The ranch hands know the drill. I’ll keep the radio on.”
We finished breakfast in that same weighted silence—Jackson working through his eggs with methodical attention, me watching him over the rim of my coffee cup, neither of us naming what had been growing between us for months.
When we were done, I got up and started clearing the table—plate to sink, cup to drying rack, knife to the specific drawer where it lived now. Jackson stayed where he was, one hand resting low against his stomach the way it always did now, his eyes on the valley spread out below the kitchen window.
“I should check the fourth greenhouse,” I said, already moving toward the back door. “The drainage channel might need more sealant before the next rain.”
Jackson nodded without turning around. “I’ll handle the dishes,” he said, his voice level.
I moved through the rest of the morning on autopilot—checking the drainage channel in greenhouse four, restacking the firewood on the porch, changing the oil in the Humvee.
Each task was necessary. Each task kept my hands busy and my mind from circling back to the same calculation: three weeks was twenty-one days too many, and twenty-one days was exactly how long it would take for things to fall apart.
Jackson moved through his own rotation—dishes, then the greenhouse starter trays, then the inventory in the tool shed—with the methodical attention he brought to everything.
We passed each other twice without speaking, close enough that I could smell the mix of soap and something greener that was just Jackson, but never quite crossing the threshold into whatever conversation was waiting for us.
By noon, the sky had gone from morning gold to the blue that meant full day was finally here. I was on the roof checking the solar panel connection when I heard Jackson come out onto the porch below.
I looked down to find him standing with one hand on the rail and the other resting low against his stomach, watching the mountains go from black to green-brown in the distance.
“We’re good,” he said, not looking up at me. “Whatever happens. We’re handling it.”
The moment stretched between us—Jackson on the porch, me on the roof.
“I know,” I said, the words coming out before I could stop them.
Jackson nodded once, slow, then went back inside without waiting for whatever came next.
I came down from the roof twenty minutes later, the connection checked and secured, and went straight to the bedroom to start packing.
The jump bag was in the closet where it had been since I’d unpacked it three weeks ago—black nylon with the wear and tear that came from being thrown into helicopters and shoved under truck seats and generally treated like it was disposable rather than essential.
I filled it with practiced attention—clothes first, then weapons, then the kind of things most people forgot about until they needed them: extra batteries, water purification tablets, and protein bars that wouldn’t freeze even in subzero temperatures.
I worked with methodical precision, each item going into its proper place, each compartment secured.
Not because it mattered—most of this would get unpacked and repacked once Sterling briefed me on what we were actually doing—but because standing still was not something I could afford right now.
The farmhouse was quiet around me—just the soft tick of the heating system and the sound of Jackson moving through the kitchen below.
By three, the bag was packed and sitting by the back door next to my boots, ready for a pre-dawn departure. I stood in the kitchen doorway for a moment, watching Jackson at the sink with his back to me, and tried to make sense of what was happening.
Somewhere in the world, a child was coming. I would be there to see it. Would make it back from wherever Sterling was sending me, would walk through that door and take up the side of the bed that had somehow become mine, would be present for whatever happened next.
The promise sat between my shoulder blades like something with an edge—not quite physical, but present enough that I had to look down at the floor to hide whatever had just happened to my face.
Jackson turned from the sink with careful attention, drying his hands on the towel that hung beside it. He didn’t ask if I was ready or how long I’d be gone or whether I’d thought about what would happen to the farmhouse if Peterson’s network decided to try again.
Just looked at me across the kitchen with that particular calm he used when he had already processed something, and said, “Dinner’s at six.”
By evening, my jump bag was packed and sitting by the back door next to my boots, ready for a pre-dawn departure.
The farmhouse had gone quiet in the specific way it did after a decision had been made and before it had been lived—no ranch hands, no voices from the bunkhouse, just the low creak of the structure settling and the distant sound of wind off the valley.
I found Jackson already in bed, lying on his side in the amber light of the low lamp on the nightstand, the blanket pulled to his hip, one hand resting against the curve of his stomach the way it always did now.
His hair was damp at the temples—recent shower, then—and his shoulders were relaxed in a way they rarely were when he thought someone might be watching.
I stood in the doorway for a moment, watching him without speaking. He’d slept in this bed every night, had woken up beside me every morning, had gradually shifted from the careful distance of week one to the proximity that meant he now had a side.
I moved into the room with careful steps, making sure nothing in my posture suggested the weight I was carrying in my head. Jackson’s eyes tracked me across the floor—not the calculation that meant he was processing threats, but something adjacent to both that made my chest tight for a second.
I sat on the edge of the mattress and asked, carefully, “Is it all right to touch you? Will it be safe for the baby?”
Jackson answered by reaching for me. His hand was warm against my jaw, his eyes giving away nothing. I came down over him slowly, one hand bracing beside his head, the other moving to his jaw and tipping his face up.
I kissed him once, soft—not how I usually started things, but tonight had a different weight and my body knew it.
Jackson’s hand came up to the back of my neck and pulled me down harder, and I let myself be pulled, let the softness go, kissed him deep and thorough until Jackson’s breath went ragged against my mouth.
His other hand moved to my chest, palm flat against my sternum, feeling the way my heart was hammering under my ribs.
I worked my way down Jackson’s throat and collarbone, dragging my teeth across his nipples until he arched up with a sharp inhale and his fingers tightened in my hair.