Chapter 6 Hotel Luna Mar – San Antonio, Texas
HOTEL LUNA MAR–SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS
Kawan stared at the ceiling fan as it lazily spun overhead. One leg draped off the side of the bed, while the other continued to throb since Lark had plopped her knee right on his wound. But he didn’t care. Not really.
She curled up against his body, hand fisted on the center of his stomach, head resting on his chest, her muscles tensed, but at least she slept. It was fitful and wrought with unease, but it was better than pacing a path in the carpet.
He drew little circles on her skin with his thumb, his arms ready to catch her if—more like when—her dream turned into a hellish nightmare.
It had been months—maybe a year—since he’d had a woman in his bed. But only one mattered.
Lark.
God, he’d missed her. Not a day had gone by that he hadn’t thought about her.
He tried not to. He tried to move on with his life as best he could.
He figured, like everything else, being in love would pass.
The intensity of it had. The crushing pain of her not caring enough even to have the conversation had eased to a dull ache.
Holding her now, stuffed those feelings into his heart, closed the chambers, and locked them away. There was no way he could let them go now—and he didn’t want to. He’d never wanted to—she just hadn’t given him a choice. Or maybe he’d given up.
He wasn’t going to do that so easily this time.
She murmured something under her breath and shifted, her body tensing into a rigid ball as if fighting off invisible hands. Kawan kissed her forehead. “Shhh,” he whispered.
But the battle raging inside her continued as she dug her nails into his skin. “No,” she said, her voice broken. “Wes—don’t—Alvarez—no…”
Kawan’s chest ached at the sound. This wasn’t her first dream in the last twelve hours. In the days and weeks to come, it wouldn’t be her last. He wrapped his arm tighter around her, pulling her gently into him, rooting her to the here and now.
“I’ve got you,” he said against her temple. “You’re safe, Lark. It’s just a dream.”
She twisted in his hold, breath ragged, her hand pounding against his bare chest. Her skin clammy, and her lips parted as another name slipped out—“Mina.”
It was enough to bring tears to his eyes.
He cupped the back of her head, fingers threading into her hair. “You need to let the dream go, sweetheart,” he murmured. “Stay in the present. Stay with me. Right here. Right now.”
Her breathing slowed, bit by bit, her body relaxing in his arms as if she’d heard him.
But his own heart still hammered. Seeing her unravel, even in sleep, lit a fire in his blood he didn’t know how to put out.
There was no armor for this. No training had prepared him to watch the woman he cared so deeply for suffer from ghosts that wouldn’t die.
Just because he knew how to deal with his ghosts didn’t mean he could help anyone else.
He didn’t know how long he laid there, just holding her. Long enough for her breathing to even out. Long enough for him to rememorize the shape of her. But not long enough to carve out the real peace she needed. God knew she’d earned it.
A knock at the door broke the silence.
Kawan sighed, slowly extricating himself from her tangle of limbs. His injured thigh protested as he stood, but he gritted his teeth and grabbed his camo pants off the chair. He pulled them on with careful movements, then limped to the door and cracked it open.
Thor stood there, arms crossed, looking like he hadn’t slept in days. “Got a minute?”
“Sure.” Kawan glanced over his shoulder before stepping into the hallway and closing the door behind him with a gentle tug.
“Everything all right in there?”
“Define all right.”
Thor ran a hand over his buzzed head. “She spent the night—you tell me.”
“Are you going to lecture me on appropriate behavior during a mission? Because I’m not in the mood, and this situation doesn’t—”
“No sermon.” Thor rubbed the back of his neck.
“It’s been a long night, and everyone’s on edge.
Jupiter and Specs are still trying to unravel it—but Jupiter’s worried that Specs is going to be the thing that unravels, and who could blame her after what happened.
I’ve got little to no intel coming down the ranks.
About the only good news is that because of your injury, and our connection to what just happened, we’ve been given a little leeway. ”
“What does that mean, exactly?” Kawan asked.
“A couple of weeks to keep out of trouble and run our own little side investigation as long as we keep our noses clean,” Thor said. “How’s Lark doing?”
“Not great,” Kawan admitted. “But she’s not completely gone either.
Last night… she let go for a second. She cried.
” Kawan grimaced. “I’ve known her a long time.
She’s never shed a tear in front of me, and I’ve seen her deal with pain and grief before.
But this? It’s different. We all know that.
” He ran a hand over his jaw. “She let me hold her. Take care of her, which is a big damn deal.”
