Page 182 of Fractured Loyalties
“Volker’s men?” Mara asks, slipping quietly beside me.
Lydia shrugs. “Could be. Could also be a private bounty. You’re a profitable man to disappear right now.”
My jaw tightens. “They’ll regret coming.”
She studies me. “Are you sure you’re up for that right now? You look like you just lost a knife fight with a blender.”
I grunt. “Pain is just leverage.”
Kinley leans against the far wall, checking his own sidearm, gaze flicking between us.
“We move now,” he says. “While they’re still figuring out the layout.”
“No,” I reply. “We don’t run. We need one of them alive.”
Mara looks at me. “To question?”
“No. To send a message.”
Silence.
Then Lydia nods. “What do you need?”
“A trap.”
I step fully into the center of the room, letting the weight of everything settle. The sex. The blood. The betrayal. The name Volker won’t stop using.
Eidolon.
He’s making it public. Dragging my past back into the light.
He wants the world to see what I buried.
And I want to know why.
Because the next man who breathes that name in my direction won’t get the privilege of spitting out his last breath.
The safehouse has three exits. One leads to a dead-end trail meant to fake a getaway path. Another spills into a ravine that no one walks out of. The third? That one we save for when we want to be seen.
Kinley and I step into the kitchen—him calm and sharp, me leaning slightly, favoring my right side. The blood is soaking through, but I’ll deal with that later.
Lydia pulls out the decoy satchel from under the false floorboard. It looks like a field kit. Inside are heat pads, signal scramblers, and something far more important—a GPS tracker that broadcasts just long enough to look like a mistake.
“You want them to follow it?” she asks.
“No. I want them to think we panicked. That we’re bleeding, exposed, trying to run.”
Mara comes in behind us. She’s changed—black jeans, a loose hoodie. She watches silently, but her presence changes the air. Tightens it.
I toss the satchel to Kinley. “Place it near the trailhead. Make it look like someone dropped it. Then circle back. Silent. No lights.”
He nods, already gone before I finish the last word.
Lydia tosses a fresh clip onto the table. “Still only five out there?”
“Unless they’re hiding thermals.”
She smirks. “If they are, we’ll know soon.”
