Page 145 of BounBound By Scars

Status: Inactive

Last Active: 6 years ago

Type: Unknown

Defection Risk: Critical

File Visibility: Tier 1

Siwáng?

No first name. No history. No location.

Just the word.

I filed it away for later.

For now, I had to get to the conference room. Zane was about to brief the team on the mission that could finally put us one step ahead.

Even if just for a moment.

THIRTY-THREE

Amelia

“You’re a fucking genius!”

The door flew open, slamming into the wall behind it. I jumped, startled—snapping out of whatever spiral I’d been caught in.

Zane stood there, taking in the mess that was me.

I was on the floor, Bouquet beside me. My eyes burned, swollen from crying. I’d been curled there for what felt like hours, wrecked by a grief I didn’t know how to name.

Because how do you mourn someone who isn’t dead—but who left like they were?

God, I missed him. Kabir. His silence had become the loudest thing in my life.

Zane stepped in quickly, crouching beside me. “Hey—hey, what happened? Are you okay?”

I wiped at my face, embarrassed. “It’s nothing.” My voice cracked. “Why am I a genius?”

He let out a slow breath and sat beside me, his back hitting the edge of the bed. “I configured the weapons module for that,” he said, nodding toward my drone.

I sniffled, half-laughing as I wiped my nose on the back of my hand. “Thanks.”

“It’s Maverick,” he said, voice clipped.

I blinked. “It is?”

He nodded once. “Yeah. Spencer came clean. The Pentagon approached him for a ‘consulting role’—but it was more of a threat. Scared the hell out of him.”

“So how’d you figure it was Mav?”

Zane smirked, a bitter edge to it. “Spencer suspected he wasn’t the only one approached. So I scanned Mav’s system. He’s the one who leaked our RLM data to the Pentagon. Subtle as hell, I’ll give him that.”

I sat with that for a moment.

Then he turned to me, expression softening. “Amelia, I owe you an apology. Kabir… he was probably being leveraged with the rat. I should’ve listened to you sooner.”

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