Chapter 8 - The Price of a Secret
“You’re remarkably bad at playing the helpless victim, Agent Bennett,” I replied, stepping out from the shadows of the steel beam, my hands relaxed at my sides but my body coiled like a spring.
Khloe flinched at the title. She swallowed hard, her grip tightening around the small black drive until her knuckles turned white.
“So Vance finally ran my digital footprint,” she said bitterly. “I suppose that means you know I’m not just some terrified caterer who happened to pick the wrong hotel lobby.”
“It means you used me as a meat shield to punch your way through an O’Neill extraction trap,” I said, closing the distance between us by two deliberate steps. “You knew the sniper was on the mezzanine. You knew the men by the coat check were spotters. You walked right into my line of sight because you needed a distraction powerful enough to break their formation.”
“I didn't have a choice!” Khloe burst out, stepping forward, the anger finally overriding her fear. “O’Neill’s people murdered my partner inside our division office three days ago because we found the wire transfers linking his narcotics network directly to the federal prosecutor’s office! They locked down our servers, they burned our safehouse, and they were going to bury me right beside him!”
She pointed the encrypted drive directly at my chest.
“I didn't want to involve you, Victor. But when I saw you standing by the bar—cold, untouchable, looking like a man who eats bullets for breakfast—I knew you were the only variable in that room chaotic enough to break their line.”
“And if I had caught a bullet instead of you?” I asked quietly.
Khloe’s voice dropped to a harsh whisper. “Then you would have died doing what you do best—standing in the way of monsters.”
May you like
The sheer audacity of her words hung in the cold air between us. For a fraction of a second, I almost smiled.
Before I could answer, a sharp, metallic click echoed from the base of the staircase below us.
