Page 13 of Oliver

Emery

Ididn’t sleep.

The bed was warm, the cottage quiet. But my mind wouldn’t shut off.

Every time I closed my eyes, I saw the cell where I was kept. The men who spoke in another language and treated me like a pawn in a game I didn’t understand.

I’d trained my whole life to be the fastest woman in the water. I wasn’t trained for this.

But I’d survived.

Barely.

But I did survive because these SEALs saved me.

I sat up, dragging the blanket tighter around me. The faint sound of waves crashing against the cliffs filtered through the cracked window. If I listened hard enough, I could pretend I was back in La Jolla, waking up before dawn to train.

But I wasn’t that girl anymore.

I padded out of the room, the wooden floor warm under my feet. Oliver was on the couch, half-asleep with his arms folded across his chest, boots still on.

He looked… tired. But alert, even now. Like his body refused to rest until he was sure I was safe.

He stirred as I stepped closer. His hand instinctively reached toward his waistband—then relaxed when he saw me.

“Couldn’t sleep?” he murmured.

I shook my head.

He shifted, sitting upright. “Nightmares?”

“No,” I whispered. “Just memories.”

His jaw tightened, and he moved aside, patting the couch.

I sat, knees pulled to my chest, arms wrapped around them. “I keep trying to make sense of it. Why me? Why now?”

Oliver didn’t answer right away. “Sometimes bad people don’t need a good reason. Sometimes they just think they can get away with it.”

Silence.

Then I asked the question I’d been avoiding.

“What if this isn’t over?”

Oliver looked at me, eyes steady and unwavering. “Then we’ll finish it.”

We.

Notyou.Notme.We.

I didn’t know what to do with that.

“I’m not used to someone taking care of me,” I admitted. “Even as a kid, I did everything on my own. Swim. School. Press. My dad was always deployed. My mom…loved me, but she didn’t understand the pressure.”

Oliver nodded. “I know what that’s like.”

I glanced over, studying him. “You do?”

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