Page 210 of Operation: Defiance

Chapter Fifty-Six

Raine

Everything is too loud. My body remembers all the hands causing me pain.

The market smells like fish and sugar and rain and bodies. I’m not steady, the world tilting, like I’m on a ship in the middle of a storm.

Asher still has his arm around my waist—supporting me. He always seems to know exactly what to do—what I need. How to comfort without caging me in. His muscles are coiled tight enough to snap, and something in him has gone dangerously still.

I focus on Claire’s face. On her pained expression. Her lips are pressed into a thin line, and she’s shaking.

“We don’t have time to start from the ‘beginning.’” I reach into my pocket and run my thumb over Asher’s challenge coin. The raised lines in the center give me something to focus on. “GSD is actively trying to track me down, Claire. If they find me, they’ll finish what they started.”

Confusion pinches her brows. At my side, Asher vibrates with anger. “They’ll kill her.”

Claire recoils like Asher slapped her in the face. “That’s not—no. You expect me to believe they’d execute you because you saw the wrong file?”

I hold her gaze. “They already tried. Strapped me down, stuck electrodes to my temples, and ran so much current through me, I couldn’t feel my own body anymore.”

She flinches, but I’m not done.

“Does that make you uncomfortable? Imagine what it felt like for me. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t scream. I couldn’t think. And the man who flipped the switch probably signed out and went home for a nice dinner.”

Asher’s fingers tighten at my waist. The rest of him is deathly still.

“This has been going on for at least six years. Probably a lot longer. Most of the agents I found who’d disappeared from the system? They were women. Someone believes we’re easier to control—and easier to erase.”

Claire shakes her head once, like that simple movement can rid her mind of the image I put there. “That’s a serious accusation. One you can’t take back.”

“Yes. It is. Which is why I need proof. The only place I can get it is from inside GSD. Since I can’t walk through the front door, I need someone who can.”

“Me?” She takes another step back.

“You’re the one person I know they won’t lean on. Not yet, at least. Systems only has forty-seven people in the whole department. Two of us disappearing at once? That’s suspicious enough. A third? An Assistant Director? They won’t be able to explain that away. Even if helping me puts an escalation flag in your file, I’ll have what I need to go public before they can act on it.”

Claire chews on her bottom lip hard enough it turns white. “I can meet you after work. At six.”

“No. Right now, or not at all,” I demand.

“Why?” Her brows shoot up, a hint of shock in her voice. “I’m due back at the office soon…”

“I can’t risk you changing your mind. Or sending a field team to meet us in your place. That would be the end of me. Of us.” I angle my head toward Asher.

“You think I’d turn you in?” Her voice fractures, suddenly smaller.

I hold her gaze for a long moment. “I think you might not have a choice.”

That hits hard. She nods slowly, her shoulders dropping. “Okay. But…I don’t have my laptop with me.”

“The library is only a few blocks away,” Asher offers. “Good sight lines and plenty of exits.” He glances down at me, brows lifted. “Does GSD allow external connections to the directories you need?”

I nod. “They should. I’m not touching active ops. Personnel files and approval chains only.”

Asher drops his hand from my waist and steps closer to Claire. “I need all your devices. Phone, smart watch, tablet…anything you have on you.”

Claire stiffens. “Excuse me?”

“Non-negotiable.” There’s nothing soft in his tone. No apology. “Anything with a signal could lead GSD right to us.”