Page 14 of Oath of Protection (Blood Oath Bargains #1)

FOURTEEN

WAR COUNCIL

Blueprints covered every surface in the secure conference room like battle plans for a siege.

Cam studied the compound layouts, marking sight lines and defensive positions while the Valente family's most trusted soldiers filed in one by one.

Men who'd sworn loyalty to Sal decades ago, who'd survived wars and investigations and the kind of violence that left scars visible and otherwise.

"Everyone's here," Matt said quietly, closing the door behind the last arrival. "These are the only people we're certain Tony didn't compromise."

Sal sat at the head of the table, looking every one of his sixty-five years but with steel in his eyes that hadn't dimmed.

To his right, Nico spread intelligence photographs from their warehouse surveillance.

To his left, Bianca reviewed legal contingencies with the focused intensity that had made her one of the city's most feared negotiators.

"Gentlemen," Sal's voice carried the weight of absolute authority. "We have a problem. My eldest son has been selling information to our enemies for the better part of a year."

The room went dead silent. These men had known Tony since he was a teenager, had watched him grow into the role of underboss. Learning he was a traitor hit like a physical blow.

"Jesus Christ," one of them muttered. "How bad?"

"Security layouts, patrol schedules, weapons inventory." Nico's voice stayed level, professional. "Plus financial records showing payments from Kozlov accounts. He's been positioning himself to take over after they eliminate me."

"And tonight?"

"Tonight they come with enough firepower to level this place." Cam stepped forward, indicating positions on the compound blueprint. "Three assault teams, military-grade weapons, complete intelligence about our defenses."

"Except their intelligence is wrong now," Sal said, his eyes finding Cam's face. "Because we're going to give them something they don't expect."

For the next hour, they rebuilt the compound's entire defensive strategy.

New patrol routes that avoided Tony's leaked schedules.

Relocated weapons caches that bypassed his known positions.

False intelligence planted where he could find it, designed to send the assault teams into carefully prepared kill zones.

"What about Tony himself?" Bianca asked. "He's still family."

"He stopped being family the moment he put a price on Nico's head." Sal's voice was granite. "But he doesn't die unless there's no other choice. Exile is punishment enough."

The old man's restraint surprised Cam. Most people would have ordered Tony killed immediately. But Sal was still a father, even now.

"Timing?" Dante asked.

"Full dark. They'll hit us between midnight and two AM, when security shifts and visibility drops." Cam traced approach routes on the blueprints. "Three entry points—main gate, east fence line, and the service road. Standard military tactic, divide our attention."

"Countermeasures?"

"We let them in."

The room erupted in surprised voices until Sal raised one hand for silence.

"Explain," he said quietly.

"We can't stop them from getting inside the perimeter. Too much firepower, too much preparation." Cam's finger moved across the compound layout. "But we can control where they go once they're in. Channel them toward defensive positions, use the compound's architecture against them."

"It's risky," one of the soldiers said. "If the timing's off?—"

"If the timing's off, we're all dead anyway." Nico leaned forward, studying the plan. "But if it works, we end the Kozlov threat permanently."

"And Tony?" Bianca's question was soft, but everyone heard it.

"Tony gets a choice," Sal said finally. "Surrender and live in exile, or fight and face the consequences."

The meeting continued for another hour, working through contingencies and communication protocols.

Cam watched these men—killers and soldiers and criminals—plan strategy with the kind of methodical care that kept families alive for generations.

He'd worked with military units that showed less professionalism.

"One more thing," Sal said as the meeting wound down. "Cam."

He looked up, meeting the old man's eyes.

"You're not hired security anymore. As of tonight, you're family." Sal's voice carried the weight of formal declaration. "You protect my son, you protect us all. That makes you one of us."

Something shifted in Cam's chest at the words. He'd spent eight years building a business on professional distance, on being the expert outsider who solved problems and moved on. Being claimed by the Valente family meant something different. Something permanent.

