A muzzle flash sparked behind the second SUV.

Ghost's arm moved.

He fired past her shoulder without looking away from her face.

A man screamed in the distance.

Nyra's breath caught.

Not because of the shot.

Because Ghost had not missed.

Because he could kill around her like the rest of the world was background noise.

"Move," he said.

"No."

His voice dropped lower. "Nyra."

Her name in his mouth did something it had no right to do during an active firefight.

She ignored it.

"You don't get to decide what risks I take."

"You were about to run into automatic fire."

"For my brother."

"For a lie."

"You don't know that."

"I know men like him."

"And I know what it feels like to bury someone without a body."

That landed.

She saw it.

A tiny fracture behind the cold.

Ghost went silent.

For half a heartbeat, there was no race. No smoke. No Hollow Sun. No BLACK VEIL. Just the two of them standing in the middle of a battlefield, both shaped by ghosts they refused to name.

Then the third SUV accelerated.

Straight toward them.

"MOVE!" Kane shouted.

Ghost grabbed Nyra and threw them both sideways.

The SUV smashed through the concrete barrier where they had been standing.

Impact shook the ground.

Nyra rolled hard across asphalt, pain tearing through her ribs. Before she could push herself up, Ghost was over her.

One knee down.

Rifle up.

Three shots.

The windshield burst inward.

The driver slumped.

The vehicle kept rolling, slow and dead, until it hit the wrecked Mustang with a crunch that made Nyra's soul leave her body.

She stared.

"My car."

Ghost looked down at her.

"You're alive."

"My car had emotional value."

"It was being used as cover."

"She had a name."

Kane appeared beside them, dragging Razor by the collar. "Please tell me you two are not arguing about the car."

Nyra pushed herself up, wincing. "He let someone hit her."

Ghost stood, then reached for her.

She slapped his hand away.

His fingers stopped in midair.

For a split second, everyone nearby seemed to notice.

Nyra noticed too.

And hated the sting of guilt that followed.

No.

No guilt.

He had no right to drag her away from the only man who had said Milo's name like he knew the shape of the truth.

Razor coughed from the ground. "Touching. Really. But if Hollow Sun wanted you dead, sweetheart, you'd already be—"

Ghost stepped on his wrist.

Razor's sentence broke into a scream.

Nyra grabbed Ghost's arm.

This time she did touch him.

On purpose.

"Don't."

Ghost went still.

Completely.

His gaze dropped to her hand on his sleeve.

Then slowly lifted to her face.

Around them, bullets still cracked in the distance. Elias returned fire from the SUV. Nik pinned the last gunman behind the van. Lucas shouted directions through the comms. Kane stood with his weapon raised and the expression of a man watching a train wreck develop romantic tension.

Nyra tightened her grip.

"Don't break the only lead I have."

Ghost stared at her for one long, terrible second.

Then he removed his boot from Razor's wrist.

Razor sobbed into the asphalt.

Kane exhaled. "Great. Love communication."

Ghost's voice stayed quiet. "Get in the vehicle."

Nyra's anger surged back instantly.

"No."

Kane closed his eyes.

Ghost turned his head toward her.

"You are bleeding."

"So is everyone I've met tonight. It's clearly your team aesthetic."

"You can yell at me in the SUV."

"I can yell at you right here."

More headlights appeared beyond the rail yard.

Lucas's voice snapped through the comms. "Bad news just upgraded. More inbound, and local cops are two minutes out."

Elias shouted, "Then move!"

Kane shoved Razor toward the BLACK VEIL SUV. Reed, pale but functional, opened the rear door from inside and hauled the man in with one elegant, irritated pull.

Nyra took one step after them.

Ghost blocked her.

Again.

Her temper snapped.

"If you put me in that car without telling me what Razor knows, I swear to God—"

Ghost moved.

Too fast.

One arm around her back, the other behind her knees.

Nyra left the ground.

For one full second, her brain simply refused to process the insult.

Then she exploded.

"Put me down, you oversized tactical red flag."

Ghost carried her toward the SUV through smoke and gunfire like she weighed nothing.

"I am extracting you."

"You are kidnapping me with better posture."

"You are injured."

"I am furious."

"Yes."

"Do not yes me."

He reached the SUV. Elias had the engine roaring. Kane shoved Razor inside. Lucas was laughing somewhere over comms like he had lost all loyalty to survival.

Ghost set Nyra into the backseat.

She immediately tried to climb out.

He braced one gloved hand against the roof and leaned in, blocking the exit with his body.

Huge.

Unmoving.

Infuriating.

"Move," she snapped.

"No."

"I almost had answers."

"You almost had a bullet in your throat."

"That's my throat."

His eyes sharpened.

The silence after that was brutal.

Then Ghost said, low and controlled, "Not anymore."

Nyra froze.

So did Kane.

So did everyone close enough to hear.

Ghost didn't seem to realize what he had said until it was already in the air between them.

Nyra stared at him.

Her heart hit once, hard and stupid.

Then the gunfire behind them intensified.

Elias barked, "Doors!"

Ghost stepped back and slammed Nyra's door shut.

The SUV launched forward before she could grab the handle.

Nyra twisted in her seat, glaring through the window as the race meet burned behind them.

Razor lay cuffed on the floor, groaning.

Her Mustang sat wrecked in the smoke.

Hollow Sun men scattered under BLACK VEIL fire.

And Ghost climbed into the front passenger seat like he had not just carried her out of the one place she might have gotten the truth.

Nyra leaned forward between the seats.

"You had no right."

Ghost didn't look back.

"You were dying."

"I was investigating."

"You were bait."

"I was close."

His head turned slightly.

Not enough to face her.

Enough for her to see one grey eye in the rearview mirror.

"You still are."

The words slid cold through the SUV.

Nyra went quiet.

For the first time all night.

Kane looked from Ghost to her, then down at Razor bleeding on the floor.

Outside, sirens screamed closer.

Inside, Razor laughed weakly.

"You really don't know, do you?"

Nyra looked down at him.

Her pulse slowed into something colder.

Razor smiled through blood.

"Hollow Sun didn't take your brother because of what he knew."

Ghost's hand tightened on the dashboard.

Razor's eyes glittered up at her.

"They took him because of what he was carrying."