Chapter Four
"Absolutely not."
Trooper's voice was flat. Final. The kind of tone that probably made hardened soldiers snap to attention.
Jessica didn't flinch.
"Those records identify every unit in my facility. Rental histories, payment patterns, access logs—if there are other compromised units, that's how we find them." She crossed her arms, matching his stance. "I'm not asking for permission. I'm telling you what needs to happen."
They were in a cramped kitchen in one of the club's safehouses—a nondescript cabin buried in pine forest twenty miles from anywhere.
Trooper had installed her here four hours ago with instructions to sleep, which she'd ignored in favor of pacing and making lists of everything the smugglers could destroy if they got to her office first.
"They'll be watching your facility," Trooper said. "Osborne—the big one from the bar—he's running search patterns right now. He'll have men positioned at every access point."
"Then go around them."
"It's not that simple."
"Make it that simple." Jessica stepped closer, close enough to see the tension in his jaw. "You said you plan operations. You said you account for every variable. So account for this one: I need those records, and I'm going to get them with or without your help."
Something flickered in his eyes. Frustration, maybe. Or something closer to respect.
"You'd actually go alone."
"I've been taking care of myself since I was twelve years old. Four younger siblings, a mother working double shifts, and nobody else stepping up." She held his gaze. "I don't wait for rescue. I handle things."
Trooper was silent for a long moment.
Then he pulled out his phone.
"Ghost. Change of plans. We're hitting the storage facility at dawn." A pause. "Yeah, I know. She's insisting. And she's right—those records could blow this whole operation open."
Jessica felt something loosen in her chest. Not gratitude—she hadn't asked for his approval. But something close to relief that she wouldn't have to do this alone.
"Forge meets us at the north access road, 0445. You take position at the east perimeter. I'll walk her in through the service entrance." Another pause. "No, I've got her."
I've got her.
The words landed differently than they should have. Possessive. Certain. Like she was something he'd already claimed responsibility for, whether she'd agreed to it or not.
He ended the call and turned back to her.
"We move in four hours. You stay within arm's reach of me at all times—no exceptions. If I say run, you run. If I say drop, you hit the ground. And if something goes wrong—"
"You have contingencies."
"I have seventeen contingencies." He didn't smile, but something in his expression shifted. "You're going to follow every one of them, or I'm dragging you out of there whether you've got your records or not."
Jessica nodded. "Fair."
"Get some sleep. You'll need it."
She didn't sleep.
Dawn came grey and cold, mist rising from the Carolina pines as they approached the facility.
Jessica rode behind Trooper on his bike, arms wrapped around his waist, cheek pressed against his back. She'd never been on a motorcycle before last night, but she was learning fast—lean when he leaned, hold tight when he accelerated, trust the machine and the man controlling it.
Trust.
That was the part that should have been harder.
They dismounted a quarter mile from the facility, in a treeline that gave them cover while Trooper checked his phone. Ghost's position. Forge's position. Something called "overwatch" that she didn't ask about.
"Osborne's got three men at the front gate," Trooper said quietly. "Two more at the east fence. Service entrance looks clear, but they'll have eyes on the main building."
"The service entrance connects to the maintenance corridor. It runs behind the office—I can access my files without going through the main lobby."
"Show me."
She sketched it in the dirt with a stick. The layout she knew by heart, the one she'd walked every day for six years. Trooper studied it, asked two questions, and nodded.
"We go in through maintenance, you grab the records, we exit through the loading dock on the west side. Forge will have a vehicle waiting." He met her eyes. "Ninety seconds in the building. That's all we've got before they realize something's wrong."
"I can do it in sixty."
Something that might have been a smile flickered across his face. "Then we'll have thirty seconds to spare."
They moved.
Jessica had never felt anything like it—the controlled silence, the deliberate footsteps, the way Trooper positioned his body between her and every possible threat.
He guided her with touches so light she barely felt them.
Hand on her elbow. Fingers at the small of her back.
Pressure that said this way without words.
The service entrance was unlocked, just like she'd said. The maintenance corridor was dark, just like she remembered. And her office door was exactly where she'd left it, the key still on her ring.
"Sixty seconds," Trooper breathed behind her.
Jessica moved.
Her filing cabinet was old, heavy, stuffed with six years of records she'd been meaning to digitize. She grabbed the folders that mattered—Unit 247's rental history, the master access log, the payment records that would show which accounts had funded the smuggling operation.
Forty seconds.
