Page 19 of Ranger’s Honor (Lone Star Wolf Rangers #4)

DALTON

K ari’s footsteps pound up the stairs, the sound sharper than it should be in a house that feels too exposed.

I grab my go-bag from where I left it in the utility room—the canvas worn, the strap frayed from years of hard travel—and drop it onto the kitchen island with a solid, familiar thud.

The zipper rasps open, sharp in the quiet, revealing the contents like a soldier laying out his armor.

The scent of gun oil and leather hits me, grounding, anchoring.

Each item I grab—cash, burner phone, weapons, encrypted comms—isn’t habit. It’s ritual. I don’t pack light. I pack lethal. Fast, efficient, precise. Every motion mirrors the adrenaline building in my veins as I load the essentials.

By the time she comes back down, there’s a duffel over her shoulder, her steps a little too measured, like she's holding herself together with sheer force of will. There’s something unguarded in her eyes—determination, sure, but also the echo of fear she’s trying not to show.

She’s rallying, pushing past the tremor of betrayal that her laptop had become a weapon against her.

Her mouth is set, her jaw tight, and every inch of her screams control—controlled panic, controlled anger, controlled purpose.

Her movements are tight with tension but her posture composed, as if daring the fear to try her.

I watch the way her fingers move the strap higher, her knuckles white around the grip, and something low in my chest responds—not pity, not even pride. It's something deeper.

She’s rattled, sure, but she hasn’t folded. That matters more than she knows. That fire in her eyes burns steady, refusing to be snuffed out. It guts me a little, how much I want to protect her and how much I need her to stay exactly this strong.

“I’m not leaving the files,” she says, cutting straight to it. “If the Reaper has everything, I need what’s left to counter it. It’s not negotiable.”

I stare at her for a beat, then nod once. “Grab a hard copy. Flash only. Nothing wireless. Rush will have untraceable electronics waiting for us. And wear boots—we may be off-road before this is over."

She’s gone again, fast and efficient. I take the moment to pull out my encrypted sat phone and call Rush.

He answers on the first ring. “Problem?"

"Compromised system. Tracker piggybacked on a decryption string. We think the Reaper's seen it all."

"Shit. You in motion?”

“About to be.”

“Fuck.”

“Yeah. I need a second site. Quiet, out of grid range, but close.”

Rush doesn’t hesitate. “Use the old stilt house on Bay Point. Keys are in the cache box behind the well pump. Stay dark, Dalton. Don’t take anything electronic with you but your sat phone, and don’t use anything that isn’t waiting for you at the house.”

“Copy.”

I grab my jacket, head outside, and toss the rest of the gear into the truck. Just as I swing the passenger door open, Kari steps out, a small fireproof case clutched in her hands.

She doesn’t meet my eyes as she sets it in the passenger footwell, her jaw tight with that familiar, stubborn set.

We don’t speak—not as I lock up the house, not as I sweep the perimeter.

Every instinct in me is on high alert. We should have gone to ground when this first started, but Gideon, and then I, wanted her comfortable.

The fact that she’s still inside this threat radius twists something sharp in my gut.

She’s strong—no question—but she’s not trained for this kind of war. And if I fail her—if I let one misstep or one missed angle put her in a body bag—I’ll never recover. I’ve buried brothers, teammates, civilians. But her? That would end me.

There’s a tight, twisting burn in my gut every time I think about how close we came today. She has no idea how many ways this could’ve gone sideways—how many times I imagined scraping her blood off pavement, holding her too late, too still.

I can’t let it happen. I won’t. I note the tension in her shoulders, the way she'd pulled that case from the footwell and now holds it like it’s armor. When I slide behind the wheel, she pulls the case to her chest like it’s her only tether.

I keep my eyes on the road as I pull away from her house. Her jaw is tight, pulse ticking in her neck. If anything happens to her... I won’t survive it. I’ll burn down the fucking world to keep her safe.

Twenty minutes out of town, the tension finally breaks.

“Do you think the Reaper will follow?” she asks, voice low.

“If he knows where we are, he’ll try. But he doesn’t know where we’re going. And I'm one tough sonofabitch to tail.”

She grins and nods slowly, but the nerves haven’t let go. I can feel them vibrating off her like static. Her fingers curl tighter around the case. “I should’ve caught it sooner.”

