Then he walks over. He crouches in front of me.
“Look at me.”
I look up. His face is grim, dirt-streaked.
“You survived the apartment,” he says. “You survived the jump. You survived the drive.”
“This is different. I’m exhausted.”
“You are carrying a twenty-pound emotional load.” He unbuckles his pack.
“What are you doing?”
“Give me your sweater.”
“What?”
“It’s cotton. It’s wet. Cotton kills. It holds moisture against your skin.” He opens his pack. Pulls out a thermal tactical shirt. “Put this on.”
“I’m not stripping in the woods.”
“Cassie, look at your fingernails.”
I look. They are blue.
“Hypothermia,” he says. “Stage one. Confusion. Shivering. Poor coordination. If you don’t get dry and warm, your heart stops. Put on the shirt.”
He turns his back again. “I’m watching the perimeter. Change.”
I fumble with my sweater. Pull it over my head. The cold air bites my skin. I’m wearing a thin camisole underneath, soaked with sweat.
I peel it off. For a second, I am bare in the freezing woods. Vulnerable.
I pull on his shirt.
It’s massive on me. The sleeves hang past my hands. But it’s dry. And it’s warm. It smells like him—gun oil, cedar, and man.
The scent wraps around me. It feels safer than the cabin. Safer than my apartment.
“Done,” I say.
He turns back. His eyes sweep over me, checking the fit. He nods.
“Better?”
“Warmer.”
“Let’s go.”
He shoulders his pack.
“Diego?”
He pauses, doesn’t correct me.
“Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me yet. We still have five miles.”
