Page 18

17

Dagger braced one forearm against the twisted trunk of a massive ceiba tree, its roots sprawling like gnarled veins through the jungle floor. Steam rose off his skin, sweat mixing with the thick humidity clinging to every inch of him. His chest heaved from the sprint after that frantic getaway, muscles trembling, lungs burning. Every part of him screamed for rest, but there was no time.

The canopy above barely filtered the light, casting flickering shadows over the damp, loamy ground. Low, urgent voices drifted from nearby, Flash and Quinn, murmuring in a pocket of tangled undergrowth where leaves glistened with recent rainfall and vines hung like serpents from the trees.

He moved toward them, boots crunching softly over the leaf-littered terrain. Quinn turned first, her honey-brown curls clinging to her mud-streaked cheeks. Even battered and breathless, she stood straighter when she saw him, relief flaring bright in her eyes.

Flash stood at her side, a silent wall of vigilance, his gaze constantly scanning the dense greenery. He projected that unshakable presence Dagger had come to rely on, a brotherhood forged in blood, sweat, and love. When Flash caught Dagger’s eyes, his taut expression softened just slightly. He glanced at Quinn, then gave a single nod that said I’ve got her , and I see you in equal measure.

Dagger crossed the space in three strides and cupped Quinn’s face with both hands. Her skin was warm, damp from the heat, and he pressed his forehead to hers. She quivered, whether from exhaustion, fear, or something deeper, he didn’t know. Didn’t care. All he saw was her. Alive. Resolute. Still not giving up.

“Listen,” he said, voice low and rough, “you stay here with Flash. I’ll come back for you.”

Her lips parted, ready to argue, but he shook his head, thumbs brushing over the curve of her cheekbones.

“Langford and his goons are moving fast. Herrera’s men are around here somewhere, tightening the perimeter. We don’t have the luxury of waiting. You know me, Quinn. I don’t sit on the defensive.” He looked to Flash. “We bring the fight to them.”

She inhaled shakily, lashes damp. “I know,” she whispered. “I just don’t want to lose you.”

“You won’t.” He gritted his teeth, ignoring the sharp ache blooming in his side. “I’m going to thin the bastards out. Trust me.”

Her eyes flared with that stubborn fire. “You better come back,” she said, more challenge than plea. “Or so help me, I’ll drag your lethal ass out of that jungle myself.”

A breathless laugh escaped him, rough, real. He cupped her jaw tighter, letting himself feel her, anchor to her. “I know we still have a lot of shit to deal with, but I love you. Down to my fucking soul. You get that?”

She nodded, throat bobbing. “Yeah. I do.” Her fingers slid to his jaw. “We’re not done, Hollis. I’ve got things to say, truths, confessions, all of it, and I’m not saying them to your damn gravestone. Got that?”

“Got it, babe.” He looked over her shoulder to Flash, tossing him the sidearm. His teammate grinned like a bastard.

“Watch her.”

Flash nodded, a flicker of steel in his eyes. “At all costs, brother.”

With one last press of his lips to Quinn’s forehead, Dagger turned and vanished into the emerald labyrinth of vines and mist, swallowed by the living, breathing heart of the jungle.

“Doesn’t he need that gun?” Quinn asked.

Flash chuckled. “They don’t call him Dagger for nothing, honey.” He grinned wickedly. “Knives out, hoo-yah.”

Quinn crouched in the tangle of underbrush, the wet earth soaking through her pants, the thick scent of moss and decaying foliage curling in her nose. The slap of Dagger’s footsteps faded into the damp hush of the jungle, swallowed by the dense canopy and whispering vines.

She wanted to follow, God , she wanted to follow, but a steadying hand on her shoulder from Flash kept her rooted. His grip was firm, grounding.

“He’ll be okay,” Flash said, scanning the shadows beyond the brush, eyes sharp and restless. “We don’t need weapons.”

She knew that, knew just how lethal and unyielding the man was. Her brother-in-law… The term felt strange now, hollow and distant. With Brian gone, death do us part had severed that bond. In its place, clarity settled in like a long-awaited exhale. That tether was broken, not with bitterness, but with peace. Dagger… he wasn’t just some remnant of a painful past. He was hers now. The man she’d always secretly wished had been hers, even when she’d buried that truth beneath guilt and grief.

Brian had clung to her with fear. But Dagger… he simply stood beside her . Steady. Constant. No chains, no demands, just quiet strength that lit something fierce in her.

