Page 6 of Daddy Defender
Raze, across from us, grinned like a maniac, his shaved head gleaming under the cabin’s red light.
“More fun for us, then,” Raze said, loading a grenade launcher. I rolled my eyes, adjusting my tactical vest. “Focus, Raze. We get the girl, we get out. No heroics.”
The politician’s daughter, Elena, was barely twenty-one, kidnapped from a charity gala in Bogotá. The cartel wanted ransom—ten million, or her head.
Elena’s father, a senator with more enemies than friends, hired the Night Ops Guard when the Feds stalled.
Our job: infiltrate, extract, vanish.
We fast-roped into a clearing near the cartel’s compound, silencers on, moving like ghosts. Elena was in a basement, bound but unharmed.
Cole took point, his massive frame clearing the way while Raze and I flanked, neutralizing guards with precision.
We had Elena out in ten minutes, sprinting to the extraction point where our chopper waited, piloted by a grizzled vet named Hicks—now this is a Guard who has truly seen it all, which makes the whole thing worse…
Then it went to hell.
A rocket-propelled grenade screamed from the trees, slamming into the chopper’s tail. The blast threw us to the ground, Elena screaming as flames lit up the night.
Hicks was gone—nothing left but twisted metal.
“Move!” I roared, hauling Elena over my shoulder.
Cole and Raze covered us, their rifles spitting fire as cartel gunmen closed in. Bullets zipped past, tearing through leaves. My lungs burned, but I kept running, Elena’s weight nothing compared to the dread in my gut.
We trekked three days through that jungle, dodging patrols, wading through swamps, Cole’s navigation skills keeping us alive.
Raze’s jokes kept us sane, even if I wanted to punch him half the time.
Elena, tougher than she looked, never complained, clutching my hand like I was her lifeline. On day three, we hit a Guard rendezvous, a Black Hawk waiting to whisk us to safety.
Elena’s father met us in Miami, tears in his eyes.
“My miracle, you’re all heroes,” he said. “Trust me when I say you will be rewarded fully. Heroes like you deserve the very best.”
I didn’t feel like a hero. Far from it. Not with Hicks’ death on my conscience, not with the fresh scar above my eyebrow from a near-miss bullet. In all my time as a Guard, I’d never felt so low coming out of a successful mission…
I snap back to the bar, the jukebox’s twang pulling me out of the memory.
My grip on the beer bottle’s too tight, knuckles white.
That mission was why I’m here in Sunny Ferns, licking my wounds, trying to remember who I am when I’m not a soldier.
But this boy—this surfer dude with the nervous eyes—he’s pulling me back into the game way sooner than I’d ever want.
However, I can’t look away.
That’s not who I am.
He’s staring at his phone now, his face pale, lips parted in shock. Whatever he just read hit him like a gut punch. His hand shakes as he sets the bottle down, the clink loud in the quiet bar.
He’s not just spooked anymore—he’s terrified.
My Daddy instincts flare, that need to protect, to control the chaos, surging through me. I’ve seen that look before, on Elena, on civilians caught in crossfires.
Whoever’s got him this scared, they’re no small-time threat. Every bone in my body is telling me that this is the real deal. I’vebeen here too many times, seen too many things to not know when my gut is telling me to act.
He slings his bag over his shoulder, moving fast, like he’s about to bolt.
