Chapter 40
FORTY
Pale morning light seeped through the cracked blinds, painting thin stripes across the safehouse walls.
The room smelled of salt air, and the faint antiseptic tang from the night before.
Ryan sat at the edge of the kitchen table, a printed satellite photo spread between him and Gates.
The map was creased from travel, its edges frayed.
Gates had already circled their target in red ink.
Lucía perched nearby on the couch, a blanket wrapped around her shoulders, a thermal mug cradled in her hands. Her face was pale but sharper than last night. Awake. Alert. Listening. The collar of a clean shirt tugged awkwardly against the bandage at her shoulder.
Gates tapped the compound, a walled property nestled just inland from Puerto Cortés, a tiny settlement a few miles up the coast. “The Altamar Complex,” he said.
“Technically a seafood distribution facility, but it’s been dry for years.
Now it’s a fortified stash house with docks out back.
Water access. Boat routes to the mainland. ”
Ryan leaned forward. “How many guards?”
“I’ve had my tech guy Reyes do a full recon. Five we can confirm on shift at any given time. Maybe more inside. Thermal scans show vehicles coming and going irregularly. No fixed schedule. Whoever runs it doesn’t want patterns.”
Lucía cleared her throat. “If Noah’s there, he won’t be visible. They’ll keep him in the interior block. Minimal windows, heavy surveillance.”
Gates nodded. “Exactly. We go in fast, hit the comms relay first, then the perimeter cameras.”
Ryan stepped closer, eyeing the red markings on the paper. “What’s the ingress plan?”
“Boat drop. Quiet outboard, approach from the reef. We’ll beach two hundred yards from the fence line and hike the rest.
“We go in fast and hard. Split once we breach. Ryan, you and I sweep the south wing. Lucía hits the control room, pulls any data she can on recent shipments, lockdown overrides, or movement logs.”
Ryan frowned. “She’s not cleared for fieldwork. She took a bullet less than a day ago.”
Lucía didn’t blink. “I’m not sitting this out.”
“No one’s asking you to sit it out,” Ryan said, tone sharper than he intended. “But that compound won’t go easy. And if they see your face—”
“Then they know I’m still a threat,” she cut in, calm but steely.
Gates studied her, then nodded, almost approving. “She’s right. If anyone can crack their internal files, it’s her. Besides, we need her eyes on the network. Whoever’s running this place didn’t build it for fish.”
Ryan hesitated. His jaw tightened, hand flexing against the back of a nearby chair. “Fine. But she stays on comms.”
Lucía gave him a look that was pure fire. “Don’t give me orders.”
“She operates from the boat,” Gates said. “It’s stable, has power, and it keeps her mobile. We’ll set her up with secure comms and a digital tap into the compound. If anything goes sideways, she’ll see it before we do.”
Ryan crossed his arms, his gaze dropping back to the satellite printout. It all sounded too clean. Too rehearsed. He didn’t trust it, and he didn’t trust Gates. Not fully. Maybe not even partially.
Lucía caught his eye. She gave a near-imperceptible shake of her head—don’t voice it. Not yet.
Ryan stood and moved to the window. Outside, the hills dropped off sharply toward the sea. A cluster of gulls circled in lazy arcs overhead. A small boat bobbed near the rocky inlet, distant and slow.
Gates went on, “We hit them at midnight. Lights out. No vehicles. All battery-powered gear. I’ve got NV scopes and suppressed weapons if we need them.”
“You bringing anyone else?” Ryan asked.
Gates hesitated. “Just us and Reyes. A bigger team draws attention. We can’t afford that.”
Lucía asked, “What happens if the intel’s wrong? If he’s not there?”
Gates’s answer was immediate. “Then we get out fast.”
Ryan turned to Gates, jaw tight. “And what’s your play when this is done? You handing me over to the USMS? To spend the rest of my life in a federal prison?”
“No,” Gates said. “You get this boy out, you walk. That’s my word.”
Ryan exhaled sharply, dragging a hand through his hair. The plan sat between them, full of holes they couldn’t afford to face.
But they were going anyway.
Ryan sat at the table, his PPK stripped and scattered in neat rows across a dishtowel. His hands moved with practiced calm: clean, oil, reassemble. The ritual of it settled his nerves.
Gates leaned in the doorway, arms crossed, watching. “What were they calling you back in Ensenada? El…Muro?”
