“I’m right here.”
The words scrape out rougher now.
“You don’t leave me. You hear me?”
Nothing.
Fear claws hard through my chest.
“I didn’t come this far to lose you now.”
Still nothing.
But I keep holding her hand anyway.
One more second.
One more breath.
Then a nurse gently pulls her away from me.
And the doors close.
Just like that.
Gone.
The silence afterward feels worse than gunfire.
31
Clay
Smoke crawls through the east wing thick enough to taste.
Burned wiring.
Concrete dust.
Blood.
Every breath scrapes going down.
Lucas moves beside me with his rifle raised while emergency lights flash weak red across the corridor.
“Two kids confirmed,” he mutters. “Still missing the rest.”
“Not for long.”
Gunfire cracks somewhere deeper in the compound.
Less coordinated now.
More desperate.
Good.
Means we hit them hard.
