Page 40 of Defending Van

2:46 P.M.

Disappearing straight after Makayla was sold would have been a blatant statement that there was something different about him.

Van never cared when the women were sold. Usually, he was relieved because they were Prey’s responsibility now. His job wasn't to rescue them, it was to stop the same thing that had happened to them from happening to anyone else. He’d always taken his job seriously, because, well, what else did he have?

No family, no friends, no hobbies. His job was his life, which made it easy for him to sacrifice months of his life to being undercover. Sometimes he’d adopt hobbies for a persona, like here at Azure, he was the guy who was obsessed with movies and was always glued to one screen or another, but in his real life, he had nothing. Moved from one undercover gig to another, occasionally went to a Prey event if he wasn't undercover, but only if Falcon made him feel like it was unavoidable.

For the last two decades, he’d been able to shut himself off from everyone, feeling nothing for another person, no matter what they were going through. He’d been able to compartmentalize like a pro, and he’d never had to worry about emotions getting in the way of anything he did.

Until now.

Until one woman didn't cry and beg when he caned her.

Until one woman threatened to slit his throat.

Until one woman showed him kindness when she owed him the opposite.

Now that woman was gone, and he couldn’t think of anything else but getting her back.

It had been well over twenty-four hours since he injected the drugs into her system and held her in his arms while she passed out. The trust she showed him was staggering, and it had almost brought him to his knees. Probably would have if he wasn't cradling something precious.

And Makayla was precious. He had no idea how she did it, no idea how she’d come out the other side of her childhood ordeal without bitterness and anger, how she looked at the world and found light where he only found darkness. For the first time since he was a small boy, he wanted what Makayla had found, he wanted more than emptiness.

Which meant getting her back was non-negotiable.

“Van.” Falcon sounded surprised when he opened the door mere seconds after Van had pushed the buzzer. Not that the man could really be surprised to see him. He’d used the code at the front gate to gain access to the property, and he knew that Falcon had cameras up everywhere, so the man would have tracked him down the long driveway as soon as he got an alert that someone had come through the gate.

“I told you I was coming,” he reminded his boss as he stepped past him when Falcon held the door wider open to let him in.

“I know you did, I guess I just … wasn't sure you'd actually follow through.”

Anger sparked inside him. While it had been a staple of his childhood, he’d been in his teens by the time he learned to shut it out, shut everything out, function like he was empty inside, because that was the only way he could survive the horrors he lived through daily.

Now it curled around him like an old friend, and he didn't bother slamming the door in its face. Instead, he embraced it.

“You thought I'd leave her to rot after I told you I was coming to you to talk about how we’re going to get her the hell out?” he snarled.

Apparently, the threatening step he took toward his boss only amused Falcon because the man grinned at him. There was something similar in their smiles, and he knew they were a lot alike in so many ways. Or at least they had been. Until Hope came along and saved Falcon.

“Welcome to the club,” Falcon said, clapping him on the shoulder.

“What club?”

“The fallen for a woman club.”

“I haven’t … I'm not sure I'd go so far as to say …” Van stammered—something he never did—but he couldn’t seem to finish his sentences. While he wasn't sure he’d fallen for Makayla per se, he did know that he wanted to be around her, wanted to soak in her sunshine and let it thaw his heart. He wanted to see her smile and hear her soft, gentle voice. He just wanted to look at her and soak in her presence because she was like oxygen for a dying man.

And maybe that’s what he’d been all along.

Not empty inside, but dying.

“Don’t have to admit it out loud if you're not ready to,” Falcon told him. “I fought it like hell at first. Wound up hurting Hope because I refused to accept that it was already done, I'd already fallen for her. But I got my head on straight eventually, and you will too.”

For now, he wasn't ready to say anything like that out loud. He’d never expected to have even a friend, let alone someone who could be more. And while it scared the hell out of him, he did acknowledge that Makayla had the power to be more.

If she wanted to be.

And that was what scared him the most. Because why on earth would she want anything to do with him? She was goodness and light, sunshine, there was no other way to describe her. But that didn't mean she would feel anything for him other than the kindness and care she showed to everyone who crossed her path.