Page 66 of Code Name: Kingslayer

I pull her toward it, but she digs her heels in at the passenger door.

"The data," she says. "I have evidence. In my bag. I left it?—"

"Forget it." I open the door, ready to physically place her inside if necessary.

"No." She pulls back, stronger than she looks. "That data proves what they're building. Who's funding it. Without it, this is pointless."

"Without you alive, the data's worthless." My voice drops to command register, the tone that made SEALs fall in line. "Get. In. The. Truck."

She meets my eyes, and something shifts. Recognition. She sees what I am—what I do—and instead of fear, I see calculation.

"They'll kill more people," she says quietly. "The delivery system I designed can be weaponized for chemical or biological agents. Aerosolized. Dispersed over populations. The data proves they're planning to sell it to the highest bidder."

Her words hit like shrapnel.

How many people, I want to ask. How many innocents are we weighing against your life right now?

But I already know the math. It's always the same math.

"Where's the bag?" I ask.

She points to a second-floor window. "My office. Northwest corner."

Of course it is.

I look at the warehouse—fully engulfed now, flames licking through broken windows. Look at her—determined, terrified, refusing to leave without finishing what she started.

Look at my truck—fifteen seconds to safety.

"Stay here," I order, already moving back toward the building. "Lock the doors. If I'm not back in three minutes, drive. There's a safehouse address programmed in the GPS."

"Wait—"

But I'm already running, because this is what I do. I blow things up and walk into fire and make impossible choices about acceptable losses.

Dr. Isabella Durand just became more than an extraction target.

She became a reason to survive.

And that's either going to save us both or kill us trying.