Page 123 of Prey

He cups my face in his hands, thumbs brushing over my cheekbones. “I love you. Both of you.”

“We love you too. Come home to us.”

As I watch them disappear into the Chicago night, I rest my hand on my stomach and whisper a prayer to whatever gods protect broken men who choose to become heroes.

Fifty more children are about to learn either that hope isn’t lost after all.

44

NIKOLAI

The Virginia facility burns behind us as we lift off, orange flames licking through reinforced windows that were never meant to shatter. I watch it collapse through the helicopter’s side door until it becomes just another distant inferno against the darkness. Twenty-seven bodies inside. Fifty-three children free.

The numbers should feel like victory. They don’t.

I lean back against the bulkhead, rifle still warm across my lap, and check my phone. No messages from Jenna. She’s probably asleep—it’s past 3:00 AM Chicago time. The thought of her curled up in our bed, hand resting on her still-flat stomach, creates a pull in my chest that has nothing to do with the mission’s adrenaline crash.

“That was different,” Marcus says from across the cabin, peeling off his tactical gloves. Blood streaks his forearms where he’d gotten too close during the breach. “The tech they were using—neural mapping in real time, pharmaceutical cocktails that worked in minutes instead of months.”

Theon nods, checking his equipment case. “Someone’s been improving the formulas. The compounds I found weren’t theusual Project Architect standards. More refined. More targeted.” He meets my gaze. “Faster.”

The captured facility director’s words echo in my head.

There are thirty facilities like this. Across multiple countries. You’ll never stop it.

I’d put two bullets in Dr.Kevin Webb’s skull after Theon’s chemical cocktail loosened his tongue. Clean shots. Professional. Not because he deserved quick death—because I didn’t have time to make it slow. Because every minute I spent breaking him was another minute away from Jenna.

“The neural implants were surgical grade,” Ezra adds, scrolling through photographs on his tablet. “Real-time monitoring of stress hormones, dopamine levels, fear responses. They weren’t just conditioning these children—they were mapping their neurochemical reactions to optimize the process.”

Raphael shifts in his seat, the eight-year-old girl from the facility still clinging to his tactical vest. She hasn’t spoken since we found her in the sensory deprivation chamber, and she won’t let go of Raphael.

The rest of the kids are on their way to a safe house in Wisconsin. Foster families pre-screened by our people, trauma specialists on call. But watching her small fingers grip Raphael’s gear, I know she’ll carry those scars forever.

Just like we all do.

“Thirty more facilities,” I say. The helicopter’s engines make it safe to talk, but the words still taste like ash. “Multiple countries. That’s what Webb said before I killed him.”

Darius looks up from cleaning his knife. “You believe him?”

“Theon’s compounds don’t allow for lies.” I check my phone again. Still nothing from Jenna. “We’re dealing with something bigger than we thought. Project Architect didn’t die when we escaped—it evolved.”

The silence stretches between us, filled only by rotor wash and the soft whimper of a child having nightmares in Raphael’s arms.

“So what’s the play?” Dominic asks eventually. “We can’t hit thirty facilities simultaneously. And if we move sequentially, they’ll adapt. Improve security. Move the children.”

“We need intelligence first,” Ezra responds. “Financial networks, personnel rosters, operational schedules. I can map their connections, find their weaknesses.”

“And then we burn them all,” Marcus says with quiet finality.

I nod, but part of me is already back in Chicago, already walking through our door, already checking that Jenna is safe. The hunter in me wants to pursue every lead immediately, eliminate every threat before it can metastasize. But the man who’s going to be a father in eight months needs to know his world is secure before he destroys the rest of the network of evil that preys on children.

The helicopter banks toward Chicago, city lights spreading below us like scattered diamonds. Fifty-three children are safe tonight. Hundreds more are still trapped in concrete rooms, electrodes attached to their skulls, their humanity being erased.

The work will never be finished. There will always be another facility, another doctor, another program trying to turn children into weapons or commodities. At least now I have something worth coming home to.

Someone who makes the violence feel like it serves a purpose greater than revenge.

I close my eyes and let the helicopter carry me toward Jenna, toward the life we’re building in the spaces between missions. Tomorrow we’ll start planning the next extraction. Tonight, I just want to hold my pregnant girlfriend and pretend the world isn’t full of monsters.