Page 42

Amelia

“Three.”

Delara’s voice broke the stillness. Crisp. Sharp. No one breathed for a moment.

I blinked, forcing myself to focus. The lounge light felt too bright. The air, too still.

My head throbbed from days of no sleep. I was running on stale coffee and whatever rage I had left.

It had been a week since the Romano Estate op. Everyone else was still coming to terms with the way they’d failed Kabir.

Same self-deprecating conversations. Every fucking day.

For a week.

And still—nothing.

No word from Kabir.

No call. No whisper. No sign.

I felt like I was dying in pieces.

“Are you absolutely sure?” Sebastian asked.

Delara didn’t even look at him. She slammed her palm against the table. “Of course I’m bloody sure.”

She shot up from the couch, pacing like a trapped animal.

“I only took out three snipers at Romano’s estate,” she said, raking a hand through her hair. “There were more—six that I saw for sure. But by the time I lined up the next one, they were already dead.”

Zarek leaned forward, eyes narrowing. “Kabir.”

“Yeah.” Delara threw her hands in the air. “It was him. It had to be. Which is why I’m pissed as fuck .”

“Delara—” Seb started.

“No. I’m not done,” she snapped. “I gave you the benefit of the doubt. I looked at the facts. Stayed neutral. I listened to you.”

Sebastian sounded ashamed. “I never said he was rogue—”

“You didn’t have to,” I muttered.

My voice sounded distant. Hoarse.

Everyone turned.

I didn’t look up from my hands, fingers still trembling against the hem of my sleeve.

“You didn’t say it,” I added softly. “But none of you stopped it either.”

“Amelia—” Leora said, sitting beside me.

“I’m not mad at you,” I said before she could finish. “You told me what you believed.”

“And I ignored you,” Zarek said quietly, almost to himself. “Leora told me. I dismissed it.”

That surprised me.

Not the admission.

Just how broken he sounded saying it.

“Where is Dylan?” Kaylan asked, breaking the silence.

No one answered.

He hadn’t shown his face since I beat the shit out of him. Since the betrayal.

“Probably in his room,” Logan said. “He’s…not ready to face us.”

Neither am I.

Zane, who’d been standing silently near the entrance, finally stepped forward. He looked paler than usual. Haggard. His mouth opened, then closed.

Then finally—

“You need to know something.”

Everyone stilled.

He took a deep breath. “Last night, I found something buried in a dark node. A hit list.”

Sebastian tensed. “Go on.”

“Seven targets,” Zane continued. “Each one… you. Squad Six. The men—Logan, Zarek, Kabir, Dylan—five million each. Open kill orders.”

I closed my eyes.

“And the women?” Leora asked, her voice tight.

Zane swallowed. “Twenty million. For detainment. You. Kaylan. Amelia.”

“Detainment?” Kaylan asked. “What the fuck—why not just kill us?”

“They didn’t want you dead,” Zarek muttered grimly. “They probably wanted to use you.”

Leora pressed her hand to her belly. “Jesus…”

Zane nodded. “I traced the digital scrubbing pattern. The entire list was wiped—fully erased. Not archived. I barely found it before it was gone. But the deletion signature… was recent.”

“Where?” Logan asked, his voice low.

“Arlington, Virginia,” Zane said.

Silence.

He did it.

Kabir.

“He’s alive,” Logan whispered.

I exhaled slowly. A shudder ran through my body.

Alive.

But what the hell did he go through to keep us alive?

“Why didn’t he contact us?” Logan asked. “Why let us believe he—?”

“Because Dylan shot him ,” Kaylan snapped.

The room went cold.

Logan didn’t argue. Just looked away.

“Maybe he didn’t think we deserved to know,” Leora said quietly.

“Maybe,” I murmured. “Or maybe… he’s still out there, bleeding, trying to fix everything while we sit here questioning his loyalty.”

Zane sat down finally. “He was playing Romano.”

“Yeah…” Sebastian hummed.

I didn’t speak again.

There was nothing left to say.

I was tired.

So goddamn tired.

He said he’d come back.

I had to believe that… right?

Fuck.

I was sitting in the lounge surrounded by people who once called themselves a family. But right now?

It felt like he was the only one who ever meant it.

