Mara turned back to the screens. To Amira and Karim Nazari. To the compound in Mosul and the clock counting down.
"We don't have a choice."
"That's not an answer."
"It's the only answer that matters."
Quinn's fingers paused. She turned in her chair, her young face serious in the monitor glow. "This is different, Mara. It's not just the location or the security. It's the window. Four days isn't enough time to do this properly. We'll be operating on incomplete intel. Making decisions on the fly. If anything goes wrong?—"
"Then we adapt," Mara said. "Same as always."
"What if we can't? What if we get there and it's not four guards, it's eight? What if the security is tighter than G.I.D.E.O.N. predicted? What if?—"
"Quinn." Mara's voice was gentle but firm. "I need you focused. Not spiraling. Can you do that?"
Quinn took a breath. Let it out slowly. Nodded.
"Good. Because I need you sharp for this. I need G.I.D.E.O.N. running at full capacity. I need every advantage you can give us."
"You'll have it."
Mara headed for the door. Paused. Turned back. "That boy is seven years old. In four days, he'll be loaded into a truck and delivered to someone who paid a fortune for him. His mother will be executed to cover the tracks. That's not a hypothetical. That's what happens if we don't move."
Quinn's jaw tightened.
"So yes," Mara said quietly. "This is different. This is harder. This is operating on the edge with incomplete information and a deadline we didn't choose. But that boy doesn't have ninety-six hours to wait for perfect intelligence. He has what we give him."
"Understood."
Mara walked out into the pre-dawn darkness. The bayou was starting to wake up. Birds calling. Insects humming. The first pale light touching the eastern horizon.
She walked to the dock. Picked up her abandoned coffee mug. Looked out over dark water that reflected nothing but shadows.
Nine and a half years ago, she'd been the girl in the cage. Waiting. Hoping. Praying that someone would come. Someone had come. Tallie Porter. Federal agent. The woman who'd looked at Mara and seen a person instead of inventory.
Now Mara was the one coming. The one kicking down doors. The one showing up when nobody else would.
Four days. One compound. Two people who needed someone to be the person who came for them.
She set the coffee mug down. Headed back toward the compound. There was work to do. Planning. Preparation. The careful orchestration of violence that would end with a mother and son breathing free air for the first time in years. Or it would end with Mara in a grave in Mosul and Shadow Veil burning to ashes.
Either way, she was going.
Because that's what you did when you survived. When you'd lived through the cage and the basement and the men who treated you like inventory. You became the person who came for the others. Every single time. No matter the cost.
EN ROUTE
The C-17's interior lights were dimmed to red. Engines roared steady and constant beneath steel and insulation, a low vibration that settled into bone after the first hour and never quite left. The kind of sound that became white noise until you stepped off the plane and your ears remembered what silence felt like.
Steele sat against the fuselage, helmet resting beside him, gloves clipped to his vest. Across from him, Bulldog had his eyes closed. Not sleeping, just conserving. The man could drop into a rest state anywhere. On helicopters. In trucks. Standing up if he had to.
Hawk sat near the ramp, posture relaxed but alert, gaze unfocused in the way of a man replaying angles in his head. Running through sight pictures. Wind calculations. The thousand small variables that made the difference between a clean shot and a miss.
Ghost was the only one with a tablet out, screen brightness muted to nothing, reviewing updated satellite passes of a compound outside Mosul. His fingers moved across the screen with the careful precision of a man who knew that one missed detail could get everyone killed.
Risk rechecked medical kits without being asked. IVs secured. Tourniquets staged. Hemostatic gauze accessible. Quick-clot where he could reach it. The man treated gear prep like prayer. Methodical. Reverent. Necessary.
Joker leaned back with arms folded, boots hooked under cargo netting, looking like he was about to fall asleep except his eyes were open and tracking every sound, every shift in the aircraft's rhythm.
