Page 21 of Protective Assignment (Warrior Peak Sanctuary #1)

Cade looked from the man to River and back again. River looked as though she was about to be sick right there, hardly able to draw in a breath, and the man stood frozen, like he had seen someone he had never expected to lay eyes on again.

“Wait, do you two know each other?” Xavier asked with a frown.

River shook her head and looked at the ground, but the man nodded.

“River, don’t you remember me? It’s Louis. Dr. Louis.”

She wouldn’t even look at him. Wouldn’t look at any of them. Cade put an arm around her waist and she leaned into him like he was the only thing keeping her upright in that moment. He squeezed her in close, and felt her body trembling helplessly against him as she tried to pull herself together.

“I want the two of them in my office, now ,” Lawson demanded, snapping his fingers and making her flinch. “River and Dr. Louis both have some explaining to do.”

River tried to pull away from Cade, but he kept a firm grip on her.

She needed to face this, whatever it was, but he wasn’t going to let her do it alone.

No matter how she knew this guy, no matter what had happened between them in the past, she had to come clean and tell them what she knew.

This man had been found at the location of a break-in by the Shepards, after all.

Did that mean she knew something about them, too?

Cade guided River into the lodge, where Xavier and Lawson steered the man—the doctor—to Lawson’s office. Cade’s mind reeled as he took it all in. Maybe it was the hit he’d taken from the doctor still scrambling his head, but he couldn’t make sense of it.

Xavier and Lawson went to get coffee before they began their interrogation, leaving Cade, River and the man who called himself Dr. Louis waiting in the office. Louis stared at River but she wouldn’t look him in the eyes. Instead, her eyes darted nervously around the room.

“River, you must remember me,” he said in a soft voice.

She stood stock-still, eyes pinned to the wall next to him. A tear ran down her cheek, but she hardly seemed to notice it was there.

“You’re looking for Haven, aren’t you?” he asked her.

She still didn’t respond, but she began to shake when he said that name. Who was Haven? Cade was utterly lost as he tried to figure out how River knew this guy. He knew they were going to get to the bottom of it one way or another when the others got back.

Lawson and Xavier returned, taking their seats behind the desk and gesturing for the rest of them to do the same.

Although Louis had fought them when they’d first met, he’d been surprisingly cooperative when they’d told him they were working with the Feds.

He had allowed himself to be transported up to the lodge without too much more of a fight, even apologizing to Cade for headbutting him.

“So,” Lawson began, raising his eyebrows at the doctor. “Are you going to tell us who you are?”

“I’m Louis,” the man replied at once, shooting another look at River like he was trying to figure out if she was going to say anything. “I… I’m a doctor. Or, at least, I was. I’ve been working as an informant for the last few years against the Shepards of Rebellion.”

Xavier narrowed his eyes. “How do we know you’re working against them and not with them?” he asked, leaning forward.

“I can’t prove it to you, but trust me, I wouldn’t have come so quietly if I was a bona fide member,” he replied. “I’ve been acting as their doctor for a long time now, but I’ve been feeding information to the Feds the whole time.”

“Can we confirm that with our contact?” Lawson asked, and Xavier nodded, getting to his feet to take care of the request. Once he was out of the room, the doctor continued.

“I’d heard them mentioning you before, the Feds I was working with,” he explained.

“Ever since the Shepards started moving on a little farther north, things have been…changing. It’s been harder to stay on top of everything that’s going on.

But when I saw what they’d done to that man, the one who owns the warehouse, I…

I just couldn’t continue. I couldn’t keep standing by and pretending anymore.

That’s why I broke with them. I didn’t feel as though I had a choice. ”

His voice hitched in the back of his throat as he spoke, and Cade wondered just how much he had seen over the years he had been an informant for the Feds on the Shep- ards of Rebellion. How much had he had to keep his mouth shut about?

And how did River tie into all this? That was the part he couldn’t make sense of. Was it like he had suspected, and she was part of the Shepards? Was that who she had been on the run from? Was someone in that group the ex she had fled from, or had that just been a cover story?

Xavier returned to the office and nodded at Lawson.

“He’s telling the truth,” he replied. “He’s been working with the Feds for the last few years on this.”

“If there’s anything you need to know or anything I can help with, please just let me know,” the doctor told them, glancing between Xavier and Lawson.

“I know you’re helping with the case, and trust me when I say you’re going to need every advantage you can to bring these guys down.

I’ve seen what they can do, how far they’ll go… ”

He trailed off. A shiver seemed to run through the room.

The enormity of what they were facing wasn’t lost on Cade.

This man had been ready to fight his way out of the situation he’d found himself in to get away from the gang.

