Chapter 7 · Someone's On the Old Channel

"Stay down."

Iris doesn't. She's already shoving herself upright against the wall, blood streaking down from her shoulder where Vera's shot clipped her. The bodies are still warm on the twelfth floor. Arranged in formation. My formation. The one we used in Kandahar when we needed to mark a safe house for extraction.

"They knew," I say. "Someone knew."

"Knew what?" Her voice is tight. Pain or fear, I can't tell. "That you'd recognize corpses laid out like a sick fucking art project?"

"That I'd recognize the pattern." I'm scanning the room. Three exits. Two are blown. The third leads to a stairwell that collapsed last loop. "Someone on my old team is in this building."

"Your old team is dead." She's pressing her palm to the wound. "You told me that. You said Noah Blake died in Syria."

"I said he went dark." I move to the window. Bulletproof glass. No way out. "There's a difference."

"Not a useful one." She's standing now, swaying slightly. "We need to move. Vera's coming up behind us and—"

The lights cut.

I grab her wrist and pull her low. The emergency strips kick on, bathing everything in red.