"We haven't discussed—" Sarah started.
"We're discussing it now." The Admiral's expression was all business, but his eyes crinkled with warmth. "Knight Tactical needs a financial specialist. Someone who can follow money trails and work with the team in the field. Interested?"
Sarah's mouth opened. Closed. Opened again.
"I... I have a seventeen-slide presentation about why you should hire me."
"I'm sure you do." Now he was definitely fighting a smile. "Email it to me. Consider it a formality. The job's yours if you want it."
"I want it," Sarah said immediately.
"Good. Report to Hope Landing next Monday. Griff can show you around." He turned to leave, then paused. "Oh, and Ms. Winters? Excellent work with the bear spray. Not many people can take down our Ghost."
He left. Sarah turned to Griff, who was grinning.
"Did that just happen?"
"A hundred percent. Welcome to Knight Tactical," he said. "Where everything's made up and the PowerPoints don't matter."
She kissed him then, right there in the hospital room with morning light streaming in and their whole future spread before them. When they broke apart, she reached for the evidence bags.
"These belong to you," she said, holding out Tank's tags.
"Negative. Tank's tags are yours. You finished his mission." He touched the tags gently. "He would want you to have them."
Sarah nodded, fastening them around her neck. Then she picked up the evidence bag with her father's cross, her heart hammering.
"I have something for you," she said, pulling out the silver cross.
"Sarah, that's your father's?—"
"I know what it is." She held it out to him. "Dad wore this his entire career. Mom gave it to me when she died. She said I'd know when I found the right person to share it with."
Griff's hands stayed at his sides. "I’m not worthy of that."
"Negative, Captain Hawkins. You are." Her voice shook slightly. "You came back to faith through this mission. Through Tank. Through us. Dad would have understood that journey—he had his own dark nights of the soul."
"Sarah—"
"Please." She stepped closer. "You saved me. You walked back into faith to do it. Let me give you something to remind you that the Lord is still there, even when things get dark."
Griff's eyes were bright with unshed tears, but he stopped protesting.
She reached up, fastening it around his neck herself. "You're exactly who my father would have wanted to wear this. A warrior who protects others. A man who found his way back to God. The man I love."
The cross settled against his chest. Griff's hand came up to touch it reverently.
"Thank you," he whispered, pulling her close. "I'll honor it. Honor him."
"I know you will."
Leaning into him, Sarah ran her thumb over the cross at the base of his throat. "Tank would think this is crazy. Me with his tags, you with my cross, both of us alive when we shouldn't be."
"Tank would think this is perfect," Griff corrected. "He always said God works in mysterious ways. Pretty sure bear spray qualifies as mysterious."
They stood there for a moment, looking at each other. Tank's tags gleamed against Sarah's chest. Her father's cross caught the light against Griff's. Two legacies, two faiths, two hearts finally finding their way home.
Sarah saw everything in his eyes—the grief that was finally healing, the faith that was slowly returning, the love he'd been too scared to voice. And she knew he could see the same in hers—the courage she'd found, the family she'd gained, the future she was choosing.