A spark flared low in her chest, a flicker of something more than fear or panic. Something alive. Something building.

She swallowed hard against the knot in her throat. You’re not broken anymore. The jungle pressed in, thick with heat and tension, but so was she. She had been ashes once, burned out, hollow, but not anymore. A fire stirred beneath her ribs, slow and steady.

Minutes crawled by in heavy silence. The jungle thickened with tension, every rustle or shift of shadow prickling the hairs on her neck. The air was dense with moisture, the kind that clung to skin and made every breath feel heavier. Somewhere in the distance, gunfire cracked, a sharp staccato echo that made her flinch. Her heart leapt with each shot, her mind conjuring every worst-case scenario. She strained to hear a sign, anything, that Dagger was okay.

A hot wave of panic curled through her chest, sharp and suffocating. Logic told her he was trained for this. But love didn’t care about logic.

Then there was movement.

Leaves shuddered behind them. Flash whipped around, pistol up, a silent predator. Another rustle came from the opposite side. Quinn’s pulse thundered. Flash’s gaze snapped between the threats. He couldn’t cover both.

She spotted a figure creeping low through the undergrowth, camouflaged, almost ghostlike in the dim green light. Another man circled behind Flash, too close, too fast. Her stomach dropped. If that second one fired, he would drop Flash, or just as deadly, give away Dagger’s position.

She didn’t think. Her body moved before her mind caught up.

She dropped to a knee and snatched a jagged rock from the dirt, the slick surface biting into her palm. Flash said something, maybe a warning, but the surge of adrenaline drowned everything else out.

“Get away from him!” she shouted, voice cracking like thunder against the hush.

She slammed the rock into the attacker’s skull. The man reeled with a guttural curse. Flash spun and delivered a brutal follow-up strike that sent him sprawling.

But the victory shattered in seconds.

Figures erupted from the trees, half a dozen, maybe more, rifles raised, boots pounding through the muck. Herrera’s insurgents, eyes wild and faces painted with mud.

Quinn’s breath caught in her throat. She raised her trembling hands, heart hammering. Flash’s pistol was nearly empty. They were surrounded.

Cold dread slithered through her, but beneath it curled something hotter, defiance. She didn’t want to go quietly. But common sense screamed louder. If they fired now, they’d be slaughtered.

Rough hands seized her arms, wrenching her upright. Flash fought like a man possessed, but a rifle butt slammed into his ribs, driving him to his knees.

Quinn twisted, shouting, “ Dagger! ” but her voice was swallowed by mocking laughter.

The world lurched around her as they were dragged deeper into the jungle, shoved forward through choking vines and slick, uneven ground. Each step pounded with a single, desperate thought, hold on… just hold on… Dagger will come for us.

Then she heard it, Langford’s voice, smug and venomous, echoing through the trees. “We have your teammate and your lady love. Give up, Dagger. It’s over.”

But Quinn’s fire sparked hotter. That flicker of flame deep in her gut tethering her to Dagger.

It wasn’t over.

Not even close.

Not until they said it was.

The jungle pulsed with heat and threat, dense with the scent of wet bark and the iron tang of blood. Somewhere behind him, Dagger could still hear the ghost-echo of Quinn’s scream, ripped from her throat as they dragged her away. He’d had zero choice. With Flash and Quinn in the clutches of Herrera’s men, he gave up. Wanted to smash that smug grin off Langford’s face, but instead he let them zip-tie his wrists again.

The weight of her scream pressed against his ribs like a vice, each breath shallow and sharp. Sweat trickled down his spine, but the chill inside him was glacial. Every vine, every tree, every rustle of leaves was suddenly too loud, too alive, like the whole rainforest was holding its breath, waiting for him to detonate.

Then Langford spoke.

“Funny thing about your brother, Hollis.”

The words sliced through the heavy air like a blade, sharp enough to gut. The tone of Langford’s voice told him his words were going to hurt.

Dagger went utterly still. Every nerve in his body snapped taut. His breath turned to ice. Focus tunneled. He could feel Quinn’s energy echoing in the space she'd just been, like heat lingering after fire, like a phantom tether stretching between them even now.

The air thickened, heavy with threat. The storm was already here. It lived in his chest. She and Flash came into view, but Langford’s voice carried that smug, mocking cadence that made Dagger want to bury him six feet under and salt the earth. He shoved him past her, her eyes wide and whiskey dark…with her love. He gritted his teeth, seeing nothing but his future there, their future, and something in his chest unraveled, even as Langford continued his taunt.