"I understand," he said.

"Do you? Because once you're family, you're family forever. Good times and bad, prosperity and war. There's no walking away when things get difficult."

Cam glanced at Nico, seeing something shift in his expression. Recognition, maybe. Or relief that his father was offering what Tony had demanded Nico choose between.

"I wouldn't want to walk away," Cam said quietly.

Sal nodded, satisfaction flickering across his face. "Good. Because tonight's going to test everything we believe about loyalty and trust."

The others filed out to make preparations. Nico stayed behind. The conference room felt larger with just the two of them, blueprints and photographs scattered across the table like evidence of everything they were about to risk.

"You sure about this?" Nico asked. "About becoming part of all this?"

"Are you?"

"I've been part of this my whole life. I don't have a choice."

"Yes, you do." Cam moved to stand beside him, close enough to smell his cologne mixed with tension and determination. "You could walk away tomorrow. Disappear, start over somewhere else. Leave all of this behind."

"Could I? Could you?"

The question settled between them like a weight. Cam had built his life on being able to walk away, on maintaining the distance that kept him safe from exactly this kind of entanglement. But walking away from Nico felt impossible now.

"No," he said finally. "I don't think I could."

"Then we're both committed to seeing this through."

"Together."

"Together." Nico turned to face him fully. "Cam, what if we don't make it through tonight?"

"We will."

"But what if we don't?" He stepped closer, close enough to see the exhaustion lines around Cam's eyes, the weight of responsibility he carried like armor. "What if this is all we get?"

Cam's jaw tightened. "Don't talk like that. We plan for victory, not?—"

"I'm not talking tactics." Nico's hand found Cam's chest, fingers spreading over his heart. "I'm talking about this. About us. About all the things we haven't said because we thought we had time."

The words hung between them, dangerous and true. They'd been dancing around admissions for weeks, hiding behind professional boundaries and careful distance. But tonight, those walls felt impossibly thin.

"Nico..."

"I love..." Nico's voice caught. "Christ, I love how you see things I miss. How you make me feel like I can fall apart and you'll catch me. How you chose this—chose me—when you could've walked away a dozen times."

The words came out raw, unfinished. Cam felt his chest tighten with recognition and something deeper.

"I love that you trust me with decisions that could destroy your family," Cam said against his mouth. "I love that you're strong enough to let me be strong for you. I love that choosing you was the first real choice I've made in eight years."

They stood there in the empty conference room, surrounded by the detritus of war planning, aware that in a few hours bullets would be flying and people would be dying. Aware that all their careful strategies might not be enough to keep them breathing until dawn.

"If something happens to me tonight," Nico said, his voice steady despite the words, "take care of my family. Not the business—Dante can handle that. But my mother, Bianca, the kids. Make sure they're safe."

"Nothing's going to happen to you."

"But if it does?—"

"If it does, I'll make sure they're protected. But it won't come to that." Cam's hands found his face, fingers gentle against stubble and worry lines. "We're walking out of this together."

"What if... what if I hesitate tomorrow because I can't lose you? What if loving you gets us both killed?"

"What if I freeze up because I care too much to think straight?" Cam's voice was equally rough. "What if all my training means nothing when it's you in the crosshairs?"

They stared at each other, both acknowledging the fears that had been lurking beneath the surface. The possibility that love might be a liability in a world where hesitation meant death.

"We're stronger together." Nico's voice was quiet, certain. "Every time it mattered, we didn't freeze up. We got better."

"You sure about that?"

"I'm sure that I'd rather face tonight with you than face tomorrow without you." Nico's mouth found his, desperate and sure. "I'm sure that whatever happens, we face it together."

"I should check the defensive positions," Cam said against his lips.

"I should brief the team leaders."

Neither of them moved.

"Not here," Cam said, glancing toward the door. "Somewhere... somewhere that's ours."

