He turned from the window, his expression serious but not unkind. “Your tactical leadership during The Eightfold Kings takedown was, to put it mildly, exemplary. Your record, in general, paints a picture of decisive, courageous, and brilliantly executed operations. You have delivered a significant blow to organized crime in this country.”
Blair kept her face a neutral mask, but a flicker of satisfaction warmed her chest. “It was a team effort, sir,” she said. She had done her job to the best of her ability. That would always be enough.
Dejardins nodded. “As a result, a position has opened. It’s a new posting, born directly from the success of this operation. We’re standing up a national-level Drug Interdiction Task Force, based in Ottawa. We need a commander to lead it. Someone with your field experience and your proven tactical acumen. We would like you to take the promotion and lead that task force.”
The words hung in the air, sharp and unreal. Inspector. Ottawa. National task force. It was a lightning strike. A career-making offer. A dream she hadn’t even known she was allowed to have. For a full three seconds, her mind simply refused to process the sentence. The blood drained from her face, a cold wave washing over her. Darrow’s gaze on her burned with a new intensity.
She finally found her voice, but it came out as a breathless whisper. “Sir… I… I don’t know what to say.”
A slow, vicious smile spread across Darrow’s face. It was a look of pure, unadulterated shock, but it was a shock that had curdled into something ugly and triumphant. He saw his opportunity. He saw his exit.
“You’re… you’re promoting her?” he sputtered, his voice a choked, incredulous gasp. He pointed a trembling finger at Blair, his composure shattering like cheap glass. “After the insubordination? She hijacked this operation right out from under me. Took over and continued to be?—”
“Successful, Superintendent Darrow,” Dejardins cut in, his voice turning to ice. He didn’t raise it, but the temperature in the room dropped by ten degrees. “You on the other hand have undermined her since she took this post. I have read the reports, and you’re already being reprimanded for failing to promote her and nurture her as an up-and-coming leader. The Americans have expressed to me how, even in the face of your disapproval and pettiness, she forged ahead, got the resources they needed, provided a stable leadership space, and used her brilliant mind for this very outcome. That is the only metric that matters in this room. Is that clear?”
Darrow’s mouth opened and closed like a fish on a dock. He was utterly deflated, his face a mottled purple of rage and humiliation. She suspected he thought she was going to be chastised, and instead, she had once again proved him wrong about who she was.
Blair barely saw him. Her world had narrowed to the chief superintendent’s calm, steady gaze. This was everything she should want. Except it seemed to complicate her life further. Instead of being in the field at WILD, she’d be behind a desk, and after that intense moment with Breakneck, she was thrown into a confusing rollercoaster ride. “If I could have some time to think about this.”
Darrow huffed a hard breath, clearly disgusted she wasn’t jumping at this chance to advance, but ladder climbing was his focus. It had never been hers.
Dejardins’s expression softened slightly. “This is a significant life change, Staff Sergeant. I understand that. Take until the end of the week.”
Blair nodded, her movements feeling stiff and automatic. “Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”
She turned and walked out of the office, the weight of the offer settling onto her shoulders like a lead cloak. Behind her, she could feel Darrow’s impotent, burning stare, but it didn't matter. The only thing she could feel was the terrifying, exhilarating, and utterly confusing freedom of a future she no longer recognized.
Breakneck watched her pace the length of the small conference room. She hadn’t sat down since she told him.
Inspector. Ottawa. National task force.
The words had landed like a round he hadn’t seen coming.
He leaned against the table, arms folded, posture loose by habit, but inside everything was coiled too tight. This wasn’t fear. He knew fear. Fear was clean. Sharp. Useful.
This was something else.
“This is big,” he said finally, his voice even, careful. “Hell of a promotion. Something you goddamned deserve.”
She stopped pacing and looked at him. Really looked. Like she was bracing for impact. “It is.”
He nodded once. He trusted himself to do that much without cracking. He didn’t trust himself to say more yet.
Ottawa meant distance. Command meant permanence.
It meant a future that didn’t line up with his life at all. Not because he was gone too much, but because her work, work she deserved to do, would place her somewhere out of his reach. She would be here, in Canada, rooted in a role that demanded her presence, her authority, her loyalty. He would go back to Virginia Beach. Back to the Teams. Back to a life that had no overlap with hers beyond time stolen in between deployments.
He already knew that wouldn’t be enough.
What he wanted with her was something he hadn’t ever thought would be possible, a woman in his life who was everything he never knew he could have.
There was no arguing that away. No compromise to be found. There wasn’t an equivalent position waiting for her where he lived, and even if there were, he wouldn’t ask her to give up what she’d earned. Being a Mountie already made relationships difficult. Ottawa made it final.
He was locked in too. Not just by contract, but by brotherhood.
The Navy wasn’t something he was passing through. The SEALs weren’t a phase he’d outgrow. Leaving them wasn’t an option without losing a part of himself he wasn’t sure he could sacrifice. They were the one constant that had never wavered, never lied to him, never left him guessing.
Except now his heart was involved.
