Page 69 of Raven's Mark
"I'm okay." My voice sounds far away. "The cuts are shallow. He roughed me up getting me out of the compound, but nothing's too bad."
His gaze drops to the zip ties still biting into my wrists, and something shifts behind his expression. Not softness. The opposite. A cold fury held so tightly in check it's almost worse than if he'd let it loose. He pulls a knife from his belt and cuts the plastic in two sharp movements. The blood rushes back into my hands and the tingling makes me clench my fists.
He doesn't wait for me to find my feet. He scoops me up and carries me to his truck like I weigh nothing, and the heat of hisbody against mine, the hard planes of his chest pressed against my ribs, sends a pulse of awareness through me that has no business existing right now. He sets me sideways in the cab with my legs dangling out the open door, his hips between my knees as he reaches behind the seat for a first aid kit.
His hands are steady as he cleans the cuts on my forearms, wiping away the dried blood with antiseptic wipes. Every pass is precise and controlled, his fingers wrapping around my wrist to hold my arm still, and the contrast between the violence he just delivered and the care he's taking now makes my chest ache in a way I wasn't prepared for. His thumb presses against the pulse point on the inside of my wrist, and I know he can feel how fast my heart is hammering. He doesn't comment on it. His eyes flick up to mine, and the heat in that brief glance says he doesn't need to.
"Tell me what happened inside the compound." His voice is low, controlled, and close enough that I can feel the warmth of his breath against the inside of my arm. "What did Alvarez say?"
"We were right about everything." I flex my fingers, working feeling back into them, trying to focus on words instead of the way his hands feel on my skin. "Alvarez has been compromised most of his career. He was running interference for the cartel from inside the ATF, burying investigations, redirecting resources, and flagging informants. Harlan was his local infrastructure, using the sheriff's office to provide cover and logistics."
Jesse nods, processing. His hands don't pause their work on my arms. He wraps gauze around my left forearm, his fingers overlapping each pass with practiced precision, and when his thumb grazes the sensitive skin on the inside of my elbow, my breath catches. His jaw tightens almost imperceptibly. He heard it.
"And Harlan was worse than we thought," I continue, forcing my voice steady. "He told me he used every one of your father's original routes. The whole pipeline, Jesse. Bo's contacts, his staging points, his corridor. Harlan inherited the blueprint and built on it. He also mentioned money laundering through Oklahoma casinos, a distribution network running through Central Texas."
"Did he give you names?"
"No. But he implied Alvarez wasn't the only federal agent on the payroll."
Jesse absorbs that without any visible reaction. He finishes the last wrap of gauze, his fingers pressing the edge flat against my skin. His hands linger on my forearms, bracketing my wrists, and for a moment neither of us moves. Standing between my knees with my wrists in his hands, he looks at me with an expression that's equal parts fury and hunger and something possessive enough to steal the air from my lungs.
Then he steps back and offers me his hand.
I slide down from the cab. The world tilts for a second and his arm catches my waist, pulling me flush against him. His hand spreads wide across my lower back, fingers pressing into the curve of my spine, and the solid wall of his body against mine is the only steady thing in the world. My palms land on his chest and I can feel his heartbeat under my fingers, strong and even while mine is still racing.
I look past him at the two men who appeared from the tree line. One is already on a radio, coordinating with someone while the other secures Harlan's truck. They move with the professional efficiency of operatives who've done this kind of work a hundred times before.
"Jesse." I nod toward them. "Who are they?"
"Additional operatives. Shadowland. I had them shadowing you from the moment you walked into town." He says it withoutapology, his arm tightening around my waist, watching my face for whatever reaction he's expecting.
I look at the two men again. Calm, competent, positioned perfectly for a crossfire if Harlan had tried to run instead of shoot. They were already in place when Jesse arrived. They'd been tracking us the entire time.
A laugh surfaces from somewhere deep and exhausted, surprising us both. "I should be furious with you."
"Are you?"
"Aside from you, they're the best thing I've ever seen." I lean into him, letting his arm take more of my weight. The adrenaline is fading now and every bruise and cut is making itself known with interest. "You had a backup plan for your backup plan."
"I had a plan to keep you alive." His voice drops low, rough against the top of my head. "Everything else was secondary." His mouth presses against my hair, and the gesture is possessive and unhurried and certain, the kind of claim a man makes when he's already decided you're his and the rest of the world can adjust accordingly. My fingers curl into his shirt, and the sound I make against his chest is closer to a sob than I'd like to admit.
One of the operatives nods to Jesse as he passes, and Jesse nods back his arm still locked around me.
The drive back to the compound doesn't take long. Jesse keeps one hand on the wheel and the other on my thigh, his palm warm and heavy through the denim, his fingers curled around the inside of my knee in a grip that's half possessive and half anchoring. His thumb traces slow, absent circles against my inner thigh, and every pass sends heat climbing through me, building in steady increments that have nothing to do with the fading adrenaline and everything to do with the man beside me. I press my thigh into his hand, a movement so small it could be involuntary, and his fingers tighten in response. A muscle jumps along his jaw.
Neither of us speaks. The quiet between us isn't heavy or loaded. It's charged, alive with everything his body is saying to mine through the press of his hand, the tension in his forearm, the way his grip shifts higher on every turn.
When we pull up to the compound, the scene has transformed. Federal vehicles line the access road, lights flashing blue and red. From the truck I can see agents in tactical gear moving through the property and cartel members face-down on the gravel in zip ties, a row of them lined up along the fence with federal agents standing over them.
Jesse parks at the perimeter. He helps me out of the cab and keeps his arm around my waist as we cross the gravel. Alvarez is in the back of a Bureau SUV, his hands cuffed behind him. My legs are steadier now, but Jesse doesn't let go, and I don't ask him to.
Uncle Robert pockets his phone when he sees us coming. His gaze drops to the gauze on my forearms, and the mask he wears slips for just a second before he pulls it back into place.
"Harlan?" he asks.
"Dead." Jesse says the word the way another man might sayhandled. Final. Already filed away.
Uncle Robert nods once, then looks at me. "You okay?"
