Engine low.
Breathing steady.
I keep one hand on the wheel…
the other resting just close enough to my weapon to matter.
Because tonight?
Everyone is hunting me.
And they’re getting closer.
I shouldn’t have gone to the hospital.
That was the mistake.
The one crack in my armor.
The one moment I let myself—
feel.
My jaw tightens.
I push the thought away.
Not now.
Not ever again.
But it’s already there.
Burning.
Jase.
The way he looked when he was bleeding out.
The way he still tried to fight.
For me.
My grip tightens on the wheel.
“You shouldn’t have done that,” I mutter under my breath.
But the truth?
He was never going to stop.
Not for orders.
Not for logic.
Not even for survival.
And that’s exactly why I had to leave.