They made it to Nico's private office, barely, hands never quite letting go, mouths finding skin whenever they could. The door locked behind them with a click that sounded like finality.

"Look at me," Nico said, his voice rough with want and something deeper. When Cam's eyes met his, the careful control was gone completely. "I want to remember this. Remember you. Everything about this moment."

"We're going to have a thousand more moments," Cam said, but his hands were everywhere—threading through Nico's hair, tracing the line of his jaw, mapping the places that made him gasp.

"But what if we don't? What if tonight is all we get?"

His shirt disappeared, pulled away with reverent hands that shook slightly. Cam's mouth followed the path his fingers had traced—the hollow of his throat, the line of his collarbone, the scar over his ribs that told stories of other battles, other times he'd almost died.

"I used to think scars were ugly," Cam said against his skin. "Evidence of failure, of not being careful enough."

"And now?"

"Now I think they're proof." Cam's mouth found the scar from the car bomb, gentle and worshipful. "Proof that you're strong enough to survive anything. Proof that you kept fighting long enough for me to find you."

When Cam's shirt joined his on the floor, Nico's hands mapped muscle and old wounds with the same reverence.

A puckered mark on his shoulder from Kandahar.

The long line across his ribs from a knife that had come too close.

Stories written in flesh, proof of all the battles Cam had survived to be here.

"I want to memorize this," Nico said, his mouth finding the pulse point at Cam's throat. "Memorize you. The way you taste, the way you feel..."

They moved together with desperate tenderness, each touch a promise, each kiss a prayer.

This wasn't the desperate hunger of their first time or the comfortable intimacy of established lovers.

This was something else—two men making love like it might be their last chance, like they could somehow burn the memory deep enough to last forever.

When Cam's mouth found his again, Nico could taste salt—tears he hadn't realized were falling. "I'm scared," he admitted against Cam's lips.

"Of dying?"

"Of losing you. Of losing this." His hand found Cam's heart, feeling it hammer against his palm. "Of never getting the chance to tell you that you saved me long before tonight. Not from bullets or bombs, but from being alone."

Something broke in Cam then. He pulled Nico against him, skin to skin, breathing ragged with want and fear and love too big for words. "You're not alone. You'll never be alone again."

They made love like men possessed, like they could somehow press close enough to merge into one person who might survive what was coming. Every touch carried weight, every whispered word a vow. When it ended, they lay tangled together in the aftermath, breathing hard, hearts beating in sync.

"Whatever happens tomorrow," Cam said against his hair, "I want you to know—this is the best thing that ever happened to me. You. This. All of it."

"Even the part where people try to kill me on a regular basis?"

"Especially that part." Cam's mouth curved against his temple. "Keeps life interesting."

Outside, the compound hummed with final preparations. Men checking weapons, reviewing positions, preparing for war. But here, in the quiet space they'd carved out from chaos, there was only truth.

"Promise me something," Nico said.

"Anything."

"Promise me we'll have this conversation again tomorrow night. When it's over."

Cam's arms tightened around him. "I promise."

Neither of them was sure they could keep that promise, but it was all they had. Some promises were made in public, witnessed by crowds. This one was whispered in darkness, sealed with desperate hope that love might be stronger than bullets.

"We should go," Cam said finally. "They'll be expecting us."

"I know." Neither of them moved, both reluctant to break the spell that had wrapped around them like armor.

When they finally dressed, preparing to face what was coming, the air between them felt different. The last walls had fallen. The final admissions had been made. Whatever happened in the hours ahead, they would face it as they'd faced everything else—together.

But as they left the office to make final preparations for a battle that would determine everything, Cam found himself thinking that some things couldn't wait. Some admissions needed to be made before bullets started flying, because there might not be another chance.

Tonight they'd find out if their partnership was strong enough to survive war.

And if they were both strong enough to survive the truth about what they'd become to each other.

Some battles were won with superior firepower. Others were won with superior reason to survive.

Tonight, they had both.