14. Clay
Clay
Keeping up with Hannah in the middle of a war zone is apparently impossible.
She moves through chaos like she was built for it.
Smoke pours through the warehouse while gunfire rattles outside, and somehow she still drops beside a crying child with steady hands and a calm voice like the world isn’t falling apart around us.
It should scare me less than it does.
Instead, it terrifies me.
Because every second she’s exposed feels like another chance for me to lose her.
“Hannah,” I bark as she moves toward another injured civilian near the overturned crates.
“I see him,” she shoots back without even looking at me.
Of course she does.
A burst of automatic fire tears through the loading entrance.
I grab her instinctively and yank her backward just as bullets rip through the space where she’d been standing.
She slams hard against my chest.
The impact sends pain slicing through my ribs, but I barely feel it.
Because for one brutal second—
All I can think about is how close that was.
Too close.
Way too damn close.
Hannah looks up at me, startled.
My hand is still locked around her waist.
Her heartbeat pounds against my chest almost as hard as mine.
“You cannot keep doing that,” I snap.
Her eyebrows shoot upward instantly.
“Doing what? Saving people?”
“Trying to get yourself killed!”
“I had cover!”
“You had luck.”
The argument dies abruptly when another explosion rocks the warehouse hard enough to shake the floor beneath us.
Children scream nearby.
Dust and smoke billow through the rafters overhead.
And still—
Neither of us lets go right away.
Jesus Christ.
Eight months.
Eight months without seeing her, and somehow standing here with her in my arms feels terrifyingly natural.
Like my body already knows exactly where she belongs.
The realization hits hard enough to nearly knock the air out of me.
Hannah seems to realize it too.
Because suddenly her breathing changes.
Shallower.
Uneven.
Her eyes flick briefly to my mouth before she pulls away quickly.
Professional mask back in place instantly.
“People first,” she says tightly.
Right.
People first.
Always.
I force myself to let go.
Even though every instinct inside me wants to drag her out of this building and never let her out of my sight again.
Russ’s voice crackles through comms.
“Clay, we’ve got multiple hostiles moving toward the north entrance.”
“Copy.”
Lucas appears through the smoke carrying a little girl in his arms while Miles helps two injured civilians toward the side exit.
“Extraction route’s getting ugly!” Lucas shouts. “We need to move!”
“We still have wounded!” Hannah yells back immediately.
Of course she does.
A man groans somewhere near the back wall.
I turn toward the sound automatically.
And freeze.
One of the injured militia men from earlier lies slumped against the concrete near the office doorway, blood soaking heavily through his abdomen.
The same man Hannah treated.
He’s barely conscious.
Hannah moves toward him instantly.
I catch her wrist before she reaches him.
“No.”
Her eyes flash immediately.
“He’ll die.”
“He tried to kill people.”
“He’s still human.”
Dammit.
I stare at her for one long second while gunfire echoes outside.
This woman.
This impossible, infuriating woman.
Even now—
after being kidnapped,
dragged through a war zone,
held captive—
she still refuses to stop caring about people.
Even the ones who hurt her.
And somehow that makes me love her more.
The realization lands hard and final this time.
Not attraction.
Not attachment.
Love.
Real.
Terrifying.
Complete.
“Hannah,” I say roughly, “we cannot save everybody.”
Pain flickers briefly across her face.
Not because she doesn’t know that.
Because she does.
And she hates it anyway.
Before she can answer, the wounded militia man suddenly grabs weakly at my vest.
Dark eyes lock onto mine.
Then toward Hannah.
“North bridge,” he rasps painfully.
We both freeze.
The man coughs hard, blood staining his lips.
“They take doctor there next.”
My pulse spikes instantly.
“What?”
The man grimaces weakly.
“Commander… wants American doctor moved.” Another painful breath. “Bigger camp north of river.”
Ice floods my bloodstream.
Another transfer.
Another disappearance.
Hannah crouches beside him immediately despite my glare.
“When?” she asks.
“Tonight.”
No.
Absolutely not.
The militia man grips Hannah’s sleeve weakly.
“You helped my brother,” he whispers. “Children too.”
His eyes shift toward me again.
“Get her out.”
Then his hand slips loose.
Gone.
Silence hangs for half a second around us despite the chaos.
Then reality crashes back hard.
“Hannah!” Miles shouts from the loading entrance. “We gotta move!”
Smoke thickens rapidly near the ceiling now.
The warehouse won’t stay standing much longer.
I grab Hannah’s hand this time instead of her wrist.
Tighter.
More desperate.
Her eyes snap to mine immediately.
“We are leaving,” I say.
No argument this time.
No resistance.
Maybe because she hears it in my voice now.
The fear.
The desperation.
Everything I haven’t said out loud yet.
Another explosion shakes the building violently.
The lights finally die completely.
Darkness swallows the warehouse.
And somewhere outside—
Heavy vehicles start approaching the river.