Everyone was quiet for a long moment before Zarek spoke up.

“Amelia,” he said.

I looked up, barely.

“I think you should talk to Dylan.”

I blinked once.

“He hasn’t spoken to any of us,” Zarek added. “Maybe hearing from you—his sister —will bring him out of it.”

I stared at him for a beat too long. The silence stretched.

Then I said it. Plain. Final.

“No.”

Zarek’s mouth pressed into a tight line, like he’d expected resistance but not that.

Not cold refusal.

He looked disappointed, even a little hurt.

That was all it took to push me over.

“If you’d shown even an ounce of that care to Kabir,” I snapped, voice razor-thin, “maybe he wouldn’t have walked into hell alone.”

His jaw tensed. Eyes dropped.

Good.

Let him feel it.

“Alright,” Sebastian interjected, stepping in. “That’s enough. We’re not… turning on each other.”

I groaned and then the room quieted again.

Zarek’s shoulders dropped, his expression unreadable now—but the guilt was obvious. It hung in the air between us like fog.

Sebastian exhaled, then looked around. “We received confirmation this morning. Romano’s cousin, Daniella Eames—she was killed last night. Gas explosion at her home in Denver.”

“Shit,” Logan muttered.

Kaylan straightened. “You think it’s retaliation? Or clean-up?”

“Likely clean-up,” Seb said. “Could be Romlinson. Someone’s tying off loose ends.”

I swallowed, but it scraped all the way down. My chest felt tight. Too tight.

Zane sat hunched over his laptop, eyes darting across the screen. Probably trying to substantiate what Seb and Kaylan had just said.

I kept my eyes on his laptop. It was easier than picturing Kabir bleeding out in an alley somewhere.

Alone.

I had asked Zane—why he left him there. I didn’t care that Kabir had insisted. I didn’t care what he said or what plan he had.

Zane should’ve made sure he got the medical help he needed.

Should’ve brought him back.

Suddenly, Zane tensed—his fingers digging into the sides of his laptop like it was the only thing tethering him to the room.

Leora noticed it too. “Zane?”

He didn’t respond.

His face had gone pale. Still. Terrified.

Then he started typing again—faster now. Frantic. Scanning. Clicking.

I was watching him fully now, no longer pretending to be detached.

Then he stopped moving.

Just… stared.

And when his breathing changed—sharper, shallower—I felt the ice spread through me.

“Is it Ronan?” I asked, voice barely holding together.

Zane slowly shook his head.

The world tipped on its axis when he spoke next.

“Kaylan, get behind Amelia,” he said suddenly, voice quiet but firm.

“What—” I turned, confused.

Zane didn’t look at me. “I planted a discreet camera across the Romano estate that night during the op,” he said, barely above a whisper.

I frowned. He hadn’t given me enough dots to connect, but his panic was bleeding into me now—slow and steady like poison.

He finally met my eyes. “I just watched Kabir enter the estate last night at twenty-one sixteen.”

My heart dropped.

“The mansion exploded at twenty-two thirty-four,” he said. “He never came out.”

I couldn’t breathe. Kaylan’s hand landed on my shoulder but I barely felt it.

Zane wasn’t done. He kept going—like the truth was something he had to rip out, piece by piece.

“The news just broke. Massive explosion. Romano’s mansion is gone. Dozens of casualties. Confirmed dead—Robert Romano, two Pentagon security officers, three high-level intel agents…”

No one moved.

No one could.

Kabir.

My lungs locked. Vision tunneled.

No thoughts came—just static. Just white noise and a cold, creeping fog filling the space where I used to be.

He’s dead?

Kabir is dead.

Kabir is dead.

Zarek stood up suddenly, knocking into the lounge table.

“Hey, hey—” Logan reached for him, steadying him by the shoulders but he shook him off violently.

His eyes were hollow. Frantic. His breath coming faster now.

Not a full breakdown. Zarek didn’t do that. But he was still… not okay.

Leora went to him. Gently took his hand. He didn’t shake her off.

He just kept muttering. “N-Not again. L-Logan…”

My hands were cold.

Everything in me was folding inward.

Shutting down.

The room was blurring at the edges, like a dream trying to wake me up.

Kabir is dead.

The sentence repeated, dull and deafening.

