"So how did you find me?" I press. "Who sent you?"
His jaw works like he's deciding how much truth to give me. "Overheard some people talking. Followed them."
I process that for three full seconds. "You overheard? You're telling me you just happened to overhear where I was being held and decided to mount a one-man rescue operation?"
"Something like that."
"Something like—" I lean forward, ignoring the way it makes my head pound. "Where's your team?"
Silence. Just the hum of the engine and the roadnoise.
"Where is your team?"
"I don't have one." He says it like he's reporting the weather. "Not on this."
The implications hit me all at once. "You went rogue. For someone you've never met. Why?"
"Because you had three hours before they moved you. Guardian HRS couldn't spin up that fast."
At least that confirms one thing. He’s an operative for Guardian HRS.
"Three hours?" My voice rises despite my attempt to control it. "How do you know I had three hours?"
"Because I heard them say it." He glances at me, and there's something in his eyes I can't quite read. Something that looks almost like guilt. "In a bar in Nogales. Two cartel members talking about a pickup. Three hours. After you signed whatever they needed you to sign."
I stare at him, trying to make sense of this. "So you just... followed them. With no backup. No authorization. No idea who I was or what you were walking into."
"Yeah."
"That's insane."
"Probably."
"You could have been killed."
"Wouldn't be the first time I took that risk."
Something in the way he says it makes me look closer. There's a weight to those words, a history I'm not privy to. And under his shirt, I can see the edge of dog tags—but they don't sit quite right. Like they're not his.
"You saved my life," I say finally.
"That's the job."
"It's not your job."
He doesn't respond, just keeps driving, keeps checking mirrors like he expects pursuit any second. And maybe he does. Maybe I should, too.
My fingers find the trust documents in my lap, trace the bloodstains. Tyler's name right next to mine. Both signatures required.Four hundred thousand dollars that our mother left us, that we agreed to never touch except in emergencies.
Tyler said the cartel thinks Mother left us something valuable. Said they were torturing him for information about where it is.
But if that were true, why would they need my signature on a trust fund we both already know about?
The pieces don't fit, and that wrongness sits in my stomach like swallowed glass.
We drive for another twenty minutes before Frost turns off the highway onto a dirt road I almost miss in the darkness. The truck bounces over ruts and rocks, and every jolt sends fresh pain through my skull. I bite down on the inside of my cheek to keep from making a sound.
Ahead, a structure materializes from the darkness—a low-slung ranch house, single story, windows dark. There's a barn off to one side, half-collapsed, and a rusted water tower that probably hasn't held water in decades.
