I force the beast down. I force long years of calculated restraint to the surface. She needs honesty. She needs devotion. She needs the man, not the monster.
"Neither."
I take one half-step forward, closing the distance between us to mere inches. The scent of aviation fuel and cold wind hits my lungs like a physical strike. I stare down into her beautiful, fierce eyes.
"You are not my pilot anymore, Reese. The contract ended the second that helicopter hit the ground." I keep my voice dead steady. A vow spoken into the marrow of her bones. "And you are not my prisoner. The door is behind me. You have the weapon. You know how to survive the cold. If you want to walkout into the blizzard and take your chances with the wolves, I will step aside."
She stares at me. Her chest hitches.
"But if you stay," I continue, my voice dropping to a rough rasp. "If you choose to stay in this room. If you choose to leave this mountain with me. You do it as my woman."
I simply raise my hand and press my palm flat against my own chest, right over the heavy thud of my heart.
"Untouchable," I say. "A queen in a city of monsters. You will not be a liability, because anyone who questions your place by my side will not live long enough to finish the sentence. I will burn Chicago to the ground before I let my world destroy you. That is my vow. That is the truth."
I drop my hand back to my side. I step backward, retreating until my spine hits the timber door again. I restore the physical space between us. I give her the room to breathe. I give her the room to choose.
Reese does not look away. The cabin goes quiet under the weight of my confession. The woodstove crackles. The wind howls against the frosted glass of the small window. She holds all the power. I have laid my throat bare to her. I have surrendered to a pilot with a bleeding forehead and an unyielding spine.
Her eyes search mine. She is looking for the lie. She is looking for the trap.
She finds nothing but absolute devotion.
Reese slowly lowers her arm. She places the Glock on the small wooden table next to her. She releases her grip on the weapon. She releases her grip on the fortress she has lived inside for her adult life.
She takes a breath to speak.
The HAM radio sparks.
A loud, piercing burst of static shatters the quiet intimacy of the room. It is not a hiss. It is a violent, aggressive screech of interference.
I snap my attention to the desk. The red encryption light is off. The frequency dial has not moved, but a signal is overriding the channel. A brute-force transmission bleeding through the dead zone.
"Target localized," a voice crackles through the speaker. It is heavily distorted, buried under layers of static and wind noise, but the words are legible. "Blackwood grid. Moving in on foot. Prepare the breach."
My pulse spikes.
That is not Dominic. That is not the Costa family extraction team. They are grounded at the border of the park, waiting for the storm to break.
"Confirm thermal signatures," a second voice responds on the open channel. "Two bodies inside the main structure. Move the ordnance to the tree line."
The voices are not Costa.
They are Bellanti.
They are not two days away. They are on the mountain. They are outside the cabin.
I look at Reese. She looks at me. The war has reached the cabin.
9
Reese
Static screamsfrom the radio speaker.
The harsh, metallic screech slices through the cabin, obliterating the charged stillness between us. My grip tightens on the steel of the Glock in my hand.
A voice cuts through the crackling interference. It is unencrypted, arrogant, and thick with a brutal Chicago accent.
