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“You can barely sit up.”

“I don't care. That psycho has Joy. I'm not lying here doing nothing.”

“You'll be useless in your condition,” Simon said firmly. “Let us handle this.”

“She's my woman.” The words came out as a growl. “I should have protected her.”

“And you will,” Nash said. “But right now, the best thing you can do is let us find her while you heal enough to be useful.”

The logical part of my brain knew they were right. I could barely stand without help, let alone track down a kidnapper. But every instinct I had screamed that I should be out there hunting for Joy, not lying helpless in a hospital bed.

“Find her,” I said to the room at large. “I don't care what it takes. Find her and bring her home.”

As the men filed out to coordinate the search, one thought kept circling through my mind.

Glenda had been right under our noses the entire time, playing the concerned friend, earning Joy's trust, gathering information about our routines and security measures.

And now she had the woman I loved.

The silence in my hospital room felt heavier than the pain radiating through my broken ribs. Fifteen minutes had passed since the guys had filed out to coordinate the search for Joy, leaving me with nothing but the steady beep of monitors and the crushing weight of my own failures.

That left Trenda, Ava, and Roxie sitting in the two uncomfortable vinyl chairs beside my bed. Roxie had her phone pressed to her ear as she coordinated with someone about search grids. Ava paced the small space like a caged animal, her usually perfect hair disheveled from running her hands through it.

I stared at the ceiling tiles, counting the water stains while my mind spiraled into familiar territory. The kind of dark thoughts that had haunted me since Africa. Since I'd led good men into an ambush and watched them die because I'd trusted bad intelligence.

Bullshit, you failed them.

The voice in my head sounded like my own, but crueler. More vicious.

You were supposed to protect them. You were supposed to see the trap coming. You were supposed to bring them home.

My chest tightened, and not from the broken ribs. The same crushing weight that had driven me to the edge after losing Todd, Roy, and Hamm pressed down on my sternum like a concrete block.

Now you've failed Joy, too.

I closed my eyes, imagining her face as she was pushed into the trunk of a car by someone she trusted. The confusion. The fear. The moment she realized what was happening to her.

She trusted you to keep her safe. She believed in you. And where is she now?

The monitors beside my bed started beeping faster as my heart rate climbed. Trenda looked up from her phone call, concern creasing her features.

“Graham.” Her voice cut through the noise in my head. “You're spiraling.”

I opened my eyes and met her gaze. Did Trenda understand veterans? The way we sometimes retreated into our own heads when the weight of responsibility became too much to bear. What was I thinking? She was married to Simon. Of course she did.

“I should have seen this coming.” The words tasted like ash in my mouth. “Should have known it was Glenda.”

“How?” Ava stopped pacing and fixed me with a sharp look. “She fooled all of us. Even me, and I’m a suspicious bitch.”

“That's my job. Reading people. Seeing threats before they materialize.”

“Your job is loving Joy and keeping her safe,” Roxie said, the same words Joy had spoken to me after the SWATing incident. “You can't predict every possible attack.”

But I could hear the doubt creeping into my own thoughts. The same voice that had whispered poison after Africa. The same poison that wouldn’t allow me to face my father again.

You're not good enough. You never were. You let your team down, and now you've let Joy down, too.

The beeping grew more insistent. My hands started shaking, and not from the medication wearing off.