Page 72 of Wraith: Lethal Impact

He breathes.

"How long?" I ask.

Ivy turns her head toward me. The analyst reassembles behind her eyes.

“Eight, maybe ten minutes." She grits the words through clenched teeth. "Twelve-man assault team, maybe more. Breaching charges on three entry points. They hit us less than two minutes after I found the signal anomaly."

She looks up at me, and the fury in her expression burns hotter than the building. "The comms were compromised. Someone cloned our encrypted frequency. A signal riding the primary channel. They've been listening to every transmission since Bangkok."

The words land like rounds to center mass. Every tactical decision. Every route. Every fallback position. Every conversation about the compass data and the installation coordinates.

All of it, broadcast in real time.

To the Consortium.

"The safehouse in Bangkok?” My voice is flat.

"Same intercept." Ivy's jaw sets. "I should have caught it. The latency was there from the beginning—milliseconds of lag on every transmission. I didn't look for it because I trusted my encryption." A breath. "I trusted my work, and Lily paid for it."

"Stop." Cipher's hand covers hers on the bandage. "None of it is your fault."

"You should've seen Lily. She fought like a goddamn animal." A ghost of something—pride, disbelief, awe—flickers across Ivy's pain-glazed expression. "Your ballerina picked up a Beretta, killed three of them, and used the warehouse like a stage. She moved like a ghost. I've never seen anyone reposition that fast."

An image detonates in my skull. Lily holding a Beretta in the dark while the facility burned around her.

"I went down. She ..." Ivy presses harder against the bandage. "She stood up. In the middle of the warehouse. In the open. She told them she was what they came for. And she ran outside.”

"She drew them off you."

"Every one of them." Ivy's grip tightens on the bandage. "She counted on it."

North. Toward the radar installation.

I stand. The movement is mechanical—a body executing a pre-programmed sequence while the mind inside it catalogs the failure.

I left Lily without saying goodbye. I stood outside the door, then turned my back, walked away, and they took her.

"Bronco." I key the radio. My voice comes out level. Controlled. The operator speaking while the man drowns. "Strip the dead hostiles for everything—weapons, ammunition, radios."

"Copy."

"How many did you drop?"

"Two confirmed. Lily got three. The rest pulled out when they had her."

"That leaves seven from the assault team, plus whatever's garrisoned at the installation." I run the numbers. "Call it thirty hostiles."

Ivy's expression doesn't change, doing the same count I just did, arriving at the same impossible number.

"You have five operators and half a loadout."

"Four." I hold her gaze. "Cipher's staying with you."

Cipher's head comes up. Relief crosses his face first. Shame follows a half second behind it.

"I can run the chatter from the vehicle." He's already reaching for an argument he doesn't believe. "I can come."

“We’re not leaving Ivy alone. Not wounded. You're staying with her.”