“He wasn’t even supposed to be on Herrera’s radar. You know that, right? But someone had to let Ramos know he wasn’t State Department. That he was, in fact, a government agent.”

Something inside Dagger cracked open, deep, ancient, and ice-cold. His blood turned to liquid nitrogen. A roar started in the back of his skull, building behind his temples. A hurricane forming behind his eyes.

Langford chuckled. “Oops. The secret is out.”

Behind him, Quinn’s sharp inhale cut through the thick hush of the jungle. He didn’t even have to turn. He could feel the way she froze, the way her body leaned toward the sound, needing the truth even though it burned.

Langford wasn’t done. Of course he wasn’t. He leaned in, his words coated in poison. “Ramos was thrilled to get rid of him. That fucker tortured Brian himself. Your brother didn’t just die, Hollis. He bled out slowly. Helpless. Tendons in his arms sliced so he couldn’t even fight back.”

Dagger’s throat closed. His vision shimmered, not from tears, he was too far gone for that, but from rage.

“One hour,” Langford added, almost gleeful. “That’s how long it took. A mercy kill in the end.”

Dagger’s hands curled into fists, fingernails slicing his palms. His heart slammed against his ribcage, fast and hard and hollow. The roar in his ears was deafening.

“I bet his ghost is still rattling around in the basement of El Helicoide.” Langford smiled, eyes gleaming. “I murdered your brother, Hollis. I wonder how he’d feel, knowing your fucking his lovely, lovely wife.”

Everything inside Dagger detonated. He lunged. There was no thought, only motion. Pure, explosive instinct. Langford’s back hit the tree trunk hard, bark cracking under the impact, the smirk torn from his face as Dagger’s zip-tied fists drove into his throat. The thud echoed through the canopy like thunder. Leaves shook. Birds exploded from the branches overhead in a startled rush.

Behind him, Quinn cried out, shaken, raw.

Langford choked, sputtering, but the bastard still smiled. “Go ahead,” he rasped. “Kill me. Do it. See how far you get before my men put a bullet in her head.”

“Dagger!” Flash’s voice cracked through the storm in his skull like a lightning strike. “No!”

He didn’t move. Couldn’t.

Flash was there in an instant. “You kill him now, you give him everything . You hear me? This isn’t justice, Kade. It won’t bring Brian back.”

“He tortured him,” Dagger snarled, voice low and unrecognizable. “He knew . He gave the order.”

“I know ,” Flash snapped. “God, I know. I want to break him in half myself. But we don’t do this, man. Not like this. This isn’t who we are.”

Langford coughed wetly, and still fucking smirked.

Dagger’s entire body was a live wire of rage, grief, and guilt so heavy it had calcified inside him. But—Quinn. His gaze flicked to the side, just for a second. She stood frozen, eyes locked on him, not with fear, but with pleading. Not for Langford. For him . Don’t become this. Not like this.

His hands trembled, not from weakness, but from restraint. From the war between bloodlust and the woman who saw every facet of him… and chose to love the man, not the weapon. He drew in a breath so deep it scraped his lungs raw. Then he let Langford go.

They shoved them through the rusted compound gate, across a cracked expanse of open ground. The jungle loomed beyond the fence line, dense, seething, alive, breathing in watchful shadow, its silence louder than gunfire, watching from every vine and leaf.

Once, this place had been a home, a weathered hacienda swallowed now by war and time. The walls had been reinforced with salvaged tin, scrap steel, and sandbags stacked like makeshift battlements. Jungle roots split the foundation in places, vines curling like strangling fingers across the facade. Nature was reclaiming the structure, even as the stench of gunpowder and blood declared it a fortress for monsters.

Spent brass littered the dirt, crates of ammunition stacked high beneath torn tarps. Armed men lounged in the shadows, eyes gleaming with boredom and violence, predators waiting for the command to commit atrocities.

They had marched them through the jungle without stop or rest. The air inside the hacienda was suffocating, thick with rot and heat, a humid veil clinging to every inch of skin. The scent of sweat, old gunpowder, rusted metal, and death hung heavy in the stillness. Light flickered from a single overhead bulb, casting shadows that twitched and stretched across cracked tile and pitted walls.

Dagger knelt in zip ties, muscles coiled beneath his soaked clothes, sweat dripping from his brow. His breath was shallow, controlled. He cataloged every exit, every weapon, every man.