Cade could only imagine how bad things had gotten for him.

How terrified he must have been that he was going to be exposed at any given moment, and what it might have meant if he had been.

River still stared at the wall, tears falling silently down her cheeks. It was clear being close to this guy had triggered something in her, drawn a memory back to the surface she didn’t want to even think about.

Finally, the doctor turned his attention to her again. He dropped his voice slightly, leaning toward her. She recoiled from him at once, like he was toxic.

“They don’t know where you are, River,” he assured her, his voice gentle. There was clearly a history between the two of them, even if it was a history she wanted to forget.

His mind flashed back to when he had first met her, how fearful and jumpy she had seemed. Was it because she knew she was being chased? Because she knew she couldn’t leave behind her old life as easily as she wanted to?

“You’re probably in the safest place you can be,” he continued, and River let out a sob.

Cade had seen her cycle through plenty of emotions in the time that he’d known her.

But this? This was unlike anything he had seen before, and he would have been lying if he said it didn’t worry him to see her like this.

He wanted to pull her into his arms and tell her it was all going to be okay, but he knew she wouldn’t have believed him.

Whatever she had been running from, it had well and truly caught up with her now, and there was no way she could pretend otherwise.

Whatever she had been heading toward, whoever Haven was, she had halted in her search for her, staying at the lodge and trusting them instead of moving forward.

Trusting him to protect her against her past.

Lawson and Xavier flicked their gazes between the doctor and River.

Lawson’s face bristled with anger, an anger Cade could only guess came from knowing how much trouble River had brought right to their door.

Despite that, though, Cade felt protective of her.

He would do anything to make sure that whatever nightmare was following her didn’t get any closer than it already had.

The doctor reached for River’s shoulder, but she pulled back from him, letting out a whimper.

Xavier eyed the two of them skeptically, trying to piece together what was going on.

Cade wasn’t even sure what was actually going down, but he stayed by River’s side, not wanting to break away from her for a second.

She seemed to have been doing so much better in these last few days, so to see her so upset and scared like this made him feel…

angry. Angry, knowing there were people out there who had given her reason to feel this way.

People who had scared her and hurt her enough in the past to turn her into this terrified woman before them now.

“Take our new friend to get some lodging,” Lawson told Xavier. “Make sure there are guards on the door at all times.”

“I’m not going to try and go anywhere,” Louis replied.

Lawson shook his head. “It’s not about you getting out,” he replied grimly. “It’s about others getting in.”

Cade nodded in agreement. He couldn’t imagine that the Shepards wouldn’t notice one of their own had gone missing, and when they did, they might put the pieces together about what he had been doing while he’d been with them.

They didn’t strike Cade as the type to forgive and forget.

Better to keep the doctor safe and get all the information out of him they could, than risk a break-in that would get him hurt—or worse.

Once Xavier had escorted the doctor from the room, Lawson turned his attention to River. His mouth was set in a hard line, his expression unreadable.

“River,” he began, his voice low. He was doing his best to control it, not to spook her, but as soon as she heard her name, her whole body tensed.

“I think I need to talk to you. Alone.”

Her eyes darted over to the door, and she didn’t say a word.

Lawson’s eyebrows shot up. “Don’t you dare make a run for it—”

But before he could stop her, she dashed out the door and into the corridor beyond.

Lawson sprang to his feet. “Dammit,” he muttered, and he went to follow her. But before he could, Cade put out his arm to stop him.

“Leave her,” he told him firmly.

Lawson glared at him. “I need her to explain to me exactly what the hell she’s doing here. And what her connection is to the Shepards.”

“I know,” Cade assured him. “You deserve an explanation. I get it. But don’t go after her. She’s terrified. She’s not going to leave, I know that. Let me talk to her, okay?”

Lawson didn’t exactly look happy about the suggestion, but he rolled his eyes skyward and let out a sigh. “Fine,” he grunted.

Though his anger was evident, he was smart enough to see that Cade was going to get a whole lot more out of River than he would ever be able to. Cade nodded his thanks.

“I’ll find out everything we need to know,” he promised.

Lawson shook his head. “I hope so,” he replied. “And I hope that woman you brought to our door isn’t more trouble than she’s worth.”

Cade turned to leave the office, Lawson’s words ringing in his ears.

There was no doubt River had brought a whole lot of trouble with her—trouble beyond what Cade could ever have imagined when he had seen her by the side of the road, in that dirty homemade dress, looking like she had been living in the wild.

But no matter what kind of trouble she had chasing her, Cade knew one thing for sure: she was worth it.

Every bit.

Now he just needed to prove that to her.