“A week, maybe.” Jesse rubs the back of his neck. “Maybe two.”
“And you’re telling me now?”
“You were in Nova Scotia,” he says. “And before that, you were—” He cuts himself off, but the implication hangs between us.
You were with her.Distracted.
I ignore the dig. “What else?”
“That’s it so far. But I don’t like the timing.”
“Neither do I.”
I stand there for a moment, staring at the ruined crates, the footsteps, the way the grass around the site lies flat as if something heavy landed there. Or crouched there. Watched.
Heat flares under my skin. Anger sharp enough to taste. Everything feels like it’s slipping. My focus. The neat lines of my empire smudging under a hand I can’t see.
Maybe because part of me isn’t looking at the lines anymore.
Part of me is looking at the woman who stood in my private quarters this morning with her breath caught on a single word. Part of me is looking at a child who looks at the ocean as if it speaks to her. Part of me is stretched thin between something I’ve never wanted and something I can’t afford to lose.
That fracture is exactly the kind of thing an enemy syndicate would exploit.Do they know?Do they know about Roxanne or Andi? It would be devastating. I’d kill. I’d burn through this entire state for them.
“Put everyone on alert,” I say.
“All outdoorsmen?” Jesse asks.
“Yes, quietly.” My voice sharpens. “I don’t want panic or gossip. But if there’s anyone out there, we'll find them. And we will find them first.”
Jesse nods. “Copy that.”
“And Jesse,” I add, my voice slowing with the weight of it, “tell your guides to keep tourists out of that area. Make something up if you need to.”
He snorts. “I’ll tell them there’s a horny moose in the brush.”
“Something believable.”
He cracks a smile. “That is believable.”
I shake my head, exasperated, and he heads for the door, slinging his coat over his shoulder. When the door shuts, the office goes still.
Too still.
Even with the late summer sun leaning golden against the windows, the room feels dim. I lean my hands on the desk, folding forward, head down for a moment, letting the tension settle into a shape I can name.
Someone is pushing into my territory. Someone bold and organized. Was burning that shipment a threat or a game? A move to take hold?
I’ll have to reach out to my partners in Toronto, let them know they’ll be missing about fifty semi-automatics, ten ghost guns, two ammo crates, and C4.
The real problem is that I’m distracted enough for them to try.
I grit my teeth. That fact alone twists something dangerous inside me.
It’s been years since I've let anything personal get in the way of the job. Years since I let anyone close enough to tug on the chain that keeps every part of my world upright. But one night six years ago—one night I never thought I’d see again—turned out not to be a loose thread, but the seam of something that’s unraveling me.
I straighten, the room spinning just enough to make me aware of how long the day has been. How tired I am. Not physically. Something else; something deeper.
My bathroom is through a small hallway, the door half open. I push it the rest of the way, letting the warm light spill out. The space is simple: stone tiles, steam glass, drawers of folded towels, the faint scent of cedar from the sauna across the hall.
