Elara shifted closer, pistol steady in her hand. Fear flashed in her eyes, but it wasn’t the kind that froze you. It was the kind that sharpened you.
“Stay behind me,” I murmured.
She bristled, like I knew she would, but she didn’t argue. Not this time.
A shout cracked from the shadows. Boots hit pavement. Then the street exploded.
Muzzle flashes tore the dark, bullets sparking off brick and metal. The windshield shattered, glass raining across the dash.I shoved Elara down, swung out the side, and returned fire in controlled bursts.
“Contact front and right!” I barked.
Oliver and Gage answered with a hail of lead, their fire cutting into the wave of Hydra soldiers spilling out of alleyways. River laid suppressing fire, voice sharp in my ear, swearing with every shot.
Cyclone shouted from the cab. “Drones are picking up at least twenty hostiles. Two trucks inbound from the south!”
Damn it. We were boxed in.
I pivoted, caught one Hydra man trying to flank left, dropped him with a clean shot. Another lunged from the shadows, rifle raised. Elara was faster—one shot, precise and merciless, sent him to the ground. Her hand trembled after, but her eyes never left mine.
I felt that look all the way down to my bones.
“Market’s too hot!” River shouted. “We need to move!”
“No retreat,” I snapped, firing until my rifle clicked dry. I slammed in a fresh mag, teeth bared. “We break their line here. Hydra wants us in a cage? Then we tear the damn bars apart.”
The Team surged forward on my command, bullets carving through Hydra’s ranks. Fire roared as one of their trucks went up in flames, heat blasting down the street. The night filled with smoke, chaos, and screams.
Through it all, Elara stayed on my flank. Close. Steady. Alive.
And I swore to God—I’d burn this city down before I let Hydra touch her again.
56
Elara
The street was fire and thunder.
Bullets shredded the air, ricocheting off brick walls, sparking against twisted metal. The market stalls I’d walked past as a child went up in flames, fabric snapping like sails in a storm. The smell of smoke, gunpowder, and burning wood choked my lungs until every breath hurt.
And through it all, Beckett stayed in front of me. A wall of fury and steel, every movement precise, deliberate, lethal. Hydra men dropped under his fire, one after another, but more poured from the alleys, faces masked, eyes burning with the kind of devotion only fear could breed.
I raised my pistol, the grip slick in my palm. My first shot clipped a man’s shoulder—my second put him down. My hands shook, but I didn’t stop. Couldn’t stop. Beckett had told me to use the fear, and God help me, I was. Every Hydra soldier who came at us was a ghost from my past, a chain snapping closed around my throat.
And I would not go back.
“Left!” Beckett’s voice ripped through the noise.
I pivoted without thinking, firing into the shadow breaking from cover. The man dropped at my feet, blood staining the dust. My stomach twisted—but Beckett’s hand brushed my arm, quick and grounding, before he moved on. That one touch told me what I needed to know. I wasn’t drowning. Not while he was here.
The Team fought like a storm given flesh. River’s rifle cracked sharp and fast, cutting Hydra’s advance before it could reach us. Oliver and Gage pushed forward like sledgehammers, taking ground with brutal efficiency. Cyclone barked directions from cover, his drone circling overhead, marking enemy positions with pinpoint accuracy.
Still, Hydra pressed harder. Trucks skidded into the street, engines roaring. Men spilled out, shouting orders in the guttural cadence I’d grown up hearing. My chest tightened, memories surging—dark rooms, locked doors, Hydra’s symbol branded across files and flesh alike.
A hand grabbed me from behind. Fingers like a vice on my arm. Panic surged white-hot. I slammed my elbow back, twisted, drove my knife home. The man dropped, shock etched across his face. My body shook, bile rising in my throat.
But when I looked up, Beckett was watching me—just for an instant, in the middle of fire and fury. His eyes weren’t horrified. They were proud.
The sound of another explosion ripped through the street, throwing me to the ground. The world blurred—heat, dust, a ringing in my ears that swallowed everything. For a heartbeat, I thought I’d lost him.
