Page 8 of Code Name: Reaper (K19 Allied Intelligence Team Two #5)

“From that moment on, I became their shadow. That’s how I got the surveillance photos and the encrypted correspondence. I followed them for three days until they almost caught me and I had to disappear.”

“That’s how you knew to warn me about Prism. You saw firsthand that she’s working with the Russians.”

The tone of his voice, the way he prompted me to talk, patiently listening without interrupting, made me wish it could always be like this between us. And that wasn’t good.

I needed conflict. Safe ground where we could argue about tactics instead of dancing around an attraction we couldn’t act on. But before I could manufacture some trivial complaint, his phone that sat on the kitchen table buzzed with an incoming text.

Reaper reached for it and checked the display. His entire demeanor immediately shifted.

“What is it?” I was already moving, setting my coffee down and shifting into action mode.

“FSB teams. Spotted one hundred miles south of here.”

Dread settled in my stomach. One hundred miles meant time was of the essence.

“How many teams?” I was already mentally cataloging what I’d need to grab and how long it would take to pack the essential gear and destroy anything that could prove we were here.

“Two confirmed. Could be more.” He looked up from the phone. “They’re advancing from the south and east.”

“We need to get out of here.” My mind raced through the extraction routes and transportation options as I headed for the stairs.

“Amaryllis, wait.”

I hesitated taking the first step. “We don’t have time to wait. Every minute we spend talking is a minute they get closer.”

“Running aimlessly won’t help. We need a plan.”

The words carried weight because they were true.

“Did you hear me?”

I whirled around to face him when his tone grated on me. “We need to keep moving. That’s what works. That’s what kept me alive.”

“Come on. You know better. We need more than cash reserves and stolen transportation.”

When the phone buzzed again, Reaper’s jaw tightened as he read what was on the screen.

“Seventy miles out,” he reported. “Teams converging.”

Seventy miles. The net was tightening faster than I’d expected.

“The smartest thing would be to return to the UK,” he continued. “Let the coalition help us.”

“No.” The word came out flat and final. “I’m handling this myself.”

“Why? Give me one good reason why bringing in people who can actually give us the support we need is a bad idea.”

Because it meant I’d have to explain why I’d gone rogue, why I’d broken protocol, why I’d disappeared without informing anyone, letting them believe I was dead.

Worse, teams meant other people would see the way I looked at Reaper, the way my pulse jumped when he spoke my name or we touched in passing.

Teams meant other women who might notice how his jaw clenched when he was angry, how his voice got rough when he was trying to control his temper.

The thought of him working closely with someone else—someone who might catch his attention, someone who wouldn’t push him away every time he got too close—made my chest tight with jealousy.

Which was insane. We weren’t anything to each other except work colleagues in a mess neither of us wanted to be involved with.

I had no claim on him, no right to feel possessive about his attention or protective about his safety.

Mercury was the one who mattered. Mercury was the one I should be thinking about.

“I asked you a question.”

“Working with the coalition means oversight and compromise. I can’t afford either right now.”

“You keep saying that like it’s some kind of mantra. Like if you repeat it enough times, it’ll become true.”

“It is true.”

“Then, why—” He stopped himself, clearly changing his approach. “Never mind.”

I knew what he’d been about to say. Why had I sent him the texts? Or did he want to know why I’d responded the way I did in that tunnel? Why had my hands gripped his jacket? Why had I made that sound when his mouth covered mine?

The answer was easy. Survival instinct. Basic human biology seeking connection in the face of death. It had to be, because the alternative was too dangerous to consider.

He took a step closer, and his nearness revealed the want and need and raw emotion that made my knees weak. “You don’t want to go this alone. Admit it.”

“Stop.” The word came out sharp enough to cut.

“Stop what? Pointing out that there’s a reason you reached out to me?”

“We don’t fit. We argue about everything.”

“We argue because we’re both stubborn, not because we’re incompatible.”

His phone vibrated again. Most likely with another update I didn’t want to acknowledge.

“There has to be another way,” I muttered under my breath.

“There isn’t. Believe me, I tried.”

“What do you mean?”

“It took three days for me to realize that if I searched on my own, I’d never find you. Three days. Not seven months.”

His words hit hard, and they hurt. “That wasn’t fair.”

He shook his head. “Fair or not, it’s the truth.”

I wanted to disagree. Tell him to fuck off. To find some other solution that didn’t involve swallowing my pride.

“They’ll want explanations,” I finally said.

“So we’ll give them.”

“They’ll want to know why you came after me.”

“They already know.”

I raised my chin. “No man left behind?”

“You know that wasn’t it.”

A response stuck in my throat, and the silence stretched between us until the phone buzzed again.

“No more time for debate.” Reaper’s voice returned to its usual controlled tone. “We’re leaving.”

“Okay. But I’m in charge of the search for Mercury. It’ll be my call on what intel gets shared and what stays classified.”

“Agreed.”

“And no personal questions.”

“Definitely agreed.”

“And if this goes sideways, if the coalition tries to bench me or shut me out of my own investigation, I’ll leave and make sure you never find me.”

I hated the way he looked at me, how his hands twitched when he took a step closer, as if he wanted to pull me into his arms and tell me it would all work out okay. “All right, then. Those are your stipulations. I’ll respect them.”

The car ride to the airfield in Dresden stretched out in silence.

Both of us were lost in our own thoughts about what came next.

I stole glances at his profile as he drove—the strong line of his jaw, the way his hands looked on the steering wheel, the sharp intelligence in his expression when he checked the mirrors.

He wasn’t merely handsome. He was hot as fuck in a way that made my mouth go dry and my pulse quicken. I should’ve heeded it as a warning to get as far away from him as fast as I could. Instead, I accepted that, for now, I had no choice but to travel with him.

He pulled the car onto the tarmac near where a private plane waited.

“Ready?” he asked.

Unsure I could speak through the doubt clogging my throat, I nodded.

After climbing the airstairs, we settled into seats across the narrow aisle from each other as the engines spun up with a low whine that vibrated through the plane’s interior. I felt the familiar knot of tension that always came with crossing points of no return.

I pulled up reports on my tablet and pretended to review them. The device served as a shield between us, a barrier against the tension building in the confined space.

We lifted off smoothly, banking toward England, uncertainty nauseating me.

I studied the tablet’s screen, but I was hyperaware of Reaper’s presence across the aisle.

How his long legs stretched out in the narrow space, the way his head rested against the seat, and the steady rhythm of his breathing.

We’d been in the air maybe twenty minutes when he finally spoke.

“So,” he said, his voice carrying a hint of amusement. “Wanna tell me about the dream you had last night?”