Flash crouched beside him, all casual insolence, lips curled in a bored smirk, eyes half-lidded. But Dagger saw the minute twitches in his fingers, the taut line of his shoulders. The readiness. The rage.

Quinn was forced to her knees a few feet away, wrists bound behind her. Her blouse was torn at the collar, one sleeve ripped entirely. A bruise bloomed purple along her cheekbone, her lip split, blood staining her chin. But her eyes, those whiskey-fire eyes, burned.

She looked at Herrera like she wanted to rip him apart with her bare hands. She wasn’t afraid. Not yet.

But Herrera wanted her to be.

Herrera prowled like a king in his court, slow and theatrical, relishing the moment. His boots echoed hollowly across the tile, spurs of sound that cut the silence. His shirt was unbuttoned at the neck, revealing a sliver of a jagged old scar, a badge of brutality worn like a crown. His teeth gleamed beneath a curling smirk, his eyes glittering with sadistic amusement.

“You thought with all your training, your weapons, all your American arrogance was going to eliminate me. That was your plan, but I always have contingency plans,” he said, flicking a glance toward Langford. “Greed knows no bounds and might is often an illusion.” Disgust curled his lips as he crouched in front of Dagger like a man playing with his prey. “Here you are. My prisoner. Shackled. Broken.”

Dagger didn’t speak. Didn’t flinch. He stared, slicing like steel, unblinking, cold, coiled violence ready to be unleashed.

The look of a warrior, weaponless but not unarmed.

Herrera’s smile flickered for the briefest second, a sliver of hesitation buried behind bravado. He straightened with an unnecessary flourish, brushing imaginary dust from his sleeve like it mattered. His fingers lingered on the grip of his sidearm, slow, performative, trying to reassert dominance.

A predator recognized a stronger opponent, knew when he was losing ground.

Then Herrera turned toward Quinn, the one he assumed was weak, insignificant.

Dagger’s body went iron-tight. Flash swore beneath his breath, low and venomous.

But Quinn didn’t shrink back. She locked eyes with Herrera, chin high, fury radiating off her in waves, her own brand of SEAL babe badassery.

Herrera’s steps were slow, calculated, the silence thickening with every shift of his boots. Predatory. Deliberate. Enjoying the show.

Dagger’s fists clenched tighter in his cuffs.

Herrera circled her like a wolf, his gaze raking over her with dark amusement. He flicked a look toward Langford, who watched from the shadows with a feverish gleam in his eyes, lips parted, hungry for chaos.

“This is his woman?” Herrera asked, a smirk tugging at his mouth.

“Yeah,” Langford said, jerking his thumb toward Dagger, who ground his teeth until his jaw ached. “Ramos killed her husband. She’s his sister-in-law.”

Herrera chuckled and crouched beside Quinn, fingers drifting toward her hair, brushing it from her face in mock tenderness.

She jerked away, her lips curling in pure disgust.

Flash’s voice sliced through the tension, sharp, clipped. “Your cousin died like a dog in the dirt, brought down by a fucking fierce woman. You’ll go the same way.”

Herrera’s gaze darkened. He flicked his fingers toward the rebel hovering behind Flash.

The man drew his blade and plunged it into Flash’s side.

Flash grunted, the sound low and tight. His body jerked, but he didn’t fall. He brought his bound hands over the wound, blood welling fast between his fingers.

His face barely changed, but his eyes were steel and full of fire.

Dagger lunged instinctively, rage snapping loose, but the guards on either side held him back, muscling him down again.

Herrera’s voice stayed smooth. “Where was I?” He turned toward Quinn, lips curling. “Ah, yes. This pretty little morsel. Let’s see how long she lasts.”

Dagger saw it coming a second too late, saw the gleam in Herrera’s eyes, meant for him, not her. A weaponized act of dominance, meant to shatter him.

Then Herrera ripped Quinn’s blouse open, fabric tearing, leaving her in a black lace bra.

Her breath caught, shock, fury, humiliation , but she didn’t cry out.

Dagger’s vision tunneled. His heartbeat became a war drum in his ears. Something inside him snapped so loud he thought the others must have heard it.

A low, primal growl tore from his throat and he surged up from his knees, dragging both guards with him, bound fists raised like battering rams.

But they slammed him down again, one driving a forearm across his throat. Another pressed a blade to his neck, steel biting skin.

