Page 51 of Unplanned Target

But I don’t have a choice. This is my job. It’s what I do. What I’m good at. It’s why I found her in the first place. And it’s probably better if she sees the reality of life with me before things go any further between us.

“I’ll be ready.” Standing from my chair, I reach a hand for Miranda.

She gives Pierce a final look before sliding her palm into mine and following me out of the office and back to my room. She stays silent until we’re inside, but then the questions start. And they don’t begin where I’m expecting them to.

“Was Tony a dick to you?” She crosses both arms over her chest, frowning. “Because he better not have been.”

“No. He wasn’t a dick.” Close, but not quite. “It’s probably good I’ll be out of the picture for the next week. It will give him time to calm down.”

Miranda angles a brow at me. “If he wasn’t a dick, why does he need to calm down?”

“Being understandably upset because I punched him in the face over his sister, and being a dick are two totally different things.” I grab the bag I take on ops from the closet and go to work filling it. “The conversation was heated, but it didn’t get out of control.”

I made my position clear—that he better not fucking talk to his sister like that again—and Butch did the same.

Unfortunately for him, Butch’s position is that I leave his sister alone, and that’s not happening. Not permanently, anyway. She will technically be without me for a week, but I’ll be back.

And he’s going to have to get over it.

“As long as he didn’t try to hit you back.” Miranda looks me over, as if she’s seeking out any sign of violence. “He didn’t hit you back, right?”

“No. He did not.” Honestly, I’m not sure Butch could have hit anything after wearing himself out banging on my door the way he did. I practically had to carry him back to the infirmary because just that amount of exertion had him close to passing out.

“Fine. I won’t kick his ass then.” Miranda’s eyes follow me around the room as she sits on the edge of the bed. “Do you know where you’re going?”

“My best guess is Alaska, but it could be anywhere. I won’t know until I’m on the plane.” I add socks and underwear to the bag. “And I won’t necessarily stay where I start.”

Miranda nods, rubbing both hands down the front of her thighs. “Will you be able to call me?”

I pause, shocked at how hard this is. I’ve watched Zeke and Maddox leave and never thought twice about how they felt walking away from Savannah and Audrey. Mostly because I was envious. Wanted to have someone home waiting for me.

But the thought of Miranda being here while I’m out there turns my stomach. The worry she might feel not knowing where I’m at or what I’m doing. The fear of whether or not I’m safe.

And this is how it’s always going to be. Shadow isn’t like Alpha or Beta. We frequently go on missions no one knows about. Missions like the one starting in forty-five minutes.

Dropping my bag to the floor, I turn and walk to where she sits, dropping to a crouch in front of her. “No. I won’t.” I rest my hands on her hips, studying her face. “And you can’t call me. It’s too dangerous to risk identifying my location.”

“That makes sense.” Miranda takes a deep breath. “Will Heidi or Pierce be able to at least tell me whether or not you’re okay?”

“Heidi is probably who you’re more likely to get information out of.” Not because Pierce wouldn’t tell her, but because Heidi honestly knows more than Pierce does about what every team is doing on any given day. She’s got her hand in almost everything that happens at Alaskan Security.

And a hell of a lot that happens outside of it.

“Okay.” Miranda gives me a weak smile. “That’s good.” She presses her lips together for a second. “You’re going to be okay, right?”

Reaching up, I curl a lock of dark hair behind her ear. “I’m going to be okay. I do this all the time.”

It’s both a good and a bad thing. It means I have plenty of experience keeping myself safe. It also means this will happen again. And again. And again. It’s something Miranda will have to get used to if things progress between us the way I hope they will.

“That’s why I’m not dead.” Her hands come to my arms, sliding up to my shoulders. “So just promise you’ll keep yourself as safe as you kept me.”

“I promise.” I pause, hesitating as I think through what I want to tell her. It might be too much. Too soon.

But what if I don’t get this chance again? What if this is the one time I make a mistake? The time I don’t come back.

“Even when I didn’t have a reason to make it out alive, I still did.” I give a single shake of my head. “I’m sure as hell not going to die when there’s so much here waiting for me.”

Miranda takes a deep breath, her chest expanding on the inhale. “I wish we had more time to talk about things before you go.”