MAIZE

When Alec left Maize internally breathed a sigh of relief, however, he did not do so without casting one last mistrustful glare at Ryder—who simply grinned like a cat and waved at the detective's back as he went away.

Maize had a feeling it would take a little more convincing for those two to begin seeing eye to eye with one another. It didn't take a genius to figure out that they clearly had a mutual disrespect for each other, after only meeting a short while ago.

It wasn't long after they heard Alec's footsteps reach far away out of earshot did Ryder's childishly fatuous demeanour fade away and replace with something colder and more guarded as he turned to her with a steel look in his eyes.

"Alright, he's gone now so talk," he demanded with a hard edge in his voice.

He was no longer playing nice anymore. Which was alright because Maize never expected him to anyway. Ryder just wasn't the type.

She knew inside he was most likely furious at her for doing this; showing up without warning, after—as he said—two years of nothing. She planned to explain to him that her choices had been limited, and that she wouldn't have come if she hadn't been desperate, but she also knew that wasn't going to be the only thing she had to explain herself for.

No, it would be much more.

Most likely regarding exactly what happened those two years ago when she 'disappeared', in his point of view anyway. The ending result of one of the worst memories and biggest regrets of her life.

The question was would he even believe her?

The person she thought she trusted most hadn't even...

She shook the memory away immediately.

But he's not here now...and he's not Ryder, she reminded herself stonily, before she gathered her resolve.

"Can we go outside for this?"

"Quit stalling Maize," Ryder responded instantly. "I don't have the patience left for it."

"I'm not stalling," she said quietly. "I just don't want anyone else around to accidentally hear what I know you're eventually going to ask me."

Ryder hesitated. "Alright..." he released a breath of air before he nodded once, a sign that he was willing to follow along with her wishes.

She led him wordlessly out to the back door, holding it open for him as they both stepped out onto the deck, facing the forest. Ryder took a stance beside her, his hands still lax in his pockets, but the muscles in his arms under his shirt were twitching in correspondence to the impatient expression he bore.

"Now explain," he demanded without vacillation, shooting her a steely look out of the corner of his eye. "What are you doing here and who the fuck said you could just show up out of the blue and break-in? Because it sure as hell wasn't me..."

"Believe me, it wasn't my original intention when we flew out here—" Maize began, but she was interrupted quickly.

"And who's 'we' exactly?" Ryder questioned with a raise of his eyebrow.

Maize answered, "Myself, the detective you just met, and the two framed FBI agents we're trying to keep alive," she stated, laying out the facts openly.

She saw the moment it clicked in Ryder's mind, if he hadn't pieced it together already; this was a mission, a matter of work. A literal case of life or death—she wouldn't have been here prepared to seek his help if it wasn't.

Ryder seemed baffled for a long moment, staring as if he wasn't quite sure he had heard her right. Slowly, his eyes furrowed and the awareness of what underlined her explanation seemed to finally dawn on him. "You're...on a job...with law enforcement?"

Maize nodded, ignoring the repudiated look on his face. "I work for them now. I'm was assigned to work as protection detail, along with West."

"You're protecting them?" Ryder questioned, bewildered and a little indignant.

"It's a long story. The other two you haven't met yet were agents of the FBI who went undercover to infiltrate an LA gang called Zmeya, the infiltration went south, they were framed, and now they're on the run. Agent Kishan Karan managed to get out and sought help from West because of a past history they shared when they were younger, that's how this all started."

Ryder continued to stare at her. "What the hell did you get yourself into, Daiyu?" he questioned.

He used her old name.

Maize shook away the gnawing that rose in the pit of her stomach. "Don't call me that, that's not my name anymore. I go by Ember now."

Ryder watched her, seeming to study her body language as she spoke, and he waited a beat before replying, "Ember huh? Not very imaginative..." he commented under his breath. She shot him an unimpressed look before he shrugged. "I'll be asking more about that later, but for right now you've got me interested. So continue. Why are you here?"

"We're here because we needed somewhere to hide out," Maize explained simply. "And you're the only one I know who lives this far up in B.C."

"Alright, I'll give you that."

She shook her head slightly at Ryder's antics. "It wasn't my idea at the start...But, I was surprised to find out that you and Cassandra still do business," she noted with a faint look of interest, recalling back to how said casino owner had hinted to her about their 'mutual friend'.

As it turns out, it had been exactly who she had thought all along, though she didn't appreciate the irony.

"Still working off the favours she's collected on you?" She asked, knowing Cassandra far too well.

Ryder gave a shrug of her shoulders and gave a close-eyed smile. "What can I say? She's fun. She pays well. And her jobs are always entertaining, one way or another."

Maize sighed knowingly. She also knew Ryder far too well, she should have expected that sort of answer from him.

"C was the one who suggested I seek you out—in her own persistently tantalizing way. Though the way she made it sound, I guess she thought you wouldn't mind..."

