“Yes,” she answered with a curt nod.
“We have multiple heat signatures,” RITA replied coolly. “Twenty-two confirmed. Approaching from north, west, and southeast. They are moving through the forest. I’ve disabled three surveillance drones. They are spreading out.”
Kiki barely heard them as she turned her focus to Nikos.
Normally, she would have closed herself off to protect herself. She did the opposite this time.
She opened her senses, spreading them outward.
Her mind reached for Nikos, not with words, not with power, but with the calm, comforting connection she got when she was with him.
A tether of golden warmth sparked in her chest and extended outward like a thread through the dark.
The mere thought of him being in danger unleashed a torrent of untamed, intense, and volatile emotions within her. Tension vibrated down the bond between them. She sensed the tension in his muscles, his intense stare, and the clear understanding that he was facing an enemy who wasn't there to compromise, but to triumph.
She could feel Benoit’s presence too. He was probing. Testing Nikos’s mental defenses the way he’d always tested hers.
Trying to see if there wasa way in.
Her lips curled back in a snarl.
Not him. You don’t get him.
“Kiki?” Cosmos murmured, his gaze turning wary.
“He’llneverhurt anyone I love again,” she hissed, her eyes darkening like storm clouds gathering.
She twisted onto one knee, her palms pressed flat to the padded floor, and focused harder. Her breath came in tight, controlled bursts.
“I see what you’re doing,” she whispered to the void, to the man who had tormented her. “But you’ve already lost.” She looked back at Cosmos. “He wants to spread us out. There are twenty-eight, plus ten armored quadcopters.”
RITA’s voice cut in again, sharp and urgent now. “The heat signatures to the west are moving at a rapid speed. Two more have broken off in a circle maneuver. Frontline group is approaching the perimeter of the property. It looks like they are sending in a group via the lake. We’re surrounded.”
Cosmos swore. “Benoit’s using some kind of psychic pressure. They want to split her attention.”
Kiki’s hands trembled.
That’s exactly what he wanted.
To overwhelm her.
To fracture her focus.
Because he knew she couldn’t shield Nikos, defend the others, and fight a psychic assault from multiple fronts at the same time.
He’d always understood the math of her—how far he could push before she cracked.
But Benoit didn’t understand an important, vital element.
She wasn’t that little girl in the white room anymore.
She wasn’t a weapon waiting to be fired.
She was a woman who loved.
And that changed everything.
Kiki surged upright, her fists clenched tight, and snarled through gritted teeth, “I will not run anymore.”