Next to him, Flash shifted, breathing ragged. His eyes flicked toward the nearest window, then to Dagger.

“Keep it cool , ” he muttered hoarsely. “She’s coming. ” His voice was thin with pain, but the meaning behind it was razor-sharp.

Lechuza.

Was that the beat of an owl’s wings, wide in flight, silent and swift, ready to descend on the filth beneath her? That was an owl’s job. Take out vermin. Flash could feel it. Dagger did too.

He drew a slow breath, fury pulling taut beneath the surface, but he nodded once, steady.

Maybe it took an owl to flip this goatfuck on its furry ass.

Herrera looked to one of his men, a younger rebel with a crooked nose and a cruel smirk. A silent nod. The man stepped forward, slow, leering, eyes raking over Quinn’s body.

“No,” Dagger ground out, voice low and lethal. Even Flash moved only to be kicked back down.

Herrera’s eyes gleamed. “Oh yes. I like to watch the breaking. You can’t stop this. You have no power here.”

The man circled around her, and she couldn’t mask the horror on her face. She pulled her gaze away from the rebel, frantically searching for him. “Nothing they do to me will ever change how I feel about you.” The rebel looked over at him, his taunting gaze full of lecherous menace as he hefted his crotch. Dropping to one knee in front of Quinn, he ran his fingers up her ribcage.

She twisted violently. “Don’t touch me!” She used her balled up fists to strike him a hard blow across his face.

Herrera laughed, the sound sharp and echoing in the confined space. “I want him to watch. Let’s see if he’ll still be quiet while you scream.”

Quinn was trembling now, not from fear, but rage. Her eyes met Dagger’s across the space, defiant, furious, unbroken .

The man assaulting Quinn didn’t hesitate. He yanked her upright, cutting her bonds with a flick of his blade, then spun her and slammed her against the wall. Her shoulder hit hard. She twisted, tried to fight, but he gripped both wrists in one hand and locked them together behind her back with his big hand.

“Let go of me, you bastard!” she snarled, thrashing.

Dagger surged against his restraints, fury lashing through him like an electric current. Flash’s jaw clenched, rage flickering like a storm behind his eyes.

That bastard leaned in close, Quinn recoiling. He groped for the clasp at her pants. Dagger’s world narrowed, his lungs crushed under the weight of rage and helplessness.

Flash surged forward instinctively, held back only by the bite of his restraints and the sheer need for timing.

Quinn struggled, one arm freed as she lashed out, raking her nails across the man’s face, drawing blood.

He snarled and backhanded her brutally, sending her head snapping to the side.

“No!” Dagger roared, lurching forward in pure instinct.

Quinn’s knees buckled. The man laughed, reaching again for her pants.

Then… the pressure shifted.

A sound, barely audible.

A breath with no body.

A breeze with no source.

The kind of stillness that made the hairs on the back of his neck rise. A hush that hunted, like something sacred and terrible had just stepped through the veil.

Then the jungle screamed .

Howler monkeys shrieked in frenzied terror, birds launched from the canopy in a chaotic flutter, wings beating like war drums. The ground seemed to shudder, alive with the thrum of things older than man. Insects hissed, branches trembled, and unseen creatures bolted into the underbrush like the underworld itself had opened.

That’s when the wall blew apart?—

A detonation of violence, smoke, and screaming stone, like the world itself had gasped and shattered to make way for the thing that wore her skin.

She was here. Lechuza. Not a ghost. Not a woman. Something between bone and blood and nightmare. The jungle’s own daughter, born of feathers and fury, carved from dark myth and whispers around the fire. She didn’t step into the scene. She claimed it.

Her presence sank teeth into the air, made the light shiver, turned oxygen into omen. Every leaf bowed. Every shadow recoiled. She didn’t make a sound. She was the sound.

Boom. The explosion ripped through the hacienda like a cannon blast, fire and steel erupting in a rain of debris. Smoke roared in, thick and blinding. Shadowguard breached, silent, surgical, and merciless, black-clad ghosts with silent eyes and unforgiving aim.

Lechuza led the charge, slipping through smoke like a predator on the hunt, silent wings, golden eyes, blades flashing like talons. A living, lethal weapon. In her wake, a golden owl flew. Not in body, but in shadow, vast, soundless, and utterly unnatural. It swept across the room, passing over heads like a silent judgment. When it passed over Dagger, terror struck him like a blade to the heart. Not fear. Not panic. Something older. Primal. The kind of dread that didn’t belong to the battlefield. He had never felt it. Not in combat. Not ever. The shadow moved on, narrowing, tightening, until it fell directly across Herrera. The man, monster that he was, collapsed into horror, his face stripped of its mask, all pretense gone. A man who knew his death wasn’t coming. It was already here .

