22. Clay
Clay
Iwant to put a bullet through his head.
Immediately.
The only thing stopping me is Hannah standing slightly behind my shoulder.
Because if this turns into a firefight right now, she gets caught in the middle.
And apparently every psychopath in this country wants a piece of her.
Fantastic.
Smoke curls through the loading dock while the warehouse burns around us in pieces.
Outside, militia fighters continue exchanging fire with the operator’s strike team near the riverfront.
Bodies already litter the street.
But inside this loading dock?
Nobody moves.
The operator watches me with the same cold focus I’d use on a target assessment.
He’s measuring reaction time.
Emotional attachment.
Threat level.
And I hate how good he is at it.
“You trained her,” I say flatly.
“Yes.”
“You helped flag her.”
A pause.
Then—
“I tried to remove her from the list.”
That catches me off guard.
Apparently it catches Hannah too.
“What?” she whispers.
The operator finally looks at her fully again.
“You were never supposed to be deployed into an active conflict zone.”
The militia commander laughs harshly from outside the loading entrance.
“And yet here we are.”
The operator ignores him completely.
Interesting.
There’s bad blood there.
Maybe enough to use.
Russ subtly shifts closer beside me.
I feel him reading the room too.
Looking for fractures.
Weaknesses.
Opportunities.
The operator’s team fans out carefully near the loading dock entrance while maintaining fire suppression outside.
Professional as hell.
Private military.
Black ops.
Ghost unit.
Something off-books.
And somehow they knew Hannah would be here before we did.
That thought settles ugly in my chest.
“Hannah,” I say quietly without taking my eyes off him, “did anyone from that training course ever contact you afterward?”
“No.”
The operator answers before she can.
“She wasn’t supposed to know she was under evaluation.”
Evaluation.
Jesus Christ.
Hannah’s expression hardens instantly.
“You experimented on us?”
“No.”
The operator’s tone stays perfectly calm.
“We identified survivability markers.”
“That’s just a prettier way of saying the same thing.”
Damn right it is.
The operator studies her silently for a second.
Then says quietly—
“You scored higher than anyone we’d ever tested.”
The words hit Hannah hard.
I see it immediately.
Because this suddenly reframes everything:
the training,
the deployment,
the ambush.
None of it was random.
Rage builds slow and violent inside my chest.
They hunted her.
The realization nearly snaps something in me.
Outside, another explosion rocks the river district.
The militia commander turns sharply toward the noise.
One of his fighters rushes toward him speaking rapid Arabic.
Panicked.
The commander’s expression darkens instantly.
“They crossed the bridge already?”
The operator hears that too.
So do I.
And suddenly I understand.
There’s another group coming.
Not militia.
Not this strike team.
Something worse.
The operator immediately looks toward Hannah.
“We’re out of time.”
“No,” I say coldly. “You’re leaving without her.”
The operator’s expression never changes.
“If she stays here, she dies.”
I step forward.
“And if she goes with you?”
A pause.
Too long of one.
That’s all the answer I need.
Hannah’s fingers suddenly wrap around my wrist.
Small touch.
Still enough to ground me instantly.
“Clay.”
I glance toward her sharply.
Her eyes lock onto mine.
Steady despite the chaos around us.
Despite the fear I can see buried underneath it.
“He’s scared.”
The statement catches me completely off guard.
“What?”
She slowly looks toward the operator.
“You’re afraid of whoever’s coming next.”
The operator says nothing.
And that silence is deafening.
Russ notices it too.
“So who’s crossing that bridge?” he asks quietly.
The militia commander suddenly answers from outside.
“The people you should all be afraid of.”
Not reassuring.
Gunfire intensifies near the northern streets.
Closer now.
Heavy caliber rounds.
Armored movement.
This isn’t another militia group.
This is something organized enough to make hardened operators nervous.
The operator finally looks directly at me again.
“If you care about her,” he says quietly, “you need to move now.”
I stare at him for one long second.
Then ask the question that’s been burning through my head since this started.
“Who the hell are you?”
For the first time—
The operator hesitates.
Just slightly.
Then finally says:
“My name is Gabriel Walker.”
The name hits Russ instantly.
I see recognition flash across his face.
Which means this just got so much worse than I thought.
“Oh hell,” Russ mutters quietly.
I look sharply toward him.
“You know him?”
Russ’s expression goes grim.
“Not personally.”
That’s somehow worse.
Then Russ says the words that turn the entire situation upside down.
“Gabriel Walker died three years ago.”