"Don't know where she got that idea," Ryder scoffed with a roll of his eyes.

"She probably thought of it as another favour returned," Maize replied wittily.

Ryder didn't have a response to that and simply grumbled irritably under his breath.

"She helped us out herself back when we were in Mexico," Maize began to explain.

"Mexico huh? Is that where you've been hiding out the past few years?" Ryder questioned with a hint of accusatory as he raised an eyebrow at her.

She shook her head, ignoring his stare. "No. Look it's complicated. Like I said, this is a mission involving the protection of the two agents—one who we only recently met up with. The other, Kishan Karan, is who we believed to be the gang's primary initial target, West and I were tasked with accompanying and escorting him to a police safehouse back in Mexico. We were only supposed to guard him there until our captain reported to us with more information, but obviously, since I'm standing here now, things didn't go quite as planned."

"What happened?"

Maize threw him a glance from the side. "Exactly what you think. The gang managed to find us and the place was stormed unexpectedly after only a few nights there. We barely made it out."

"Yikes. Sounds like my last Tuesday..." Ryder muttered with a visible wince as he scratched the back of his head.

Maize felt her lips tilt upwards as she gave her head a shake.

With Ryder being...well, Ryder, she wouldn't hesitate to bet that he was being one-hundred percent serious.

"Our chief—the only other one who really knows the situation on our side," she continued, "is working on the case to prove Kishan's innocence, without raising any red flags for the gang. But contact has been limited and from what Alec's told me, so far there's not much to go on..."

"And the other agent you mentioned?" Ryder questioned. "You mentioned only one at the beginning of all this."

"Longer story," Maize answered. "I'll explain the details later."

"Don't bother, I doubt I'll care any more than I do now," Ryder replied.

Maize mentally rolled her eyes at his uncaring tone but didn't comment. Sympathy wasn't something Ryder was known for—let alone for law enforcement officers, and neither was his attention span for that matter. Quite honestly she should be glad that he was still listening at this point, but then again, she knew curiosity was always a strong motivator, and he had questions for her that she knew there would be no avoiding at this point.

"So on that note," she said, picking up the conversation, "how have you been lately, Ryder?" she asked honestly.

"Same as always," he replied without much thought. Then he stole a steely glance at her from the corner of his eye. "Though I don't think I can say the same about you."

And so it started.

"You're not wrong," Maize hummed in agreement, looking out at the forest.

Ryder paused and stared at her. "What the hell happened to you, Maize?" he asked then, his eyes never leaving her face. "The bounty hunter I knew didn't protect law enforcement and work with police precincts—what the hell happened? Last I saw you I thought you were doing good working for the syndicate—"

"Yeah well you thought wrong," she cut him off, and Ryder paused.

"Am I detecting a hint of sourness?" He inquired, rendered unfazed by the sharp look she shot him, he shrugged. "It was an honest question."

"Listen, I don't want to get into it now," she answered honestly, looking away once more. "All you need to know is that I left—had my eyes opened and decided I was done, I couldn't do what they were asking anymore."

"The jobs prove too much to handle? Or was in your conscience finally catching up with you?" Ryder asked with a note of solicitude.

"Both," she replied quietly.

"Oh..." Ryder trailed off and hesitated, before smiling slightly. "I guess I can't really blame you for disappearing on me then, huh..."

Detecting the note of good nature in his voice, Maize gained a small smile as well, though it was still closed with guilt and the recollection of her past. "I'm sorry...that wasn't right of me."

For a few moments they let a ring of silence hang in the air.

"You could have told me you know..." Ryder picked up again. "We were working pretty closely then, you should have trusted me."

"I didn't trust anybody at the time," Maize murmured quietly. "All I could think about was escaping after I betrayed the syndicate's allegiance."

"I would have helped you."

Maize shook her head. "No...I knew what I would be getting into when I left, I didn't want to drag anybody else down with me."

"As if I would have given a crap about something like that," Ryder scoffed.

"Well, I did," Maize said.

Ryder dropped his head and sighed. "You're stubborn, you know that? At least some things never change..."

"Thanks," she replied with a faint smile.

Ryder offered a faint smirk of humour in return.

"I'm going to go out on a limb and say that the detectives with you don't know about your little gang involvement history?"

"Hell no," Maize replied with a shake of her head.

"Good, probably best you keep it that way..." Ryder muttered.

"You don't have to tell me, I know."

Ryder turned and studied her, raising an eyebrow. "Are you sure?"

"Why are you questioning me?"

"Because your voice says one thing, but your eyes say another."

Maize didn't respond.

Ryder sighed and offered an innocent shrug of his shoulders. "Look, I don't know how well you trust those companions of yours, but I would be careful. Who knows how long any trust they have in you will last once they find out who you were—even if you did leave it all in the past..."

"You warning me to be careful with my judgment or be careful with my trust?" Maize asked.

Ryder offered a small smirk.

"Both."