The jungle itself seemed to hush.

Even the fire held its breath.

Dagger exhaled, ragged, shaken. “What the hell was that?”

Flash didn’t flinch. Didn’t even glance at him. Just watched her, calm and still as a man who’d already accepted the truth. “ Her shadow, ” he said quietly. “She’s found her prey.”

A soft smile on her mouth, she said, looking directly at a cowering Herrera, “I warned you. The jungle doesn’t forgive.” Her eyes narrowed, gleaming like gold struck by lightning. “Shall we dance, brothers?”

Both men smiled, one Asian, the other Nepali, feral, coiled. “Let’s blade dance, sister,” the Nepalese man said. “The jungle calls for it.”

Dagger got chills. There was something otherworldly about these three, then there was no more time for fancy notions.

Dagger turned just in time to catch a flash of motion, A lithe figure flanked left, a blur of motion and moonlight, moving like smoke, burning like silence. His eyes didn’t glow, they smoldered , as if the fire inside him hadn’t yet decided who to spare.

The air behind him shimmered, thick with the heat of the blast, twisting in waves that didn’t move like air should. For one impossible second, the smoke curled in a serpentine shimmer, coiling through the flames in a shape too fluid, too precise . A suggestion of scales. A ripple of something ancient . Mythical . Gone before he could blink. He shook his head. Hallucination, maybe. But something about the way the fire bent around that man… It didn’t feel human.

His blade whispered, no, sang, across the first guard’s throat, severing windpipe and artery in a single, fluid draw. He fought with judgment. Like a dragon deciding which souls were worth the breath. Then he was gone. Moving. A sword dancer of another age, each strike a note in some forgotten hymn of war. Insurgents fell before they even knew death was near. Dagger had never seen him before, but he didn’t need an introduction. He couldn’t mistake a Shadowguard. Not when they moved like they remembered the first war ever fought.

On the opposite flank, another operator emerged, not charging, not running.

Stalking . A wall of muscle and silence, his movement both primal and precise, like the jungle itself had sculpted him from its darkest instincts. His kukri gleamed red and holy in his grip, whispering of centuries of warrior grit and blood -bound purpose. Then it sank deep into a man’s ribs, the curved blade twisting with brutal finality, pulling the life clean from his lungs. He didn’t grunt. Didn’t speak. He just kept moving, fluid, unstoppable, all power and predator, a living echo of something older than war. His eyes had flashed orange, then black in the firelight, just long enough to glimpse the roar beneath the man, contained, waiting to unleash.

Dagger’s vision swam, disoriented by pain, dehydration, the weight of everything they’d survived. For a second, just a breath, he thought he saw a tiger streak across the floor where the man had passed. Not in body. In motion . Huge. A phantom blur, low and lethal. He blinked hard, but the operator was already gone into the shadows, into the myth. A force of nature born not to dodge bullets but to dare them. Gunfire roared. He answered like thunder with a heartbeat.

Quinn’s assailant turned, momentarily stunned. Dagger threw off his lethargy. He moved, his hands slamming into the bastard’s throat, and he drove him backward with the force of a battering ram, slamming him into the wall. The man’s head cracked against the concrete with a sickening thud, and he dropped like a stone.

Flash was already up, favoring his left side, blood in his eyes.

Lechuza reached him first, slashing his cuffs in a single swipe. She didn’t speak, didn’t pause, but her eyes met Flash’s through the smoke. Just one heartbeat. Recognition. Connection.

The Gurkha blade was at Dagger’s side next, cutting through his restraints with a swift slash. Quinn sagged against the wall, still half-bound, eyes dazed, but the moment she saw Dagger, she pushed herself upright, rage flickering behind the bruises.

Herrera… was finally realizing he had underestimated every single one of them.

The smoke hadn’t even cleared, and Dagger was already looking for the one person in all this carnage. He spied Langford stumbling his way to the shattered wall.

He took off after him, Quinn right on his heels. He had half a mind to tell her to seek cover, but this was her fight too. She deserved to be part of Langford’s takedown. Dagger caught him, his fists flying, the fury inside him finally releasing in a brutal beating. Langford fought back, then bolted again. Bleeding, bruised, gasping, half-limping, half-dragging his carcass like a cockroach that refused to die.