“Yeah.” Thor nodded. “For her, that vulnerability probably feels like sitting in a corner wearing a straitjacket while the rest of us are tossing popcorn at her.”
“Ten times worse,” Kawan said. "We know what Moose went through with his old man. But Lark? She grew up in the system."
"Foster care?" Thor asked. “I didn’t know that.”
"Eight or nine different homes. Never stayed anywhere long enough to put down roots." Kawan leaned against the doorframe. "That carves out a different kind of hollow."
“Growing up in foster care didn’t do that to you,” Thor said.
“Yeah." Kawan rubbed the back of his neck. "But I got lucky."
The Paddocks' horse farm. Central New York.
Green hills and honest work. Dave and Martha had taken in foster kids for years—loved every single one of them, even if they couldn't make the adoptions stick.
In Kawan's case, his piece-of-shit father wouldn't sign away his rights.
Kept popping back into his life with empty promises and demands for money.
But the Paddocks had kept their promise.
Protected him. Given him a home, even if the paperwork said something different. They were family. Blood didn't matter.
"Lark never had stability as kid," Kawan said quietly. "Most of her placements weren't bad people. Just temporary. A bed and three meals, but never a home. She didn't learn what commitment looked like until the military."
"And that's a different kind of love," Thor said.
"Exactly. Brotherhood. Loyalty under fire. But not the kind that says 'I choose you' without conditions."
“Jesus, that’s fucking scary. No wonder she makes Rambo look like a soft bunny.”
“I’m grateful we’ve been given a little room to dig into what happened—but she needs time to heal,” Kawan said.
“Lucky for you, I’ve already called Brick,” Thor said.
“The only thing keeping Specs from spiraling is being able to pound on the keyboard. If she tries to sleep, she panics. If Jupiter takes over, she’s bossing him around and losing her cool.
She can’t go on like that, and I doubt Lark’s going to be able to cope.
She lost everyone but Specs. If I were her, I’d already be in that fucking straitjacket. ”
Kawan glanced back at the door. “She needs something more than any of us can give her. More than orders or the regulated duties of the military can. But it has to be her decision. You know Lark like I do. The moment she has to reconcile what’s clashing between her emotions and her intellect, her brain wins and a piece of her humanity goes with that battle. ”
Thor huffed a quiet laugh. “Sounds familiar.”
“Watch it,” Kawan said, smirking. “You’re not exactly a team player yourself.”
Another voice cut in before Thor could respond.
“Mornin’ sunshine,” Jupiter said as he rounded the corner, coffee in one hand, his tablet in the other. He looked Kawan up and down. “Doesn’t look like you slept much, but it does look like you—”
“Is there a reason you left Specs alone?” Thor asked.
Kawan usually enjoyed a little sparing, especially with his buddies, and Jupiter was always his favorite target, but for now, he was grateful Thor stopped it.
“She’s not alone. Both Lief and Sloan are with her in her room,” Jupiter said. “We got an encrypted message ten minutes ago from Grady. At least, the signature matches what he used before.”
“And?” Thor asked.
“It’s not much, but the meaning is explosive,” Jupiter said.
“The one line reads: They know. Not secure. Move now. Specs is still running forensics to make sure it wasn’t spoofed, but it looks legit.
While we have no idea who they are, and we have no idea if we should trust Grady or not, both Specs and I agree that we should move locations. ”
“I’m on board with that.” Kawan’s spine straightened. “Is there anything that you’ve found that points to Torin? Bretton? Or even Bradford?”
“Bradford had the AI, but before the chaos, I could’ve sworn he handed it off to Bretton. Or maybe Bretton took it. Hard to tell since my comms went in and out or were glitching,” Jupiter said.
Thor leaned closer to the monitor.“When the three men scattered, it appeared that Bretton and Bradford went in the same direction, but Torin went out from the other side, under that bridge.”
“That’s what little I have on the security footage,” Jupiter said. “But I don’t trust it. It was scrambled, and until I can study it more, I’m not willing to say anything one way or another.”
“I don’t trust Bradford. He’s a real piece of work. He proved that when he worked for the good guys. And now he’s in the private sector. I wouldn’t put anything past him,” Kawan said.
“Neither would I, Thor said. “But I don’t think he’s smart enough to pull something like this off. Not without help.”
“Whoever pulled the trigger on that ambush had no idea we'd been deployed. So why send us in?” Jupiter asked, holding up his hand. “We all got played.”