The name sparks a memory. “The defense contractor attorney? The one investigating corruption?”
“The same. Phoenix flagged her as a Level 5 threat. But here’s the kicker—the Admiral didn’t order her death.”
“Why not?”
“Because someone else did.” Halo taps the screen. “There’s a secondary signature in the command chain. Someone above the Admiral.”
I stare at the data. “The Nexus.”
“Exactly. The Admiral was a piece on the board. But he wasn’t the player.” Halo looks at me. “Cassie Brennan found something. Something that scared the people who pull the Admiral’s strings. And now that Phoenix is off the leash?—”
“It’s going to finish the job,” I whisper.
“Yeah.” Halo rubs his eyes.
I look at the screen. The patterns. The data. The endless, shifting variables.
I should be terrified. I should be exhausted.
But underneath the fear, I feel a cold, fierce resolve hardening in my gut.
“We need to find her,” I say.
Halo looks at me, surprised. “We?”
“We.” I look toward the hallway where the medical suite is. “Jackson and I. When he wakes up.”
“If he wakes up.”
“He will.” I say it with the certainty of a mathematical fact. “He has to.”
The door to the suite opens.
Ghost walks in. He’s washed the soot off his face, but he still looks like a man who has carried the weight of the world for too long.
He looks at me. Then at Halo.
Then he nods.
“He’s out,” Ghost says. “He’s stable.”
The air rushes back into the room. My knees go weak again, and I have to grab the table to stay upright.
“Can I see him?”
“He’s groggy. Anesthesia hasn’t worn off. But …” Ghost steps aside. “He’s asking for you. Or, more accurately, he’s threatening to pull his IVs out if we don’t let you in.”
I don’t wait.
I move past Ghost, down the hall, toward the room at the end.
I push the door open.
The room is dim, lit only by the monitors. The beep of the heart rate monitor is steady. Rhythmic. The sound of life.
Jackson lies on the bed, broad shoulders rigid beneath the sheets. The rage is gone, the armor stripped away, but the poweris still there—contained, banked, waiting. Muscle, bone, and stubborn will held together beneath the dressings. His skin is pale under the hospital lights. IV lines thread into his arm. His eyes are open, vigilant even now. They find me the second I step in.
“Hey,” he croaks. His voice is wrecked, a ruin of smoke and screams.