But Dagger wasn’t done.

He grabbed him from behind. “You’re not going anywhere,” Dagger growled. His fist met Langford’s face, again. And again. Bone cracked under impact. Blood sprayed across the debris-littered floor. Langford’s lip split wide.

This was for Brian.

Another strike, his knuckles split open. Hot pain, barely felt.

For Quinn.

A brutal elbow into Langford’s gut. He doubled over, coughing blood onto the tile.

For the boys. For every goddamn lie.

Langford laughed through broken teeth, spitting red. “You hit like a man who can’t think,” he sneered. “You’ll die like one too.”

Dagger lunged again, the fury in him far from slaked, overwhelming form, too wild, too raw, and Langford twisted, slamming an elbow into his ribs. The impact knocked the breath from his lungs, sent pain flaring through his side.

Quinn moved. She was a blur of motion, slamming into Langford’s side with everything she had. No hesitation. No more waiting for someone else to save her.

Dagger saw it all in flashes, the twist of her body, the wild swing of her fist. It wasn’t trained, wasn’t perfect, but it was real . Fierce. His SEAL babe in full court press. Langford staggered, stunned. She drove her knee up into his groin, full force. He doubled over with an agonized cry. Langford looked up, dazed and bleeding and his face changed. He grabbed a fallen sidearm, rose to his knees and aimed, not at him, his heart lurching, but at Quinn.

“Quinn,” his shout full of anguish, “No!” Then it happened. A snap in the air. A shimmer of movement. A whisper of cloth. A blade punched through Langford’s chest from behind, angled clean through his heart. He froze. Stared down at the gleaming edge protruding from his sternum. One choked breath. One gurgle of disbelief. Then he crumpled.

Dagger stood over him, stunned. Not by the kill, but by the stillness that followed. The Asian Shadowguard stepped into the light, blade sliding free without a sound. He wiped the blood on Langford’s shirt, slow, deliberate. Then looked up. Gave Dagger a single nod. His eyes said it plainly: Traitor. No words. No glory. Just the clean, final work of someone who had ended monsters before.

Dagger’s pulse thundered in his ears. He looked at Quinn. Her eyes were wide, adrenaline-lit, chest rising fast. He reached for her. “You okay?” She nodded wrapped her arms around him, and his heart could beat again. “Yeah.” Then she looked down at Langford’s corpse, then back at Dagger. “But I’m really glad our hands are clean.” He didn’t say anything. Just squeezed her. Some things didn’t need blood to be righteous. Some justice came with a blade through the heart.

The Shadowguard stepped back into the dark, leaving only silence in his wake.

Dagger stood there, the weight of it all pressing down, Quinn in his arms, Langford at his feet, verdict hanging in the air like smoke. All he could think was: Samurai justice. With a shiver, remembering that hallucination, the smoke, the bright scale shimmer, the shape that wasn’t quite a man, Dragon judgment.

Dagger turned just as the last scream died in the compound. He tightened his arms around her, holding her trembling body to him. His love surged hot and fierce.

A gurgling rasp broke the silence, wet and savage.

His eyes locked on Herrera, stumbling, hands flying to his throat. Blood poured between his fingers in thick, hot rivers, soaking his uniform in red.

Lechuza stood before him, blade steady in her grip, breathing hard. Tendrils of her dark hair clung to her cheeks, her golden eyes glowing with unblinking calm.

She didn’t speak right away. She didn’t need to.

Dagger felt the chill move through the room like the jungle itself was watching, a presence older and wilder than man.

Herrera fell to his knees, power bleeding out of him, arrogance slipping away with every heartbeat.

Lechuza tilted her head, her assassin gaze, watching him descend, silent and precise, just like she’d always been.

Her voice cut through the quiet, low and deliberate. “You should’ve been more careful.”

Dagger could feel the weight in her words, not fury, not vengeance . Something truer . Final . Herrera’s wide, disbelieving eyes searched the room like he still expected someone to save him.

“The jungle has eyes,” Lechuza whispered. “Tonight, it saw you.”

He collapsed, dead, sprawling in his own hubris.

Dagger watched her linger, his hold on Quinn tightening, gaze fixed on the body. He looked at Lechuza. There was no triumph in her eyes.

Only clarity.

Only justice.