She’d become theirs to protect.
Histo protect.
And David Jones had never failed in protecting something he cared about. He wasn’t about to start now.
“Come on.” His legs protested when he stood, stiff from crouching and then riding, but he ignored the discomfort. “Let’s go see what our new friend has to say.”
They walked towards the security entrance, comfortable knowing that not every moment needed words. The path was level under David’s feet, routine after years of traversing it at all hours.
Tonight, something felt different.
Maybe it was the adrenaline still trickling through his body, the aftermath of successful action. Maybe it was the weight of what they’d learned and what they still needed to discover. Maybe it was Nick’s words about being allowed to want things, to have things, echoing in his mind like a permission he’d never quite given himself before.
Maybe it was simply that for the first time in weeks, they weren’t reacting. They were planning. They had leverage. They had momentum.
They had hope.
David’s tablet hummed against his palm, the resort’s systems singing their electronic song, everything functioning as it should. Secure. Protected.
For now.
Tonight, ‘for now’ was enough. In his experience, safety developed one moment at a time, one decision at a time, one protective measure at a time.
Tonight had been one more step toward ensuring that safety would last.
The rest would come.
It had to.
Chapter 44
Aftershock
The security officewas quiet in the early hours with a stillness that sharpened the senses. The fluorescent lights hummed overhead, casting a sterile glow over the gray-painted interrogation room that they fondly called the Secure Interview Room. Zach called it his Back Office.
It had once been a mundane office, left over from the resort’s early construction contract. After David and Zach had gotten their hands on it, it had been outfitted for intimidation: blank walls, a straight-backed chair bolted to the floor, and a single desk far enough away to make a man feel like a specimen under glass.
David and Nick strode inside, letting the heavy door seal behind them with a solid thunk that reverberated in David’s ribs. The air stunk of coffee, sweat, and fresh paint—the clean chemical scent of a stage set for discomfort.
Zach leaned against the opposite wall, one boot crossed over the other, arms loose at his sides. His stance might appear lazy, but the energy pulsing off him was pure coiled threat, the kind that made trained soldiers second-guess themselves. His dark shirt clung sweat-slick to the edges of his body armor, his jawshadowed from a day without a shave, and his eyes… ice in a summer storm.
Zach lifted his chin to them as though time were his plaything. “Thought you might want in,” he said, voice measured and easy. Not even winded. “So we waited.”
David’s attention flicked to the prisoner.
Mid-thirties. Sweating bullets. He was handcuffed to the chair; shoulders hunched, breathing raggedly. His eyes darted between the three of them, filled with the uneasy awareness that the rules he thought they were playing by… didn’t apply here.
“I have nothing to say to you,” the man snapped, anger sharp but hollow. “This is false imprisonment. You can’t keep me here. You have no legal?—”
Zach simply smiled. Slow. Real. And utterly terrifying.
David saw it strike the man like a punch. Color fled his face, his words dried up, and he shifted, the cuffs rattling. Too late now.
Zach stepped forward with almost theatrical calm, pulling his phone from an inner vest pocket. His boots were silent on the floor—no stomp, no echo, only the subtle scrape of intent. He tapped something on the screen, then reached down and grabbed the cuffed man’s wrists, twisting the arms until the guy gasped and flinched away.
“Hold still,” Zach rammed the man’s thumb against the scanner lit on the phone’s surface. The bone-deep groan that followed echoed enough to make Nick wince.
“There. That wasn’t so hard, now was it?” Zach pocketed his phone with a shake of his head, voice almost chipper. “This won’t take long. Anyone want coffee?”
