Her words hit like shrapnel.
How many people, I want to ask. How many innocents are we weighing against your life right now?
But I already know the math. It's always the same math.
"Where's the bag?" I ask.
She points to a second-floor window. "My office. Northwest corner."
Of course it is.
I look at the warehouse—fully engulfed now, flames licking through broken windows, black smoke pouring into the night sky.
Look at her—determined, terrified, refusing to leave without finishing what she started.
Look at my truck—ready to take us to safety.
Maman's voice whispers in my head.Fais do-do, mon petit. Le bon Dieu, he watches over fools and children.
Pretty sure I stopped qualifying for either category around Yemen.
"Stay here," I tell her, already turning back toward the building. I spit out the cigar and yank my tactical scarf up over my nose and mouth. "Lock the doors. If I'm not back in a few minutes, drive. Safe house address is programmed in the GPS."
"Wait—"
But I'm running, because this is what I do. I blow things up and walk into fire and make impossible choices about acceptable losses.
Dr. Isabella Durand just became more than an extraction target... she just became a reason to survive.
The heat hits me the moment I'm through the door—a physical wall that steals the air from my lungs. Smoke thick enough to choke on, visibility down to almost nothing.
The tactical scarf over my nose and mouth barely helps. Chemical smoke burns differently than wood or fabric. This shit gets in your lungs and stays there.
The second floor stairs are a death trap waiting to happen. They're still standing, but barely. The metal treads have warped from heat, some missing entirely where explosions tore through the structure. I test the first step. It holds.
Northwest corner—her office.
Taking the steps two at a time, I keep low, breathing shallow through the scarf. The second floor is worse—flames eating through walls, ceiling sagging in places where support's failed.
The air shimmers with heat. Sweat pours down my back, soaking through my tactical gear. My skin tightens, the first stage of burns if I stay much longer.
A section of ceiling collapses behind me, sending up a shower of sparks and burning insulation. The fire's accelerating, feeding on chemicals and oxygen in ways that don't follow normal patterns.
Her office door hangs open, half-melted from heat. Inside, a desk, filing cabinets, scattered papers. I scan the room—there. A leather messenger bag on the floor beside the desk, half-hidden under fallen debris.
Grabbing it, I turn to leave and freeze.
A device mounted to the support beam. Military-grade charge, but the construction's wrong—too much accelerant for a clean detonation, overlapping blast caps that'll create a chain reaction instead of a controlled burn. The signature screams professional training but rushed execution. The timer shows less than a minute.
My stomach drops.
This isn't the Iron Choir's work. They're precise, clinical. The mercs downstairs might be on their payroll, but this charge? Too sloppy for their standards.
And the timing's too perfect—placed after I arrived, pointing to someone who knows exactly how I work.
Only a handful of people on the continent have demolitions expertise that matches mine. Factor in who'd have motivation to track a Cerberus operation, who'd know my methods well enough to predict my movements, who'd want me buried under a building instead of just dead...
One name.
