Chapter 4
DELILAH
Ihop. Drag my ankle. Hit the bed frame with my hip and don't make a sound.
Floor behind the bed. Back against the wall.
Notebook clutched to my chest like it's going to save me.
It's not. The man with the rifle already tried to put me in the ground for it and here it is in my lap while another set of headlights crawls up the road toward a cabin that's supposed to be unfindable.
My pulse is in my teeth.
I hear Hawk's boots on the floorboards. Measured. The slide of a round being chambered already done. Ghost's breathing. The soft metallic click of the safety coming off.
The headlights get close enough that a bar of light sweeps the wall above my head.
A truck engine. Not the rumble of the one that brought me here. Different. Diesel. Old.
The engine cuts.
A door opens.
A voice.
"Hawk. It's me. Don't shoot your damn sheriff."
The air leaves me in a rush that makes my ribs complain.
I hear Hawk's boots cross to the door. Hear him open it. Hear a low exchange I can't quite catch, and then footsteps coming toward the bedroom.
"Delilah. It's Parker. Come out."
I come out the way I went in. Slower. Using the dresser, the doorframe, the wall. My ankle screams once when I put weight on it wrong and I grit my teeth through it.
The sheriff is a square man in his fifties with a graying mustache and kind eyes. He's got his hat in his hand. He gives me a nod that doesn't take inventory of my legs in the too-big Henley, which I appreciate.
"Ma'am. Sorry for the scare. I'd have called ahead but I wanted ears on what I brought with me before it went out over any radio."
Hawk is right at my elbow. Not touching. Close enough that I know he would if I started to go down.
I look up at him. "I'm okay."
"Sit."
I sit. On the couch this time. He brings the ottoman over and lifts my ankle onto it without asking, settles the quilt back across my lap, and only then turns his attention to Parker.
Parker holds up a manila folder.
"State AG moved faster than I expected. They've had eyes on Crestview's parent LLC for eight months. You handed them a live wire, Ms. Reyes. Your assay data matched anomalies they were already chasing. They needed ground truth. You gave it."
I let out a breath. "What is it. The site."
"Money laundering front. Some arms on the edges.
Your prefab structure on the west side is a processing setup they haven't used yet, but they were close.
What you saw tracking you is a private security contractor on retainer to the parent company.
Not a mine guard. Not a field hand. He's on a federal watch list."
Hawk's jaw does something.
I don't look at him.
"What do you need from me."
"Sworn statement. Digital copies of your data to a secured server the AG's office will provide. Testimony down the line. They'll want you in protective custody once it moves."
"How long before it moves."
"Five days. Seven. They want the raid timed."
"And until then?"
Parker looks at Hawk. Hawk doesn't look back. Just waits.
"Until then," Parker says, "you stay exactly where you are. Nobody knows Hawk pulled you off that slope. Nobody's going to know. If they come looking anywhere, they'll look at the hospital in town, at the trailhead, at anyplace a hurt woman might surface. They won't look here."
"And the contractor?"
"He went back down the mountain this morning. Got on a plane out of Reno. That doesn't mean he's gone. It means whoever hired him is regrouping. You keep your head down."
"I can do that."
"Good." He turns to Hawk. "You keep her that way."
"Counting on it."
"I brought a bag. Clothes. Toiletries. A laptop set up with the AG's secure channel. You'll transfer the data tonight if you can. The password lives in your head, and it stays in your head."
"Understood."
Parker sets a duffel on the floor. Hat back on his head. He nods at me one more time, at Hawk.
"Hawk. You need anything."
"Radio."
"You call."
"I will."
Parker leaves. The door closes. The ignition turns over. The headlights swing back down the road and disappear.
Silence.
I realize I'm shaking.
Not bad. A fine tremor in my hands that I didn't have five minutes ago. Adrenaline coming back out of my body the way it always does. Late. Hard. I'm used to it.
"Hey."
Hawk is crouched in front of me again. His hand covers both of mine where they're gripping the notebook too tight. His palm is warm and rough, stopping the tremor the way nothing else would.
"You're okay."
"I know."
"Say it."
"I'm okay."
He studies my face. Whatever he sees there must satisfy him, because he stands and crosses to the kitchen and comes back with a glass of water and two ibuprofen.
"Take these. Then you're transferring that data. Then you're sleeping."
"Yes sir."
His mouth pulls at the corner. He doesn't quite smile. He doesn't quite not.
I take the pills. I take the laptop. I sit at his kitchen table with my ankle propped on a second chair and I log into my cloud backup and I transfer three hundred and seventeen megabytes of data I nearly died for to a server some woman at the Nevada Attorney General's office set up for me.
It takes twelve minutes. Hawk sits across from me the whole time and cleans his rifle.
He doesn't hover. He doesn't watch the screen. He trusts me to do my work. It's the most attractive thing he's done all day and that's saying something because earlier he carried a log up from the shed over one shoulder and I made a noise I refuse to examine.
"Done."
"Good."
"I should sleep."
"You should."
Neither of us moves.
The lamp by the couch is low. The fire is low. Ghost is asleep on the rug. The whole cabin has gone the color of amber and quiet.
Hawk sets the rifle down.
"Come here."
I stand. Bad ankle first. He catches my waist before I even sway, two hands at my ribs. Careful of the bruising. He walks me the six steps to the couch like we're practiced at this. Like we've done it a hundred times.
He sits.
I sit beside him.
Not against him. Not yet.
His arm goes along the back of the couch. Not around me. Near me. The heat of him runs down my spine anyway.
"Earlier," I say.
"Yeah."
"The thing that got interrupted."
"Yeah."
"Was I imagining it."
"No."
"Are you going to tell me all the reasons it can't happen."
"I was planning on it."
"Please don't."
He turns his head. Looks at me. I've never had a man look at me the way this one does. Like he's memorizing a route. Like he's deciding something.
His hand comes off the back of the couch.
Fingers brush my jaw. Turn my chin toward him.
"Delilah."
"Hawk."
He kisses me.
Slow. The first press of his mouth against mine is careful, the way his hands have been careful with my ribs and my ankle and every bandage he's changed. His beard is soft, softer than I thought it would be. His lips are warm.
Then his hand slides back into my hair and he tilts my head and he kisses me like a man who has been holding himself still for three days.
My notebook slides off my lap onto the floor.
I don't care.
My good hand fists in the front of his flannel. His other arm comes around my back and he pulls me into him, careful of the ribs, careful of everything, and the noise I make into his mouth is embarrassing and I don't care about that either.
He breaks the kiss just long enough to breathe against my mouth.
"Going to stop in a minute."
"Why."
"Because you're hurt."
"Not that hurt."
"You're hurt enough."
"Hawk."
"I know."
He kisses me again.
Once. Soft. Like a promise.
Pulls back.
"Bed."
"Is that an invitation."
"It's an order. You're sleeping. I'm taking the couch."
"Tragic."
"Survivable."
He carries me. Doesn't ask. Just lifts me against his chest and walks me to the bedroom and sets me down on the quilt like I weigh nothing. Pulls the blanket over me. Tucks it once.
Leans down.
Kisses my forehead.
"Sleep."
He closes the door halfway behind him.
I lie there in the dark with my mouth still warm from his, my ankle throbbing, a federal investigation coiling quiet five days away, and the strangest thought I've had in years settling into my chest like it's been waiting for a chair.
I could stay here.
I close my eyes.