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This wasmy girlbeing hunted.

River tossed a rough sketch onto the table. “Ball cap. Shades. Built like he knows how to kill someone with a pen.”

I barely glanced at it. “Doesn’t matter. He’s already dead.”

Jude stood beside me, arms folded tight, jaw clenched. I wanted to pull her in and hold her again, but I knew she needed space right now—space to track, calculate, andnot fall apart.

And then Sean froze the feed. “There,” he muttered. “Is that him?”

Jude leaned in. “Yes.”

Even grainy and distant, the guy radiated wrong. The way his body angled, ready to move. The way he never looked straight at her, but always watched.

He’s a hunter.

No doubt about it.

Jude shifted closer to me. I wrapped my arm around her, anchoring her to my side. Her body eased just slightly into mine. That tiny moment of surrender gutted me.

Then Sean zoomed in.

A tattoo. Black ink. Barely visible beneath the edge of the guy’s sleeve.

Coordinates.

Jude gasped. “I know that mark,” she whispered, stepping forward and planting her hands on the desk like it was the only thing holding her up.

Her voice went rough. “They were burned into a wall in a ghost site. Syria. It was off-books. Deep black.”

I didn’t give a damn about black sites. I cared about the tremor in Jude’s voice.

I stepped in behind her, placing my hands gently over hers. “Hey,” I said, low and steady. “Look at me.”

She did.

And I saw it—the fear she never let anyone see.

“This guy’s not just following you,” I said. “He’s tracking you. Deliberate. Strategic. He’s not curious. He’s coming for something.”

Her throat worked like she was trying to swallow back everything at once. “He’s part of something I ran from, Cyclone. I thought I buried it. Burned it down.”

My grip on her tightened. “Then we dig it up and finish it right.”

“I don’t want to drag you into this,” she whispered.

I leaned closer, my lips brushing the shell of her ear. “You’re not dragging me. Ilivehere now. Right beside you,” I said, touching her heart.

She let out a shaky breath and finally leaned back into me.

And in that moment, I knew one thing for certain.

No matter what shadow crawled out of her past—

It was going to have to go throughmeto touch her.

We stayedlike that for a beat—her back against my chest, my arms around her, the rest of the world muted beneath the thrum of fear and fury.

Then River cleared his throat quietly. “We’ll keep digging. Jude, if you remember anything else—any detail, even small—tell us. We’ll track him.”