Page 113 of Never the Same

Four more operators from Alpha dropped fast behind Carter and Sebastian, including two men from Falcon Falls we’d operated with before, along with two of Sebastian’s League operatives who never shared their names, but if they worked for him, then I knew they were solid.

“Ready?” I mouthed to Hollis.

She gave me a sharp nod. I tapped the top of her helmet, and she knocked down her NVGs, then slid down the rope smoothly. Good. Muscle memory remained intact.

I followed after her, boots burning on the wet nylon, rifle clamped tight to my chest.

The ground rushed up, and a flash of lightning revealed Hankley’s pine forest. Beyond it, the outline of the protectors’ compound: concrete, steel, and fencing topped with razor wire.

Hollis landed clean, and I went down a beat later, mud splashing under my boots as I released and dropped to a knee beside her.

The first bird peeled off to avoid radar. The second swooped wide, Easton flying like an angel fearlessly right into the storm.

“Alpha Team, advance,” Carter announced.

“Stack up,” Ryder ordered, his words cutting through the thunder. “Delta left, Foxtrot right.”

We pushed through the trees, shadows bleeding in and out as the sky lit up like a war was overhead. Floodlights along the compound flickered with the storm, stuttering between dark and bright.

“Delta Two, heading to the northwest side to infil,” Alex transmitted, then vanished from my periphery, doing what he did best: becoming a ghost.

“Roger,” Ryder answered.

We waited in our positions for Alex to discreetly get inside unnoticed—his specialty, thanks to his Houdini-ish father. We had to have eyes and ears in the compound before we breached, first ensuring their protectors weren’t also innocent pawns in all this before we opened fire and engaged.

“Foxtrot Two, status?” Ryder asked Julian, then went down the line, ensuring everyone from all three units were good to go. The seconds dragged by as we answered, comms hissing with the storm.

My glove slipped on the rifle grip, breath fogging inside my night vision goggles. Visibility was already shit in this storm.

Finally, Alex came back online. “Visual confirmation. Four packages inside and alive in the basement: the king, queen, prince, and princess. All detained, but the queen and prince are isolated and in a separate room.”

I knew what that meant. Hollis’s mother was about to be drugged. The “prince” was Tristan, and if he was bound inside, he wasn’t a traitor.

“Delta Two, can you get me a visual so I can see who’s with the queen and prince?” Gideon requested.

A beat later, an image pinged every handset.

“Can you ID the tango?” Alex asked, continuing to remain an undetected ghost inside.

“Yes,” Gideon replied. “My sister’s protector.”

Kylo? My chest clenched.

“The princess’s protector,” he amended, referring to Lyra.

“Any sight of mine?” Gideon pressed.

Static. Fragments of words, and then . . . gunfire.

“Delta Two’s burned,” Ryder snapped. “All teams, snipers up to prepare for our breach. Go, go!”

The thought of losing Alex lit a fire inside me. I’d seen him on death’s doorstep once before, and I wasn’t about to watch it happen again. He had a family to return home to.

“This is Alpha One. My team, you’re clear to take the towers now.”

“Roger,” came in unison from the three designated snipers for our mission.

“This is Foxtrot Two. Tower one clear,” Julian confirmed.