She shoved everything into the bag Trooper had given her, checked the drawer twice, and turned for the door.
That's when she heard the voices.
Trooper's hand clamped over her mouth before she could gasp. He pulled her against his chest, back to the wall, and she felt rather than heard the word he breathed into her hair.
"Still."
Footsteps in the corridor. Two men, maybe three, moving with purpose. Someone had seen something—the open door, the disrupted dust, some detail Trooper's planning hadn't accounted for.
She felt his body coil. Ready. Waiting.
The footsteps passed.
Jessica counted heartbeats. Ten. Twenty. The voices faded toward the main building, and Trooper's grip loosened just slightly.
"Loading dock. Now."
They moved faster this time—still quiet, but with an edge of urgency that made her pulse hammer. Trooper had his gun out now, held low and ready, and she realized with sudden clarity that he'd kill anyone who got in their way.
The loading dock was empty.
A truck was waiting exactly where Trooper had said it would be, Forge behind the wheel with the engine running. Jessica scrambled into the back seat, and Trooper was beside her before she finished closing the door.
"Go."
Forge didn't ask questions. The truck moved, gravel crunching, and they were through the back fence and onto the access road before Jessica remembered to breathe.
"Four minutes," Trooper said, checking his watch. "Faster than projected."
"I told you I could do sixty seconds."
He looked at her then—really looked, something shifting in his expression that she couldn't quite name.
"Yeah," he said quietly. "You did."
They drove for an hour.
Trooper spent most of it on the phone, coordinating with Ghost and the others, confirming that Osborne's men hadn't followed them.
Jessica listened without really hearing, her mind still back in that corridor—his hand over her mouth, his body pressed against hers, the absolute certainty that he would have killed for her without hesitation.
Should have been terrifying.
Wasn't.
"We'll stay at the cabin for now," he said, finally putting the phone away. "Osborne knows we hit the facility, but he doesn't know what we took or where we went. That buys us time."
"Time for what?"
"Time to plan the next move." He turned to face her, and she was suddenly very aware of how close they were in the back seat. "Those records you grabbed—they're going to tell us everything. Which units are compromised, who's paying for them, how long this has been running."
"And then?"
"Then we take them apart."
She should ask how. Should demand details, timelines, contingencies. That's what she did—managed operations, required accountability, never left anything to chance.
But Trooper was looking at her with something that wasn't quite professional distance, and she found herself asking a different question.
"Why do you plan everything?"
He blinked. "What?"
"The contingencies. The backup plans for backup plans. Ghost mentioned it at the bar—he said you plan for things other people don't imagine." She tilted her head. "Why?"
Trooper was quiet for a long moment.
"Because once I didn't," he said finally. "And men I was responsible for died."
The words landed heavy between them.
"Rangers. Fourteen years ago." His jaw tightened. "I planned a perfect operation. Every detail, every variable, every way it could go wrong. And it still went wrong, because the intel feeding my plan was lies."
"That wasn't your fault."
"They trusted my calculations. Trusted me to get them home." He looked away, out the window at the pines blurring past. "Five of them came home in boxes because I didn't verify the information myself."
Jessica didn't know what to say. Didn't know if there was anything to say.
So she did the only thing that felt right.
She reached over and took his hand.
Trooper went still. His fingers were calloused, warm, and after a moment they curled around hers with a grip that was almost desperate.
"I'm going to plan every contingency for this operation," he said, voice rough. "Every variable, every exit route, every way it could go wrong. And when it's over, you're going to walk away safe. That's not a promise—that's a fact."
"Because you don't trust anyone else's planning."
"Because I don't trust anyone else with you."
The words hung in the air.
Jessica felt heat creep up her neck. "I'm not—"
"You walked into my bar and trusted me to keep you alive. You pushed back when I said no, made your case, and proved you were right." His thumb traced a circle on the back of her hand. "You're not a liability, Jessica. You're an asset. And I protect my assets."
"That's very... tactical."
"I'm a tactical person." But something in his expression softened. "I'm also a person who hasn't held someone's hand in longer than I can remember. So maybe we're both figuring this out as we go."
The truck turned onto a gravel road, the cabin coming into view through the trees.
Jessica didn't let go of his hand.
"Backup plans," she said quietly. "You mentioned you have them for everything."
"Everything."
"Do you have a backup plan for what happens if this"—she squeezed his hand—"turns into something you didn't expect?"
Trooper was silent for a long moment.
Then: "I'm working on it."
Jessica smiled despite everything.
She could live with that.