“Sit Down, You’re A Nobody. ” My General Father Said — Until He Heard My Call Sign “Ghost 13.”

Below us, the city was completely oblivious.

Cars were backed up on the highways.

Pedestrians with umbrellas were walking over the massive subterranean transit hub.

“Listen up, Rangers!” Thomas shouted over the net, dropping his visor.

“We are executing a surgical, stealth infiltration.

Vanguard operatives are holding a chemical payload in the lower utility tunnels beneath Union Station.

Rules of engagement are strict.

Suppressed weapons only.

No grenades.

No flashbangs.

You do not fire unless fired upon.

If a stray round hits that shell, we all die, and so does half this city.” He pointed directly at me.

“Your primary objective is not to clear the enemy.

Your primary objective is to get Ghost 13 to that bomb.

You are her shield.

If you have to take a bullet to keep her moving, you take it.

Do you copy?” “Hooah!” the Rangers roared in unison.

The Black Hawk flared hard, flinging our stomachs into our throats as the pilot brought us into a hover directly over the roof of an abandoned industrial warehouse adjacent to the transit hub.

“Ropes!” the crew chief screamed.

The thick fast-ropes were kicked out the doors.

I didn’t wait for Thomas.

I grabbed the rope with my thick tactical gloves and slid down into the abyss, my boots hitting the wet concrete roof with a jarring impact that made my fractured ribs scream.

I ignored it, unclipping and pulling my SIG Sauer up to my chest.

Thomas and the Rangers landed seconds later in a flawless 360-degree perimeter.

We moved silently to the rooftop access door.

Thomas deployed a pair of heavy bolt cutters, snapping the rusted padlock.

We slipped into the darkness of the warehouse, moving down the metal stairwells toward the sub-basement levels that connected to the Raleigh Union Station utility grid.

The air grew stale, smelling of ozone, wet concrete, and old grease.

I pulled my respirator mask over my face, sealing it tight.

The Rangers did the same, their heavy breathing echoing in the enclosed space.

We were now operating in MOPP Level 4.

If the gas deployed, the suits would keep us alive for exactly twenty minutes.

Through my night-vision goggles, I took point, navigating the labyrinth of maintenance tunnels using the architectural schematics Director Mitchell had beamed to my datapad.

“Fifty meters to the primary transit ventilation shaft,” I whispered over the tactical net.

“Check your corners.” We stacked up on a heavy steel door marked UTILITY ACCESS – AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY.

I slid a fiber-optic camera under the doorframe, feeding the image to the screen on my wrist.

The room beyond was a massive, cavernous intake chamber for the subterranean trains.

Massive industrial fans, currently idle, lined the walls.

And in the center of the room, illuminated by harsh halogen work lights, was the white Vanguard panel van.

Three heavily armed Vanguard operatives were standing around the open rear doors of the van.

Inside, the massive olive-drab cylinder of the KhAB-250 artillery shell was resting on a heavy metal dolly.

But this wasn’t like the bomb at Fort Liberty.

Standing next to the shell was a man in a bespoke, tailored suit, looking entirely out of place in the grimy tunnels.

He wasn’t wearing a tactical vest.

He was holding a sleek, black remote detonator.

“That’s Nathaniel Croft,” I breathed, zooming the camera in on his face.

The billionaire CEO of Vanguard Security Solutions had come to oversee the catalyst himself.

“He’s rigged it to a dead-man’s switch in his hand,” Thomas observed, looking over my shoulder at the screen.

“If we shoot him, his grip relaxes, the switch depresses, and the shell blows.” “It gets worse,” I said, tracing the wires coming off the shell.

“He’s patched the explosive directly into the train’s electrical grid.

If I cut the power, it detonates.

If the train arrives and causes a voltage spike on the third rail, it detonates.” I checked the transit schedule on my pad.

The 5:00 PM outbound commuter express, carrying twelve hundred passengers, was scheduled to arrive in the station directly above us in exactly three minutes.

We were out of time.

We couldn’t shoot him.

We couldn’t disarm it.

“So what’s the play, Ghost?” Thomas asked, his hand tightening on his rifle.

I holstered my weapon and unsealed the collar of my HAZMAT suit.

“What are you doing?” Thomas hissed, grabbing my arm.

“If that gas hits, you’ll be exposed!” “I’m not going in as a soldier, Major,” I said, shedding the tactical gear until I was standing in my civilian clothes—a gray sweater and dark jeans.

I pulled the earpiece out of my ear.

“I’m going in as a ghost.” I stepped away from the door, leaving my brother and the Rangers in the dark.

I didn’t have a weapon.

I didn’t have armor.

I just had three minutes to convince a billionaire not to end the world.

The heavy steel door creaked on its rusted hinges as I pushed it open.

I stepped out of the suffocating darkness of the utility corridor and into the harsh, blinding glare of the halogen work lights illuminating the subterranean intake chamber.

I was unarmed.

I wore no Kevlar, no HAZMAT suit, no radio earpiece.

I was dressed in a simple gray sweater and dark jeans, looking exactly like any of the thousands of civilian commuters walking through the Raleigh Union Station concourse a hundred feet above us.

I raised both of my empty hands slowly, keeping my palms open and visible.

“Contact!” one of the Vanguard operatives shouted, swinging his MP7 submachine gun directly at my chest.

The red dot of his laser sight danced erratically over my heart.

The other two mercenaries instantly fanned out, creating a tactical triangulation of fire.

“Hold,” a smooth, cultured voice commanded.

Nathaniel Croft stepped out from behind the olive-drab casing of the KhAB-250 artillery shell.

The billionaire CEO of Vanguard Security Solutions looked entirely out of place in the grimy, subterranean bunker.

He wore a charcoal-gray Brioni suit, his silver hair perfectly coiffed, his shoes polished to a mirror shine.

But his right hand was tightly wrapped around a cylindrical black detonator.

His thumb was pressing down on the spring-loaded plunger.

A dead-man’s switch.

Croft looked at me, his brow furrowing in genuine confusion.

He had expected a JSOC breach team.

He had expected flashbangs and armored Rangers.

He hadn’t expected a bruised, bleeding woman in civilian clothes.

“Who the hell are you?” Croft demanded, his thumb maintaining the lethal pressure on the switch.

“How did you bypass my perimeter sensors?” “Your sensors were calibrated to detect the encrypted radio frequencies of military tactical nets,” I said, my voice eerily calm, echoing off the concrete walls.

I took a slow, deliberate step forward.

“I shut my radios off.

And I am the woman who just dismantled your decapitation strike at Fort Liberty.” The three mercenaries tensed, their fingers tightening on their triggers.

Croft’s eyes narrowed, processing the information with the cold, calculating speed of a corporate predator.

“Fort Liberty,” Croft repeated softly.

“Colonel Hayes missed his check-in fifteen minutes ago.

I assumed there was a complication.” “There was no complication, Nathaniel,” I said, using his first name to strip away his authority.

“There was an execution.

Your four operatives in the Delta-Niner loading dock are dead.

The payload is secure.

David Hayes is currently sitting in a JSOC interrogation cell, writing out a sworn confession in exchange for avoiding a military firing squad.” I took another step forward.

The red laser dot stayed pinned to my chest.

“Shoot her,” Croft ordered, his voice devoid of emotion.

“If they shoot me, Nathaniel, you lose the only leverage you have left,” I countered smoothly, not breaking my stride.

I was banking entirely on his corporate greed.

Croft wasn’t an ideologue.