Kaylan moved in front of me—shifting my chair, her hands on my cheeks. “Amelia. Amelia, look at me—”

But her voice was muffled. Underwater. Distant.

I couldn’t hear her over the screaming in my chest.

Zane was pacing, fists clenching in his hair.

Sebastian was still standing, open-mouthed, frozen in disbelief.

Delara turned wordlessly and left the lounge, the door clicking softly behind her.

None of us stopped her.

Because there was nothing left to say.

Kabir was gone.

I stood up so abruptly, Kaylan’s hand slipped off me.

She called my name, soft, startled.

I didn’t stop. Didn’t look back.

The air in the lounge was still thick—chaos layered over silence. The kind of silence that’s louder than a scream. The kind of silence where ghosts still linger.

His ghost.

I walked down the hallway, each step heavier than the last. My limbs felt like stone, my chest like it had caved in.

Kabir was dead.

Fine.

Then Dylan deserved to know, didn’t he?

Wasn’t that what he’d wanted?

I found his door. A number plaque that suddenly made my stomach turn.

My hand curled into a fist.

I banged.

No answer.

I banged again, harder this time. My vision blurred, but I wouldn’t let the tears fall yet.

Later.

Yes.

Later I’d collapse.

Right now, I just wanted to see his face when I told him.

That he pulled the trigger.

And Kabir never came back from it.

I raised my fist to slam the door again when a trembling voice stopped me.

“Miss Desmond?”

I turned, teeth clenched.

Greta, the receptionist. Timid. Wide-eyed.

“Is—everything alright?”

“No,” I snapped. “Open this fucking door.”

“I—I don’t have access—”

“Open it.”

She stared at me, startled, then scrambled off down the hallway. Thirty seconds later she returned, fumbling with the master key in her shaking hand.

I snatched it before she could say anything else, jammed it into the lock, and flung the door open.

Empty.

The bed untouched.

The room cold.

Bathroom—empty.

Not even a towel out of place.

I stared at the sterile space for a full five seconds, then turned and walked back toward the lounge.

The hallway felt longer. Like I was walking through molasses. My chest was clenching tighter with every step.

By the time I walked in, the team had mostly dispersed.

Zarek and Leora were gone. Delara had already left.

Only Logan, Kaylan, Sebastian, and Zane remained.

Zane was hunched over his laptop, fingers flying, probably pulling up satellite footage or combing black web data streams trying to figure out what the hell happened at the Romano estate.

I stopped dead in the doorway.

“Where is he?” I asked.

Their heads snapped toward me.

“Dylan,” I clarified, my voice sharper now. “Where the fuck is he?”

Sebastian stood—frowning. “He’s not in his room?”

I shook my head. My fists were trembling at my sides.

Zane was already typing.

“Give me thirty seconds.”

No one spoke. No one breathed.

My heart thundered in my ears.

Zane’s brows furrowed. His expression dropped.

“He’s not here,” he said. “Dylan’s not inside the compound.”

That’s when everything cracked.

The numbness peeled away like flesh, and all the screaming I’d swallowed came rushing back like a dam breaking inside my chest.

He was gone.

Kabir was gone.

And now— so was my brother.

I let out a sound—half-sob, half-scream—and dropped to my knees right there in the middle of the lounge. My weight no longer mine.

My hands covered my face, but it did nothing to muffle the shaking breath that broke from my throat.

Kaylan rushed toward me, grabbing my shoulders, but I couldn’t hear what she was saying. It was just noise. Everything was noise.

Zane moved fast. He was on the floor beside me in seconds, pulling me into his arms.

I collapsed into his chest like something lifeless.

He held me tight, kissed the top of my head, over and over.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I’m so sorry. Amelia, I’m so sorry.”

I shook harder. My fingers curled into his shirt, clutching it.

Kaylan was behind me now, one hand rubbing my back. Her voice soft, steady, but I couldn’t make out the words.

Logan sat frozen, eyes glassy. Red-rimmed. His hands clenched on his knees like he didn’t know what to do with them.

No one did.

Because Squad Six wasn’t just wounded anymore.

It was bleeding out.

And I felt it in my bones.

The truth of it.

I looked up at the hollow room, at the ashes of who we once were.

This was the death of Squad Six.