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Brock guided Elena in the opposite direction, toward where they’d parked the rental SUV that morning. They walked at a normal pace, two honeymooners who’d had a scare but were fine now, everything fine.

Elena was silent until they reached the vehicle.

“He needs to be stopped,” she said. “Not just for Marguerite. For everyone he’s hurt. Everyone he’ll hurt if we don’t end this.”

Brock looked at her face and saw the determined focus. She wasn’t the broken girl in the alleyway. She wasn’t seeking revenge. She was a woman who understood that some fights were necessary.

“Then we stop him,” he said.

The drive back to the resort was silent, but Elena felt the weight of what had just happened settling into her bones. She’d killed a man today. Not directly, but her choice to move had sealed his fate as surely as if she’d pulled the trigger herself.

Brock’s hand found hers on the console, his thumb tracing circles on her palm. That small touch steadied her more than words could.

“You okay?” he asked.

“Getting there.” She looked at their joined hands, at the silver bracelet he’d bought her that morning catching the sunlight. A lifetime ago, that purchase. Before the kidnapping. Before the blood. “I keep thinking about their faces.”

“I know.” His fingers tightened on hers. “It doesn’t get easier. But you did what you had to do.”

In the back seat, Nate was already on his phone. “If we leave in twenty minutes, we’ll get to Xpujil around the same time.”

“Then we have twenty minutes to disappear,” Eden said.

Back at their suite, Elena moved through the rooms with mechanical efficiency, but her hands shook as she packed. The enormity of what was coming—tonight’s infiltration, tomorrow’s meeting with Toro—threatened to overwhelm her.

Brock found her standing frozen in the bathroom, staring at her reflection in the mirror.

“Hey.” He turned her to face him, his hands gentle on her shoulders. “Talk to me.”

“I’m scared,” she whispered. “Not just of tonight. Of everything. Of losing Marguerite. Of losing you. Of—” Her voice broke. “Of not being strong enough when it matters.”

“You’re the strongest person I know.” He pulled her close, and she felt the warmth of him surrounding her, anchoring her. “You’ve already survived the worst they could do to you. You rebuilt yourself. And now you’re walking back into hell to save someone you love. That’s not weakness, Elena. That’s courage.”

She buried her face against his chest, breathing in the scent of him—soap and sun and something that was uniquely Brock. “I don’t feel courageous.”

“Courage isn’t the absence of fear. It’s being terrified and doing it anyway.” He pressed his lips to her hair. “And you’ve been doing that since I’ve known you.”

When she pulled back, his eyes were dark with emotion she was just beginning to recognize. Not just desire, though that was there too. Something deeper. Something that looked like permanence.

“After this is over,” he said, “we’re going to have a very long conversation about our future. About what comes next for us.”

“Promise?”

“Promise.” He kissed her, slow and thorough, a claim and a vow. “Now finish packing. We’ve got a niece to save.”

Twelve minutes later they met Nate and Eden in the hallway, all of them traveling light, moving fast.

“Let’s go bring her home,” Nate said.

The highway stretched west through jungle so thick it felt like driving through a cathedral—ancient trees forming a canopy overhead, sunlight filtering through in scattered benedictions. Elena watched the landscape blur past and tried to prepare herself for what came next.

Around one o’clock, her phone buzzed. Another video.

She opened it before she could talk herself out of it, and immediately wished she hadn’t.

Marguerite. Closer this time, the camera cruel in its clarity. Fresh bruises bloomed purple on her cheekbone. Her lip was split and bleeding. But her eyes—God, her eyes were still defiant.

The hand came from off camera, striking Marguerite hard enough that her head snapped sideways. She gasped but didn’t cry out.