My gut twisted. Encircle. Not annihilate.
“They want her,” I growled.
Elara was on my flank, pistol raised, her braid whipping as she turned with me. Her face was streaked with blood and soot, but her eyes—God, her eyes—burned with fire. She wasn’t running. Not anymore.
But Hydra wasn’t trying to kill her. They were trying to drag her back alive. And that was worse.
“River! Oliver! Collapse left!” I shouted. “Don’t let them cut us off!”
River cursed but obeyed, dragging fire down the alley. Oliver covered his flank, cutting down three men in brutal precision. Gage roared as he slammed a Hydra soldier straight into a wall, then dropped him with a bullet to the skull.
But they kept coming. Herding us tighter, closer.
A spotlight flared suddenly, flooding the street in blinding white. For a split second, I saw them—Hydra soldiers in formation, trucks braced at the far end of the street. Heavy weapons mounted. And behind them, in the half-light, a banner I hadn’t seen in years—Hydra’s emblem, bold and merciless.
Elara froze, her breath hitching sharp. Her past had just stepped out of the shadows.
“Beckett,” she whispered. “It’s him. Grand’s men.”
I shoved her behind me as the first heavy round tore into the wall, brick exploding inches from my head.
“Move!” I barked. “They’re locking the street!”
Bullets rained down from the rooftops, sparking against the pavement, forcing us toward the choke point. A truck swerved to cut our retreat, more soldiers spilling from the back, their shouts a cage tightening around us.
Cyclone’s voice shouted in my ear. “We’re surrounded!”
Not surrounded. Trapped. Exactly where Grand wanted us.
I racked another round, heat burning my hands, vision tunneled in on the only truth that mattered—
“They’ll have to kill me to take her.”
And judging by the wall of Hydra bearing down on us, they damn well intended to try.
63
Elara
The spotlight burned into my eyes, hot and merciless, pinning me like a specimen under glass. Hydra’s emblem loomed behind the trucks, black and jagged against the haze of smoke. I knew that symbol too well—it wasn’t just a banner. It was a brand.
My breath caught, chest constricting. For a heartbeat, I was back there—cold walls, metal chains, the smell of antiseptic and blood. Their voices telling me I wasn’t Elara anymore. That I was theirs. That I was a weapon.
And now they were here to take me back.
“Stay with me!” Beckett’s voice cut through the roar. His hand closed around mine, rough, grounding, fierce.
The fight thundered on around us—River’s rifle cracking sharp from cover, Gage’s shout carrying over the chaos, Oliver firing bursts that lit the smoke like lightning. Cyclone’s voice shouted coordinates in my ear, frantic. But all I could see was Hydra’s wall of soldiers pressing closer, their eyes fixed on me. Not the Team. Not Beckett. Me.
“They’re not here to kill me,” I whispered, horror scraping raw through my chest. “They’re here to take me alive.”
Beckett’s grip tightened like steel. “Not happening.”
Another barrage tore through the street, bullets sparking against stone. A rocket slammed into the far wall, the blast hurling heat and debris across us. I dropped behind cover, ears ringing, hands shaking.
Fear clawed sharp inside me. Not just fear of Hydra’s hands closing around me again. Fear of what Beckett would do to stop them. Fear that he’d throw his life onto the fire just to keep his promise.
I turned, desperate, catching his face in the harsh light. Dust streaked across his jaw, sweat cutting lines through the grime, eyes blazing with a fury that burned for me alone.
