The silence that followed felt heavier than the road beneath them.
“Maybe he’s keeping her close,” Alena suggested. “Somewhere near Cedar Ridge.” Her fingers flew over her phone. “I’m texting Noah. He needs to check every building and residence in the area.”
Within seconds, Noah’s reply came back, and Alena relayed it to him. “On it. I’ll update as soon as I know more.”
Cal pushed the SUV faster, the tension in his chest refusing to ease.
The drive felt endless, but at last the stone markers of Cedar Ridge came into view. The facility sat tucked deep into the Texas Hill Country, rolling limestone ridges and clusters of oak wrapping around the property like a shield.
This wasn’t anything like a standard nursing home. The creator of Crossfire Ops, Owen Striker, had built it with a different vision, a sanctuary for wounded warriors with resources most hospitals could only dream about.
The buildings blended with the land, all pale stone and broad porches that looked like they belonged in the landscape. Pathways curved through manicured grounds, and beyond them were open stretches of wild grass and cedar. Everything about it spoke of peace and strength, a place designed to heal.
Cal lowered his window at the gatehouse and flashed his Crossfire Ops ID. Alena did the same. The guard checked, nodded, and lifted the barrier. The SUV eased inside, winding up the drive toward the main buildings.
The moment Cal parked, both he and Alena were out, doors slamming behind them. The heat hit hard, the air heavy with sun, but neither slowed their pace.
David was inside. That was all that mattered.
Cal and Alena broke into a run across the front walk. The glass doors slid open as someone familiar stepped out to greet them. Jackson Ward, one of Crossfire’s most experienced operatives.
“David’s in one of the safe rooms,” Jackson immediately informed them.
Cal gave a sharp nod. He’d been here dozens of times and knew exactly where those rooms were. They were built intothe heart of the facility, more like fortified panic rooms than anything else.
He and Alena hurried down the main corridor, shoes pounding on polished stone. The air carried the faint scent of cedar from the beams that stretched high overhead. Light streamed in from wide windows, spilling across artwork and quiet seating areas, but Cal barely registered any of it. The place had been designed to soothe and restore, yet today it felt like a fortress under siege.
They cut through a broad atrium where indoor gardens thrived under skylights, then turned into a narrower hallway. Cal recognized the wing that led to the safe rooms.
Thomas Greer stepped out from a side corridor, his security badge clipped to his chest, shoulders squared. “He’s fine,” Greer said at once, voice steady. “David’s inside with the others.”
“Anyone hurt in the shooting?” Cal asked.
“No,” Greer replied. “But I locked down the place in case the man tried to come back.”
“Thank you,” Cal said.
Greer gave a short nod and keyed open the reinforced door. The lock disengaged with a solid click, and he swung it wide.
The safe room was larger than Cal remembered, its walls lined with reinforced panels and ventilation discreetly built into the ceiling. Four patients were inside, two in wheelchairs and another on a gurney, each watched over by two nurses who moved quietly among them.
David sat in a wheelchair near the far wall, his posture as straight as he could manage. Relief spread through Cal’s chest at the sight of him. His sandy blond hair caught the overhead light, the scars on his head still visible where it had been shaved years ago for the surgeries. His left arm lay slack across his lap, unmoving, a constant reminder of what the bullet had stolen.Despite that, his smile was steady, and his eyes lit up when he saw them.
Cal’s gaze lingered on him, noting the subtle twitch in his fingers and remembering the seizures that sometimes came without warning. Every one of them had left David weaker, but never without that same unshaken warmth.
One of the nurses stepped to the side and opened a smaller adjoining door. Inside was a private space outfitted with a bed and a bank of gaming equipment, clearly meant to keep a patient comfortable if the stay stretched long.
They had planned for everything here, even this.
David wheeled himself forward with a wide grin, his good arm reaching first for Alena, then for Cal. He hugged them with a warmth that cut straight through Cal’s defenses. There was always something childlike in David now, an innocence left behind after the damage to his brain.
Cal slipped his hand into Alena’s, the old habit sliding into place. To David, they were still the couple they had once been, and Cal would keep that illusion alive for him.
David leaned back in his chair, studying them with puzzlement. “Why do you both look so anxious?” His voice was clear, touched with curiosity. Then, almost shyly, he asked, “Is Alena finally pregnant?”
The words hit like a blow. Cal’s chest tightened as brutal memories rushed in. The hospital’s sterile walls. Alena pale and broken in the bed. The endless days of pain he could do nothing to ease. David fighting his own battles down the hall, surgeries and seizures stealing pieces of him he would never get back.
Dexter’s bullet had ripped into both of them that night. For David, the damage that left him in this chair, his left side nearly useless. For Alena, wounds deep inside that no one could see. The hysterectomy had taken what they had dreamed of together,the child they had planned for. It had been the last straw, the crack that split their marriage wide open.
