Ethan (Delta Five SEALS #4)

Chapter 1

Ethan

That alone tells me everything I need to know.

Calls in the middle of the night mean one of two things—someone’s dead… or someone’s about to be.

I’m already reaching for my boots when my secure phone vibrates again across the table in the dark safehouse room.

One message.

Move now. Tier One priority. Eyes only.

No location.

No details.

Just the kind of order that means whatever’s coming is bad enough they don’t want it written down anywhere permanent.

I’m dressed and out the door in under three minutes.

Washington is quiet at this hour. Still. Waiting.

It never stays that way.

By the time I step into the underground briefing room, Ronan is already there, leaning against the far wall like a shadow someone forgot to erase. Jonah sits at the table, elbows on his knees, jaw tight. Cal stands near the screen, arms crossed, watching the door.

Jase and Mila aren’t here.

Good.

They’ve earned a break.

Which leaves me.

And if this is Tier One…

That means it’s mine.

The door opens.

Director Vale walks in with two armed agents behind him, a sealed black case in his hand. One look at his face and every muscle in my body locks down.

This isn’t routine.

“Cross,” he says.

“Director.”

He sets the case on the table—but doesn’t open it right away. His gaze sweeps the room, measuring.

Calculating.

“We intercepted a movement order out of Prague six hours ago.”

Jonah straightens. “Ascendancy?”

Vale nods once. “A surviving faction. Smaller cell. More aggressive. They’re trying to regain leverage after Zurich.”

Cal exhales slowly. “What kind of leverage?”

Vale flips open the case.

There’s a photo inside.

Female.

Thirties.

Dark hair pulled back.

Blood streaked across one side of her face.

I don’t need to pick it up.

I already know.

My chest goes cold.

No.

No damn way.

I step closer anyway, like I need to prove myself wrong.

But I don’t.

I know that face.

I know the way her mouth used to curve when she thought I was taking things too seriously. I know those eyes—sharp, steady, impossible to lie to.

I know her.

And she was never supposed to be seen again.

“Ava Winslow,” Vale says.

The name hits like a bullet.

Jonah looks at me. “Is that your Ava Winslow?”

I don’t answer right away.

I can’t.

Because I’m still staring at the photo… trying to reconcile the woman in front of me with the one I buried eight years ago.

“She’s dead,” I say finally.

Vale doesn’t flinch. “Apparently not.”

That gets my attention.

“What is this?”

“She surfaced forty-eight hours ago in Vienna,” he says. “Our source lost eyes on her two hours later. Three men were found dead in the apartment she fled.”

Ronan pushes off the wall. “Trained?”

“Yes.”

Cal lets out a quiet breath. “So she’s not running scared.”

“No,” Vale says. “She’s running armed.”

Yeah.

That sounds like her.

I pick up the photo now.

Her face is bruised. Tired. But her eyes—

Still defiant.

Still fighting.

Alive.

After eight years…

she’s alive.

“This isn’t possible,” I mutter.

Vale slides a file across the table.

I open it.

Surveillance stills. Travel routes. Timestamps. Partial intercepts.

Then one page stops me cold.

A handwritten note.

Scanned.

Three words.

Tell Ethan run.

My jaw tightens.

That’s her handwriting.

No question.

I’d know it anywhere.

“Where is she?” I ask.

Vale meets my gaze. “We believe she’s heading for a dead-drop site outside Prague.”

“Believe?”

“She’s good.”

Yeah.

I know.

Too good.

“What does she have?” Ronan asks.

Vale’s expression darkens slightly. “Names. Accounts. Fallback sites. And something we haven’t been able to decrypt.”

Jonah swears under his breath.

“Then why not send a retrieval team?” Cal asks.

Vale looks at me.

“Because if she sees the wrong face, she disappears again. Permanently.”

Silence settles over the room.

Heavy.

Everyone already knows.

This isn’t just a mission.

It’s personal.

And that makes it dangerous in a way no one here is going to say out loud.

I close the file slowly.

“What’s the objective?”

“Bring her in alive,” Vale says. “Gain her trust if you can. Extract whatever she’s carrying before Ascendancy reaches her.”

“And if she won’t come?”

Vale doesn’t hesitate.

“Then you convince her.”

I look back down at the photo.

Ava.

Alive.

After everything—

that should feel like a miracle.

It doesn’t.

It feels like something that was buried just got dragged back into the light… and it’s about to burn everything down with it.

Because grief?

Grief is clean.

Final.

This—

this rips open wounds that never healed.

I set the photo back on the table.

“When do we leave?”

“Ten minutes.”

Good.

Because if I stand here any longer, I might start remembering things I’ve spent eight years trying to forget.

The way she laughed.

The way she fought.

The way she kissed me like the world was already ending—and we didn’t care.

I shove it all down.

Hard.

Where it belongs.

Mission first.

Always.

But as I reach for the file, one thought cuts through everything else—

sharp. clear. unavoidable.

If Ava Winslow is alive…

then someone lied to me.

And I’m going to find out who.