Page 32 of Ranger's Honor
"I may not be your backup, Dalton, or a Texas Ranger or even your partner in the field—but I am your fated mate and I love you. I won't be left behind. I've already bled for this—well maybe not bled, but you know what I mean. I'm the one who’s carrying Sookie’s torch and connecting the dots no one else can see. If you walk out that door without me, I’ll still find my own way there. So your choice isn't whether or not I go, it's whether or not I go with you."
There’s steel in her tone. That fierce, unyielding resolve that drives me insane—and draws me like a magnet. I grind my jaw. "I love you too, but you don’t follow orders worth shit."
"No. I don't, but I am following the truth. And right now, that truth’s waiting at the end of a broken pier."
She’s impossible. And she’s right.
Every instinct I have screams to keep her safe, lock her in the goddamn house if I have to—but there’s something in her eyes that stops me. Not defiance. Not even stubbornness. It’s conviction. A fire that mirrors the same relentless drive that’s been clawing under my skin since the moment Sookie’s name entered our lives. She’s not trained for this. She doesn’t have a Ranger’s clearance or a soldier’s edge. But she has courage—and a mind sharp enough to make even my team sit up and pay attention.
I hate that I admire it. Hate more that it hits like a spark to dry tinder, sharpening every instinct I have until all I want is to protect what’s mine.
And yet, I also know this: I trust her. More than I trust most men I’ve bled beside. And that trust? It costs everything.
So yeah. She’s right. And it may well be the death of me.
Forty minutes later, we’re slipping into the ruins of the old South Pier. Rusted beams claw at the sky, skeletal against the shifting clouds. The boardwalk groans under our weight, warped and splintered from years of storms. Salt and aged wood hang heavy in the air. I take it all in, not with regret or hesitation, but with the sharp focus of a man who knows exactly why he’s here—and who he’s here for. The awareness of her is constant, a steady thrum under my skin, sharpening every sense. She’s close, within reach, and nothing in this place or beyond it will keep me from protecting what’s mine.
Somewhere deeper in the structure, a rusted girder creaks against the wind, long and low like a groan. The distant crash of waves echoes beneath the floorboards, their rhythm muffled by the warped boards underfoot.
Shadows stretch across broken rides and collapsed scaffolding, flickering with the intermittent hum of a failing security lamp. Each step echoes faintly, the sound swallowed fast by the ocean's pulse. I keep Kari behind me, her hand at my lower back.
Elias steps out of the shadows like he’s always been part of them. He’s lean, pale under the glare of a flickering light, eyes darting like he expects a bullet through the skull.
"You got two minutes," he says.
"Then don’t waste them," I growl. "The Reaper. Where is he?"
Elias flinches. "He’s close. Tracking movements. Watching the network for cracks. But he’s not just killing anymore."
Kari steps forward. "What do you mean?"
Elias’ eyes flick to Kari, then back to me. "He’s unraveling people. Targets fated pairs. Doesn’t want them dead—wants them destroyed from the inside out. Love, trust, stability. He severs it. Then he finishes the job."
Kari goes still beside me. I feel the tremor in her body, subtle at first, like a shiver caught between fear and rage. My arm instinctively presses closer, anchoring her to my side. The air around us sharpens. I hear the breath she pulls in—too fast, too shallow—and my wolf stirs with a low, silent growl of protectiveness. I want to drag her back, tuck her behind me, shield her from every word that just carved into her heart. But I don’t. Because I know her. She’s processing, not panicking. Still, the need to protect her ignites like wildfire through my chest, primal and fierce. She’s mine. And he’s coming for her.
"He’s fixated," Elias continues, his tone grim. "On her. The Reaper knows if he takes her out, he can cripple the investigation—and more than that, he can gut you and Gideon in one move. That coyote-shifter’s obsessed with making sure no one walks away from him whole."
Kari flinches, a flicker of something bleak flashing across her face. The words hit too close. She remembers the hollowed look in her brother’s eyes after Maggie’s near miss—the grief that lingered even in survival. And now that same threat circles her, clamping tight around her chest like a noose she didn’t know was there until it pulled taut.
Kari’s voice is tight, almost brittle. "Why?"
"Because he didn’t survive what was done to him," Elias says, his tone flat but edged with something that sounds almost like a warning.
"What was done to him?" asks Kari, her voice softening.
"It doesn't matter. Bad shit happening to you doesn't give you a license to kill and terrorize." The silence that follows humssharp in my ears. I step forward, pressing a hand to Elias’s chest. "If you’re lying..."
"I’m not. But you’re running out of time. He’s circling. And she’s marked. That’s why I called. This squares me with you and your team."
I nod. "For now, but leave Texas and don't ever come back."
He nods at Kari. A low growl churns in my throat as I step forward, shoulders squared, every muscle locked and ready. My hand curls into a fist, not from hesitation—but restraint. If he’d looked at her wrong, breathed wrong, I might’ve buried him right here in the rotting wood beneath our boots.
We’re back at the house before midnight, and she doesn’t say much. Neither do I. Her eyes stay on me like she’s trying to figure out which part of what Elias said has rattled me most.
I already know. It’s the part where she’s in the crosshairs.
She disappears into the bedroom. I give her space. But the silence that follows isn’t relief—it’s a hollow ache that scrapes at my resolve. I tell myself to stay put, to give her the distance she might need, but it’s a lie I don’t believe. When I hear the soft rustle of sheets and the distant click of a lamp going out, I move—pulled by something I don’t want to name and can’t ignore. My steps are silent as I cross the room and stand in the doorway.
