He leaned his forehead against the wood, breathing hard, the taste of her still on his lips, the memory of her body against his burned into his skin. What had he been thinking? What had he almost done?
What the fuck was wrong with him?
Thepatrolvehiclerattledbeneath Jameson. His body was present—clothed in enemy fabric, surrounded by his team, crossing back into the Boundary—but his mind remained in that blue-lit room. The stolen Veyra helmet felt heavier than before, the armor more restrictive.
No one spoke. The mission’s failure hung in the compartment like poison gas, seeping into his lungs, clouding his mind. Eight of them had entered the Heart. Eight were returning. The numbers should have been a success—no casualties, no injuries beyond minor scrapes. But the empty space where Shadera should have been rendered the statistics meaningless.
Jameson stared through the reflective faceplate of his helmet at his team. Scout cleaned blood from beneath her fingernails with mechanical precision. Breach stared at his hands, palms up, as if reading a future that no longer included Shadera. Comms monitored Veyra frequencies, his fingers tapping an anxious rhythm against his thigh. Sniper, Trace, and Medic sat with the perfect stillness of assassins, conserving energy, processing failure. And Jaeger . . . Jaeger watched him from behind his own faceplate, waiting.
Through the partition, Jameson could see the rigid line of Captain Mikel’s shoulders as he navigated the empty maintenance tunnels that would lead them back to the checkpoint. Mikel’s betrayal of the Heart should have felt like victory. Instead, it made his stomach churn—one more complication in a world already fractured beyond recognition.
“Did you know?” The words broke through the silence like a gunshot, his voice amplified inside the helmet.
No one moved, but he felt the collective tension rise. Jaeger’s helmet tilted toward him.
“Did you know,” Jameson repeated, each word carved from ice, “that she was vowed to Serel?”
Jaeger didn’t answer immediately. Instead, his head turned toward the partition, toward Mikel, who remained focused on the road ahead. A silent calculation passed between them, visible only in the subtle shift of posture.
“Yes.” The single word fell between them, heavy and final.
The rage that surged through Jameson’s veins was so potent, he had to clench his fists to keep from reaching for his weapon. The metal wall beside him suddenly seemed the perfect target for his fury, but he kept himself still, contained, dangerous.
“You knew.” His voice had dropped to a whisper. “You knew, and you sent me in there anyway. You let me walk into the Heart believing I could bring her home.”
“I thought—”
“You thought what?” Jameson snapped, cutting him off. “That she’d see me and magically decide to come with us? That she’d break the arrangement they forced on her because I showed up?”
He reached up, yanking off his helmet in a single violent motion. The recycled air hit his face, cooling the sweat that had gathered along his hairline. He wanted Jaeger to see his face, to see every ounce of the betrayal carved into it.
“Put that back on,” Mikel hissed from the front seat, his eyes finding Jameson’s in the rearview mirror. “We’re still in Heart territory.”
“Fuck your territory,” Jameson snarled, but he kept his voice low enough not to carry outside the vehicle.
Jaeger removed his own helmet, his gray eyes meeting Jameson’s without flinching. The old man’s face was impassive, his mouth set in a grim line.
“I believed that seeing you might remind her of where she belongs,” Jaeger said, his voice steady. “I believed that given the choice between the Boundary and the Heart, between you and the Executioner, she would choose correctly.”
“There was no choice.” Jameson’s words were raw, stripped of pretense. “Do you understand that? She can’t leave because Maximus has threatened to bomb the Boundary if she doesn’t go through with it.”
The silence that followed was absolute. Even the vehicle’s hum seemed to fade away as the words sank in. Jameson watched theinformation ripple through the team—Scout’s fingers stilling on her blade, Breach’s head snapping up, Comms’s hands freezing over his equipment.
Jaeger’s expression didn’t change, but something shifted behind his eyes. “Explain.”
“The drones that were following me.” Jameson leaned forward, his voice dropping lower. “He’s learned everything with them. The President knows where our clinics are, the camps, headquarters. He knows where all of it is. If Shadera doesn’t take the Vow, he starts dropping bombs. Beginning with me.”
His mind filled again with the image of her in that room, her face when she’d told him to leave, the way she’d backed away from his kiss. Something had changed in her. Something beyond the threat hanging over the Boundary.
“There’s more.” He looked directly at Jaeger now. “Those medical supplies I’ve been getting? The ones with the Serel serial numbers? They’re from him.”
“Bullshit,” Breach muttered.
“He told me himself,” Jameson continued. “Knew the exact numbers. Used it as leverage. Said if I wanted the medicine to keep flowing into the rings, I’d leave without her.”
Jaeger’s face remained frustratingly neutral. “And you believed him?”
“Yes. Even if he isn’t smuggling it himself, he knows about it and is letting it happen,” Jameson replied. "When she confirmed what the President is planning, when she said she was staying—I saw her face. She was scared. She wasn’t lying.”
