Badass in Disguise (Shadow) novel Chapter 360

Chapter 360

Author’s POV:

675

A flash of steel caught jade’s eye as another knife hurled toward them with lethal precision. She reacted instantly, her short blade clashing against the assassin’s weapon with a metallic ring that echoed through the hall.

But it was a feint. The assassin produced another blade from his sleeve, driving it toward his true target–Zach. Too fast. Jade’s knife was still locked with his first weapon, unable to counter in time.

Without hesitation, she thrust her arm into the blade’s path. White–hot pain exploded through her forearm as the knife tore through flesh and muscle, stopping just two inches from Zach’s eye. Blood splattered across his face, crimson droplets shocking him from his daze.

“Fuck!” She ripped a strip from her shirt, quickly binding the wound. “Don’t freeze up!”

Zach’s expression transformed from shock to unbridled fury. With a primal roar, he tackled the assassin, driving him to the floor and delivering a crushing blow to the man’s throat. The assassin gargled on his own blood before going still.

The grand hall had become a battlefield. Wraith and Selene fought with desperate precision against Shadow Organization’s elite killers. All four of them were bleeding from multiple wounds, breathing hard, their strength fading with each passing minute. Zach was barely standing, and SPECTER still had nearly half his death squad intact.

“This isn’t working,” Selene called out between ragged breaths, wiping blood from a deep gash across her shoulder. “If we don’t die on their blades, they’ll wear us down until there’s nothing left.”

Wraith wiped blood from his brow. “Looks like we’re all going to die here today.”

Selene glanced at him, a strange softness momentarily replacing the killer’s edge in her eyes. “I won’t let you die.”

“I’m not afraid,” Wraith replied simply, his expression unchanged.

Selene looked upward briefly, her blonde hair matted with blood and sweat. “I wonder how Void and Onyx are doing.”

They hadn’t escaped. Instead, they’d headed for the fortress control center, facing their own gauntlet of dangers. Shadow Organization assassins and operatives filled this place–one word from SPECTER would bring them all running with loaded weapons, crushing them like

ants.

Selene had told Void and Onyx that escape was the priority if things went south.

SPECTER received a report from one of his men, then turned to Selene with a cold smile that never reached his mismatched eyes. “Want to know how they’re doing?”

He swiveled a monitor toward them. On screen, Void lay motionless in a spreading pool of blood, surrounded by Shadow Organization operatives. His fate unclear.

I’ve grown tired of this game,” SPECTER declared. He nodded to Milo. “Call in the reinforcements. End this.”

Jade mentally calculated the timing, feeling the steady rhythm of her heartbeat. “Getting close to you isn’t difficult,” she said calmly. “T just needed to buy some time.*

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10:39 Tue, Oct 7

Chapter 360

Wraith caught her meaning, the corner of his mouth twitching upward. “Your people should be here by now, right?”

“Of course,” she confirmed.

As if on cue, Milo’s earpiece buzzed with an urgent transmission. His face drained of color as he listened, eyes widening in alarm.

“Sir, Milo reported, his voice strained, ‘radar has detected a large formation of armed helicopters approaching our position.”

The earpiece continued to crackle with panicked updates. SPECTER snatched it from Milo’s ear just in time to hear the control center door being breached, followed by a technician’s death gurgle–Onyx’s handiwork. The sound of slicing metal and screams filled the brief silence.

The monitors switched to external cameras. The sky had darkened with an armada of black helicopters bearing down on the fortress like a mechanical plague. The thunderous roar of rotors drowned out even the crashing waves below. Each chopper bore the unmistakable insignia of the Transcendent Military Alliance.

Aboard the lead helicopter, Maxi confirmed coordinates to the man beside him—Ethan Haxton, who should have been halfway across the world in Poland. His face was a mask of controlled tension, eyes never leaving the fortress below.

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