The jungle swallowed sound like a living thing.

Slade moved through the undergrowth with a precision that belonged to predators, not men. Heat rolled off the canopy in heavy waves, dampening his armor, fogging the edges of his mask. He’d been tracking the mercenary unit for days—dead ends, false trails, carnage left behind with their signature sloppiness. But there was something else woven into the chaos, something that pulled him forward long after the trail should have gone cold.

He found it at the edge of a ravaged campsite. A smear of blood on a broken branch. A footprint too small to belong to the men he was hunting. A familiar rhythm in the way the ground had been disturbed, the pattern unmistakable to someone who knew her like he knew the feel of a blade in his hand.

When he finally reached the clearing, the sun cut through the trees just enough to reveal her—collapsed against the base of a fallen log, dirt streaked across her skin, exhaustion clinging to her like a second layer. Alive. Breathing. Barely.

Slade knelt beside her, the world narrowing to the rise and fall of her chest. She’d fought—fought hard, from the looks of it—but even the toughest could be overwhelmed in a place that didn’t care whether you lived or died.

He lifted her carefully, the weight of her settling against him like an overdue truth.

The mission could wait. The jungle could burn.

He had found her. And he wasn’t losing her again.