Ryan fitted the barrel back into the slide. Smooth, mechanical. “You’ve been keeping tabs on me for a while, then.”
He stepped into the room, picked up a chipped mug, and poured himself coffee from the stovetop pot. “It fits,” he said, ignoring Ryan’s comment.
Ryan locked the slide back into place with a sharp metallic click and finally looked up. “You here to help, or to talk shit?”
Gates shrugged, taking a sip. “Just trying to see if the guy I knew is still in there somewhere. Because if he’s gone? Might be I’m working with a statue.”
Ryan exhaled through his nose and began threading his belt holster. “You think I wanted to walk away? You think I liked what happened in that hurricane?”
Gates didn’t flinch. “I think you couldn’t live with it. And instead of facing the wreckage, you bolted south. Hiding in hovels, behind fake IDs and aliases.”
Ryan stood abruptly, the chair scraping back.
Then Gates added, quieter now, “You were a damn good marshal. One of the best I knew. I hated that you flamed out like that. I still do.”
Ryan looked away, fingers tightening around the back of the chair. After a beat, he said, “You ever wonder why we never really got along?”
Gates’s grin was faint, but not cruel. “Because I followed the rules. And you followed your gut.”
Ryan nodded slowly. “And look where that’s gotten both of us.”
Lucía sat on the bed with her legs curled under her, the scratchy blanket bunched around her waist. Her shoulder throbbed beneath the gauze.
Outside the half-closed door, she heard low voices. Ryan and Gates. Their tones were muted but not undecipherable. Clearly, there was a thread of history between them, something old and unfinished, and she could feel it through the walls.
Every instinct screamed. It was too clean. A federal marshal arriving with medical supplies, real-time surveillance data, and an escape plan? Minutes after she took a bullet?
No. She didn’t believe in coincidence. She especially didn’t believe in coincidence when it showed up with a badge and a strong jaw.
Lucía slid to the edge of the bed, her bare feet brushing the cold floor. Her breath hitched as she pushed to stand. The room tilted. She gritted her teeth and let the wave pass. Her shoulder burned like it had its own pulse. She sat back down.
Her head ached, but her thoughts were clearer than they’d been in days.
Her fear had crystallized into focus. It wasn’t the look Gates had given Ryan that bothered her.
That had been all surface—friendly tension, something old and personal and half-buried.
Something to do with pride, or maybe betrayal.
Men like them wore past wounds like old medals.
No. It was the look he’d given her when he thought she wasn’t watching. Calculating. Measuring. Like he was appraising a locked vault.
Light-headed, she scooted back and leaned against the wall, her breath slow and shallow.
He knows too much. He has too much. And he asked too few questions.
The door creaked. Ryan stepped inside, his silhouette cutting across the floor. He held two mugs, one steaming.
“You should be resting,” he said.
She gave him a tired smile. “So should you.”
He crossed to her, handed her the mug. Coffee. Warm. Bitter. She curled her fingers around it, grateful for the heat.
He took a full step back, like he was putting a designated amount of distance between them. He did that a lot: came close, then retreated. Like a tide. She wondered idly what it would feel like if—when—he enveloped her completely. He wouldn’t be like water. He would be hot and hard and thick—
She deleted the rest of that thought from her mind like she was clearing a line of code she didn’t need.
She rested the mug on her thigh. “Gates is risking a lot for us. You believe that?”
Ryan said nothing for a long time. Then, “No, I don’t. But I do know we can’t get into that compound without his help.” He placed his mug on the table beside her bed, then turned to look at her, voice softer now. “And I also know he helped save your life.”
A beat. Her voice held no warmth. “Maybe.” She looked at the wall, not at him. “Or maybe he’s saving something else.”
Ryan didn’t push. But he didn’t look away either.
The silence between them stretched, taut as wire.
She felt his eyes on her. With it came a sensation of self-consciousness, something she’d hadn’t felt in a long time.
Normally, when she sensed someone was watching her, it triggered only panic.
She’d have to go back many years in her memory to find a time when it set off a feeling like this.
A feeling like every centimeter of her skin was suddenly on display. Like she was exposed.
In an attempt to tamp the feeling down, she took a sip of coffee, then looked up at him over the rim of the mug. “El Muro, huh?” she said dryly.
His brow furrowed.
