Page 284 of Broken Oath

Six hours.

Maybe less.

He looked at the scratches hidden behind his bunk.

Five stolen years.

Five years of pain, silence, and men refusing to give their captors the information they wanted.

Now Project Nightfall was running out of time.

That meant Shadow Division was closer than anyone inside the mountain wanted to admit.

It also meant Alan Madow and Colonel Reeves were afraid.

Afraid enough to kill every surviving witness.

Wade crouched beside the wall and ran his fingers along the bottom of the metal bunk.

During his third year in captivity, a maintenance worker had failed to replace one of the bolts securing the frame to the floor.

Wade had worked it free millimeter by millimeter.

It had taken him seven months.

Since then, the bolt had remained hidden inside a split in the mattress seam.

He pulled it out.

Four inches long.

Narrow.

Heavy.

Not much of a weapon.

But it was more than he’d had yesterday.

A soft voice drifted through the vent connecting his cell to the next one.

“We still breathing?”

A smile pulled at Wade’s mouth.

Grant Mercer.

His second-in-command.

Still fighting.

Still stubborn.

Still alive.

“For now,” Wade answered.

A pause.