"I can't take those."
"You're going into danger tomorrow because of what he started. Because of what he discovered." Griff moved behind her, gently putting the chain over her head. The metal was warm from his skin. "He would have wanted you protected."
The tags settled against her chest, heavier than she expected. "This feels wrong. I didn't even know him."
"You know what he stood for. What he died trying tostop." Griff's hands lingered on her shoulders for a moment. "That's enough."
She turned to face him, one hand closing around the tags. "I can’t take these."
“It’s a loan. The minute this mission clears, I want them back. Copy?”
“You’re going to be on the front lines. You need the luck.”
"I've got something better." His eyes held hers. "I've got you watching my six tomorrow. Tank would approve."
The weight of his trust, of Tank's tags, of tomorrow's responsibility—it should have crushed her. Instead, it felt like armor.
She let out a long breath. “Okay. A loan. The minute we win, I’m giving these back.”
He grinned. “Deal.”
Later, alone in her room, Sarah looked at her tactical gear laid out for tomorrow. The mobile command unit. Sixty seconds to save lives.
She knelt beside the bed. "Lord, steady my hands tomorrow. Clear my mind. Help me see what needs to be seen." She paused. "And thank You for bringing Griff back to his team. To You. Keep drawing him home."
Through her window, she could see Griff standing watch by the water, but his posture was different. Less isolated. Less alone.
Tomorrow they'd walk into the storm.
Tonight, she'd found her place among these warriors. Not as one of them, but as herself—the analyst they trusted with their lives, the woman of faith who reminded them of Tank's quiet strength.
Tomorrow, she'd have sixty seconds to prove that trust was earned.
28
The food truck'sinterior hummed with electronic equipment. Griff adjusted his earbuds while watching Sarah transform Doc's mobile command center into a digital war room—laptops, multiple monitors, cables snaking across every surface. The smell of coffee and gunpowder lingered from Doc's morning preparations.
He should have been in position above the command center by now, settling into overwatch in the maintenance level. But at 1430 hours—ninety minutes before their planned approach—everything had changed.
"Ghost online," he said, the familiar weight of tactical comms flooding back after six months of silence.
"About time." Maya's voice, warm despite the words. "Thought you'd forgotten how to use comms."
"Children, focus." Ronan's interruption carried relief beneath the command. "Buckley moved up the timeline. We need eyes on?—"
"Problem." Deke's voice cut through, tense. "Our credentials just went red. All of them."
Griff's blood chilled. Through the truck's reinforcedwindow, he could see the Charleston Place Hotel's elegant facade two blocks away, its old-world architecture hiding modern dangers. They'd lost their primary approach.
"Define red."
"Flagged as persons of interest. Security has our photos." A pause. "Boss, there's Stillwater contractors at every checkpoint. They've locked down the Charleston Place."
"Classic misdirection." Doc's cultured voice cut through from her monitoring station. "Make you the threat while they execute the real plan. I've seen this playbook before—Prague, 1989. Same tactics, different decade."
Sarah's head snapped up from her screens. "Oh no. Griff, look at this."
She turned one laptop toward him. Knight Tactical's operational accounts—the ones only the team knew about—showed new activity. Transactions appearing in real-time. Deposits from shell companies with names that screamed foreign interference.