“I heard it through the wall,” she added. Her smile was faint but real. “Ironically enough.”
Ryan gave her a look.
She shrugged one shoulder, careful of the bandage. “But walls don’t just keep things out, you know. They also keep things in.”
Ryan didn’t speak, but something flickered across his face.
“So what happens,” she said quietly, “when the wall comes down?”
He didn’t answer. Instead, he stepped forward.
Her heart toppled over itself. The atmosphere in the room changed instantly. It was like he’d rolled a live grenade onto the floor between them. This wasn’t joking and innuendo anymore: This was real and they both knew it.
The heat from his body met hers before his hands did—one hovering just beside her jaw, hesitant, the other brushing lightly against her wrist.
Her pulse thundered.
He leaned in. Just enough…but not quite enough. And waited.
Lucía lifted her chin. Her free hand came up, fingers catching the front of his shirt.
She whispered, “You gonna move, cowboy, or do I have to push the damn thing down myself?”
That made him smile. Then his mouth found hers.
It was gentle. Introductory. Either one of them could pull away and end it and no harm would be done. They could laugh about it awkwardly later and blame it on a heady combination of adrenaline, blood loss and the weird situation they both found themselves in.
His lips melded with hers, warm and wet, his mouth opening to glide his tongue against hers. Her heartbeat filled her whole head, and it pulsed between her legs.
She didn’t pull back. She pulled him closer.
The kiss scorched through Ryan like a match to dry tinder. For one fleeting, breathless second, all his caution, all his edges, melted. Her mouth was warm, insistent. A tremor went through her hand as she gripped his shirt, and he shifted immediately, mindful of her wound.
His hand cupped the uninjured side of her jaw with a reverence he hadn’t known he possessed.
His other hovered just beneath her elbow, steady but feather-light, as if any pressure might unravel her entirely.
The smell of her skin—clean sweat, blood, coffee, and something warm he’d started to think of as hers—seeped into his senses.
He drew her closer by instinct, only to feel her flinch, barely, as the motion tugged her shoulder. That broke through the haze. He exhaled a breath that was nearly a groan and leaned back just enough to search her face.
“You okay?” he murmured.
Lucía blinked at him, dazed. Her lips were parted, slightly swollen, her hair sticking to her temple. “Yeah,” she said, voice a little hoarse. “Just…don’t stop.”
He gave a half-smile. “Not planning to.”
He leaned back in, slower this time. More deliberate.
Their mouths met again, and this time the kiss deepened.
It wasn’t hurried now, but molten, layered with everything they hadn’t been able to say aloud.
Her hands slid up his chest, fingers curling into the soft cotton of his shirt.
His own hands traced down her spine and settled at her waist, careful not to aggravate her injury.
Every part of him was straining to stay gentle, when every part of him wanted more.
Her breath hitched as his lips moved to her jawline, then lower, skimming the curve of her neck. Her pulse thudded against his mouth, fast and shallow. She tilted her head back, eyes fluttering shut.
Then—
The door creaked open.
Gates.
Ryan froze. Lucía stiffened in his arms.
“Well, hell,” Gates said, voice bone-dry. “If I’d known you two needed a moment, I’d’ve brought candles.”
Lucía ducked her head, drawing back, cheeks flushed and breathing ragged. Ryan stepped between her and the door almost automatically, tension locking into his spine.
Gates raised his hands, mock-surrender. “Relax. I’m not here to cockblock. Just figured you’d want to know, we’ve got a window.” His tone turned crisp. “Boat’s ready. Weapons staged. We move before midnight. You’ve got an hour to gear up.”
He lingered a beat longer than necessary, gaze flicking between them. There was no grin on his face. Just a flicker of something Ryan couldn’t quite place. Amusement, maybe. Or warning.
Then he was gone.
The door clicked shut behind him. The air he left behind felt colder.
Ryan turned back to Lucía, who was still flushed but composed. Her lips were parted, her breathing just beginning to steady. She sat back on the bed, brushing her fingers over her mouth like she was trying to ground herself.
“That man,” she muttered, brushing a hand through her hair, “has the worst timing on the planet.”
Ryan gave a soft, reluctant laugh. “Yeah. Always did.”
He sat beside her. Neither of them reached for the other again, but they didn’t pull apart, either. A beat passed. Then another.
“We’re really doing this?” she said.
He nodded slowly. “Yeah. We are.”