Page 62 of Omega Hunted

I typed before I could stop myself.

IRONPINE: You’re assuming too much.

THE ARCHIVIST: No.

A pause.

THE ARCHIVIST: I’m assuming an ex-ORT captain doesn’t suddenly start researching Emric Kastor for fun.

I swallowed.

THE ARCHIVIST: Emric isn’t stupid. If Ronan Moreau was involved in extracting the omega that Emric’s hunting, then he’ll work backward. Moreau’s known associates. Former teams. Safe houses. Retirement locations. Financial records. Old mission reports. Every person Moreau ever trusted.

The cursor blinked.

THE ARCHIVIST: You don’t beat Emric by disappearing.

THE ARCHIVIST: If Moreau’s still alive, tell him to keep moving.

The chat window closed.

I sat staring at the empty screen, my laptop forgotten.

If The Archivist had pieced this together from a handful of conversations on Skinside, Emric was already ahead of us.

Knowing Ronan’s phone was compromised, I called Brec immediately. It went straight to voicemail.

“Get Ronan to call me,” I said, trying to keep the urgency out of my voice. “As soon as you get this.”

I hung up and stared at the phone, willing it to ring.

Nothing.

The silence settled around the kitchen. My mind kept circling back to The Archivist’s words. If Emric has Moreau… he has you.

Ronan hadn’t simply extracted Soren and disappeared. He’d put himself between the Kastor family and the mountain. Every false lead, every abandoned vehicle, every rumor planted on the private boards was different. They hadn’t been clever distractions. They’d been one man trying to convince an empire to hunt him instead of an omega and his unborn child.

My chest tightened.

What if it hadn’t been enough?

Worse… what if it had worked?

If Emric had identified Ronan, then Ronan was no longer just another former ORT operative. He was a witness. A loose end. The man who’d stolen something the Kastors believed belonged to them. Emric wouldn’t stop until he’d squeezed every name, every contact and every safe house out of him, whether Ronan gave them willingly or not.

I checked my phone.

Still nothing.

Ronan wasn’t careless.

I stopped the thought before it could finish.

Sitting here waiting wasn’t protecting anyone. Every minute I spent hoping the phone would ring was another minute Emric Kastor could be closing the distance between us.

I shoved the laptop closed, grabbed my keys, and headed for the door. I needed to patrol. I needed space. I needed to kill something.

After lunch that same day, Soren, exhausted, went to bed early, complaining of back pain.