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“This isn’t America,” he sneers. “Look around you. Do you even recognize this place? I can’t betray a country that doesn’t exist anymore.” The hand holding his weapon trembles. “Countries rise and fall. Our time is up. It’s time to cash it in, Reese.”
“Can’t you hear yourself? You’re destroying everything you’ve ever believed in.”
“I’m the only one who believes in what needs to happen! I’m the only one who will do what is necessary!”
A mission. That’s what the range owner said. The ones who get it in their head that they have a special purpose. Henry’s has been hammered together on the devil’s anvil. His soul has gone dark, his brain white-hot. He’s boiling in ecstatic fury. How long has he been building to this?
“I believe in putting ourselves first.” Rancid contempt drips from him. “The rest of the world can go fuck itself. He can go fuck himself.”
Again, he drags Brennan by his hair, shoves his weapon against Brennan’s head. Hot iron tears through me. Melts me, makes me weak. Rips the air from my lungs.
“You can go fuck yourself, Reese.”
He screws up his face, and for an instant, I think he’s going to do it. He’s going to execute Brennan in front of me.
“No, fuck, Henry! Merde, don’t!”
“You know, I thought you could be beside me.” Is that regret in Henry’s voice, simmering under all the rage? “I really thought we could do this together.”
“Are you out of your fucking mind?” It’s like he never knew me at all.
Henry’s eyes flash. “Fuck you,” he hisses. “Why are you even here? You were supposed to chase your fucking tail for another five hours. You were supposed to be paralyzed when you realized Sheridan had betrayed everyone. And I’m supposed to be halfway across the Atlantic, heading for my new life!”
“You know we would have found you. If not here, then in the air. How did this play out? How did this end in your mind?”
“Who would dare attack anyone holding the president captive? Who would dare shoot this plane down? Or launch an invasion against the country that would execute him as soon as a single fucking boot touched their soil?”
I swallow. “No one.”
“I was going to bring the world to its knees.”
Adrian Quinten melts out of the darkness behind Henry. He’s clearly the stable one behind this operation. Henry’s psyche has shattered. He’s held on to the pieces of his mind through white-knuckled rage, and now it’s coming undone. I have moments left before Henry reaches his end, and tries for a last play in his desperation.
“How much are you paying him?” I ask Quinten.
“Enough.”
“This isn’t about money,” Henry snaps.
“You know, it wasn’t the CIA or MI6 that killed Lena. It was the FSB.” My eyes drill into Quinten’s. “You’re working for the people who murdered her.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Quinten barks.
“I know she was pregnant. I know you loved her, and she loved you.”
“Shut the fuck up!” Henry grits his teeth and roars as he shoves Brennan from his knees to his belly and digs the barrel of his weapon into the back of Brennan’s neck. Brennan twists, and his eyes meet mine—
Do not give up.His voice is inside my head, the thought in his eyes so clear and bright I can hear him within me.
I hope my eyes are speaking just as loudly. Je t’aime, mon cher.
My internal countdown hits sixteen minutes.
“How did you come this unglued without me noticing, Henry?”
“You were so busy falling in love, you didn’t notice a fucking thing. How could you notice anything when all you saw was him?”
“And Sheridan? Did you think at all about what you were doing to him?”
