"Did Rhea mention the new email?"
"She told me. The fact that he noticed a three-day gap in your posting means he's monitoring your accounts in real time. That's not casual. That's surveillance behavior."
I wrap both hands around my coffee mug. "I know what it is."
"You've been managing this alone. That stops now." His voice is calm but absolute. The commander giving orders. "I've also reached out to Logan. He's looping in Sawyer McKenna, who's the sheriff down in Grizzly Ridge and has law enforcement resources for this kind of thing. And Dan Whitmore, who ran protection operations for years. Between Cal's team and the Grizzly Ridge network, we'll have complete coverage."
I stare at him. "You mobilized an entire veteran community in one morning."
"I mobilized people who protect the people they care about. That's what we do."
The people they care about. He says it so simply. Like it's obvious. Like I'm already part of a community I've known about for less than a week, claimed by a man I've known for less than that, and the entire infrastructure of his life has reorganized to include me without hesitation.
I've spent my entire adult life being a guest. In countries, in towns, in people's stories. I show up, I observe, I document, I leave. No one has ever rearranged their world to make room for me because no one has ever expected me to stay long enough to require room.
Cory Matthews built me a room before I even knew I wanted one.
"I need to call Rhea back," I say, standing. "There's something I need to discuss with her about the article."
"The article?"
"The piece for Altitude. I need to figure out how to write it without creating a location map for Garrett. If I publish detailsabout Mountain Ready, about you, about where this school is and how to get here, I'm handing him exactly what he needs."
Cory's expression goes very still. "You'd kill the article."
"I'm considering modifying it. Anonymizing the location. Using a different name for the school."
"That defeats the purpose. The whole point of the piece was to put Mountain Ready on the map."
"I know." I set my mug down. "And I'm telling you that putting Mountain Ready on the map might also put a target on it. On you."
He stands. Crosses to me. Puts his hands on my shoulders and turns me to face him.
"Shelby. Look at me."
I look at him. Those blue eyes are fierce and clear and burning with something that makes my throat tight.
"You don't change your work for him. You don't diminish your career for him. You don't give one inch of the life you've built to a man who doesn't deserve to breathe the same air as you. I have sixty acres of fortified wilderness, eleven years of combat experience, and a network of the most dangerous men in the country. Rhea Alvarez is running his digital footprint as we speak and Cal Hayes has personally committed Salt and Steel resources to your case. If this guy wants to come to my mountain, I welcome the opportunity."
My eyes burn. I blink it back because crying before seven a.m. is not part of my brand.
"You can't just adopt my problems," I whisper.
"I'm not adopting your problems." He tips my chin up. "I'm telling you that your problems are my problems now. Because you're mine. We established this. It's not up for debate."
I grab the front of his pants and pull him toward me and kiss him with everything I have. All the fear and gratitude and the enormous, terrifying love that I haven't said out loud yet but thathe can probably taste on my mouth because this man reads me like I'm written in a language only he speaks.
He kisses me back. Deep and slow and thorough. Then he pulls away and presses his forehead to mine.
"Write the article," he says. "Write it exactly the way it deserves to be written. Full name, full location, full truth. And then we deal with whatever comes."
"Together?"
"Together."
I spend the morning on the satellite phone with Rhea while Cory does his storm damage assessment of the property. The conversation is clinical and thorough. Rhea walks me through the counter-stalking protocol, what Cal's team can do remotely, what will require on-the-ground coordination with Sawyer and the Grizzly Ridge network.
"Pattern analysis shows he's West Coast based," Rhea tells me. "Email routing goes through Portland and Seattle nodes consistently. He's tech-savvy enough to use anonymizing tools but sloppy enough that his timing patterns are predictable. Cal thinks he's escalating, though."
