The federal sedan sped through rain-slicked streets, Anya driving with grim focus. In the backseat, Wade kept his gun on Reed, who slumped against the window, his earlier defiance gone.

‘You think you’re saving her?’ Reed suddenly laughed, a hollow sound. ‘Viktor doesn’t want her dead. He wants her broken—like he broke my daughter.’

Truenai froze beside Wade, her breath catching.

Reed’s eyes glistened with real pain, not greed. ‘She was a nurse too, until his men made her overdose. This is his revenge on anyone who defies him.’

Anya’s knuckles whitened on the wheel; this truth wasn’t in her files. Wade’s grip tightened on his weapon, the mission shifting from protection to redemption.

‘Where is she now?’ he demanded, the car plunging them deeper into a world where every rescue carried a ghost.

Reed turned his face to the streaked window. The rain blurred the streetlights into smears of gold. ‘She’s in a long-term care facility upstate. She doesn’t recognize me. Doesn’t recognize anyone. Just… exists.’ He swallowed, the sound thick. ‘Viktor visited me after. Told me he could make it right. All I had to do was look the other way a few times. Then a few more.’

Wade didn’t lower the gun. The barrel felt like an extension of his own fury. ‘So you sold out your own people. For what? The hope he’d leave her alone?’

‘For the hope he’d pay for the care she needs!’ Reed snapped, turning back. His face was raw. ‘You think the department’s insurance covers that? You think there’s a pension for a vegetable? I did what I had to do.’

‘You used me,’ Wade said, his voice low. ‘You used her.’ He didn’t specify which ‘her’ he meant. In the confined space, it meant both.

Truenai’s hand found Wade’s thigh. Not a tease. An anchor. Her fingers pressed into the tense muscle of his leg, right above the fresh bloom of blood on his jeans from his reopened wound. The contact was electric. Grounding. He felt her warmth seep through the fabric.

‘Captain,’ Truenai said, her nurse’s voice steady, gentle. ‘What’s her name?’

Reed looked at her, really looked, as if seeing the ghost he’d mentioned. His defiance crumpled. ‘Eleanor.’

‘Eleanor,’ Truenai repeated, and the name hung in the car, a soft, sacred thing amidst the metallic scent of blood and fear.

Anya broke the silence from the front seat, her eyes flicking to the rearview. ‘The facility. Name it.’

‘Sunrise Meadows,’ Reed murmured. ‘It’s a lie. There’s no sun there.’

Anya gave a tight nod, committing it to memory. The wipers thumped a steady rhythm. The car felt like a confessional on wheels, hurtling through the night.

Wade’s mind raced, connecting shattered pieces. Reed’s constant pressure to close the case quickly. His insistence on isolating Truenai. It wasn’t just clean-up. It was delivery. ‘The motel. You weren’t just tying up a loose end. You were handing her over.’

‘No,’ Reed said, weary. ‘I was supposed to secure her until a transport arrived. Sokolov’s men. They were going to take her to a private clinic. Not to kill her. To… keep her. A pet nurse for his operations. A trophy of his reach. Breaking her slowly was the point.’

Truenai’s hand tightened on Wade’s leg. He covered it with his own, his fingers lacing through hers. His thumb stroked the back of her knuckles. A silent promise. Not happening.

His own arousal was a blunt, inconvenient truth. It had nothing to do with the moment and everything to do with her touch, her proximity, the absolute trust in her grip while the world dissolved into chaos. His cock hardened, aching against the seam of his jeans, a visceral response to her survival, to her strength beside him. It was a defiant pulse of life.

He shifted slightly, the movement masked by the dark and the tension. Truenai felt it. Her gaze slid to his, a flash of understanding in the gloom. She didn’t pull her hand away. She pressed closer, her shoulder against his, the side of her breast a soft pressure against his arm.

‘The safe house Anya is taking us to,’ Wade said, forcing his voice to work. ‘Is it compromised?’

‘No,’ Anya stated. ‘It’s mine. FBI protocols. Reed had no access.’

‘You’re sure?’

‘I’m sure.’ Her eyes met his in the mirror. ‘But we have another problem. You’re bleeding, Deputy. And she,’ a glance at Truenai, ‘is shivering. Shock is setting in. We need to get inside. Now.’

The car turned into a residential neighborhood, rows of identical, dark townhouses. Anya pulled into the narrow driveway of an end unit and killed the engine. The sudden silence was deafening, filled only by the patter of rain on the roof.

‘Out,’ Anya ordered. ‘Quick and quiet. You,’ she pointed at Reed, ‘if you run, I will shoot you in the back and report you as an escaping hostile. Understood?’

Reed nodded, the fight utterly gone from him.

Wade moved first, pushing his door open, the gun never wavering from Reed. The cold night air hit his face, sharp with rain. He stood, his leg protesting with a hot spike of pain. Truenai slid out after him, her body instinctively close to his, seeking his heat. Anya came around, gripping Reed’s arm, and marched him toward the unmarked door.

Inside, it was dark and smelled of stale air and lemon cleaner. Anya flicked a switch, revealing a sparse living room: a couch, a chair, a blank television. A safe house, not a home.

‘Bathroom’s down the hall. First aid kit under the sink,’ Anya said, pushing Reed into the armchair. She produced a second set of zip-ties from a drawer and secured his ankles to the chair legs. ‘Don’t move.’

Truenai was already moving, the nurse in her overriding everything else. ‘Sit,’ she told Wade, pointing to the couch.

‘I need to—’

‘Sit.’ Her voice brooked no argument. ‘You’re leaving a trail of blood on the carpet.’

He sat. The cushions sighed under his weight. Truenai disappeared down the hall.

Anya stood watch over Reed, her posture rigid. ‘The wound. Is it bad?’

‘It reopened. It’s fine,’ Wade said, his eyes on Reed.