“No,” I snap, eyes still on the two-lane stretch of highway cutting through the wetlands. “Don’t do that. You caught it. Not me. Not Gage. Not any of the techs. You, and then you told me. That’s what matters.”

Her silence is answer enough.

Ten more minutes, and I catch it.

Glint—off the treeline to the left. Subtle. High.

“Hold on.”

I floor it.

Kari jolts, her hand grabbing the dash. “What...”

“Sniper.”

She doesn’t scream. Doesn’t cry. Just ducks low on instinct.

My foot slams the gas pedal harder. Gravel and dirt kick up beneath the tires as the engine howls.

She doesn’t panic—doesn’t even flinch beyond that one perfect move.

Her body moves with instinctive precision, dropping low, one hand braced against the dash, the other curling around the case like she’s shielding something sacred.

And goddamn if that doesn’t hit me square in the chest.

She trusts me. Completely. My chest tightens, lungs refusing to expand for a beat as the weight of that trust hits like a sucker punch.

My hands curl around the wheel, knuckles bleaching white, the need to keep her safe winding through me so tight it feels like a current surging just beneath my skin.

She follows my commands without hesitation, no second-guessing, no fear overtaking reason.

And it’s not blind faith; it’s earned, carved from everything we’ve already been through.

In that breathless second, I’m not just the man protecting her, I’m the one she believes will win, the one she chooses to believe in when the bullets fly.

That kind of faith? It’s heavy. It’s fire.

It makes my pulse roar louder than the engine.

It rattles me more than the sniper’s bullet ever could. And it makes something savage inside me uncoil, stretch, demand blood. Good girl.

I wrench the wheel hard, tires spitting gravel as we veer off the highway onto a narrow service road that runs parallel to the water. The truck skids but holds. I’m out before we’ve even fully stopped.

I don’t think. I move.

Clothes hit the dirt. The mist surges from the ground in a rush of heat and thunder, thick with color as it coils around my legs and climbs higher, devouring the air, the light, the sound. It swallows me whole.

My body answers the call without hesitation—seamless, fluid. One heartbeat I’m flesh and bone, the next I’m fur, fang, and instinct sharpened to a blade’s edge. The shift is instant. Painless. Absolute.

Inside the mist, there’s no before and after—only the crackle of energy, the hum of power crawling over my skin as it reshapes, reclaims. When the swirling haze finally breaks, I’m no longer human.

I am wolf—an apex predator with a mate to protect. I launch myself straight at the sniper, teeth bared, fury honed to a single, lethal point.

The sniper’s high in a deer stand. It’s a good placement—unmapped, camouflaged, elevation for range. He’s not expecting a wolf.

And if it’s the Reaper—if that bastard came in person—then this is more than strategy. It's personal. It’s war. The son of a bitch doesn’t just kill—he unravels, takes what you love and makes it bleed.

He’s a coyote-shifter, all shadows and cunning, and something about this—about him—feels too personal.

Too deliberate. It’s not random, not opportunistic.

This strike had weight behind it, like he knew what she meant to me and wanted to carve it out.

That thought needles at the edge of my instincts, sharp and unwelcome.

But he doesn’t understand that I won’t stop.

I’ll tear him apart and paint the fucking mangroves with his blood.

Because this time, it’s not just an op. It’s my mate.

He fires once, missing by a mile.

I launch from the base of the tree with a savage burst of momentum, claws digging into bark as I scale high enough to lunge. A blur of motion, the wind slicing past, and then, impact.

I crash into him, jaws locking on his forearm, the crunch of bone muffled beneath his scream. My claws tear across his chest as we plummet together through the branches, slamming hard into the underbrush.

He hits the ground stunned, bleeding, one leg twitching. He tries to crawl, but I’m already on him again, low and growling, every hair on my body bristling with rage. There’s no escape. Not for him.

I don’t kill him. Yet. I drag him by the ankle, back toward the truck, fury humming in every muscle. Kari’s out now, crouched by the truck door, watching with eyes wide and unblinking.

I drop the unconscious bastard at her feet.

The mist swirls again, thunder and lightning snapping inside it, colors breaking like oil on water.

I hit the ground bare and breathing hard, skin steaming.

The scent of blood and earth clings to me, sharp and metallic in the salt-heavy air.

My lungs burn from the shift, my body alive with residual power.