Page 101 of Dagger

EPILOGUE

Flash stoodmotionless beneath the jungle sky, boots sunk into the churned dirt, hands clenched at his sides.

Still, but inside, he was searching. Frantic. Restless.

Every muscle in his body was coiled with tension that had nowhere to go. He hadn’t slept in three days, hadn’t eaten in two, and still, it wasn’t enough to numb the ache. Not the kind that throbbed beneath his ribs like a second heartbeat, the one that belonged to her.

No one had answers. Not Emma. Not Tex. Not even the damn CIA.

Lechuza was gone. His thoughts churned with frantic rhythm, looping in circles, screaming in silence. No trail. No body. No whisper of her shadow in the wind.

Just... gone. He told himself it was blood loss. Hallucination. His mind filling in what his body couldn’t process.It had to be.Because anything else meant she wassomething more. That scared him worse than losing her.

Regardless of his uneasiness, the world looked different now. Duller. Dimmed. As if someone had turned the volume down on life. The light had lost its edge. Colors faded, sounds muffled,textures flat. Even the jungle felt quieter now as if she’d taken some secret part of it with her.

His senses had always been sharp, electric and now everything felt translucent. Ghost-thin.

His humor had grown darker lately, biting and brittle, jokes with razored edges that didn’t make anyone laugh anymore. Not even him.

It had always been his shield, his armor. But now, it was cracking, fracturing, exposing a heart that felt like it was only half beating, struggling to keep rhythm without hers.

He told himself she was alive. She had to be. But the truth pressed heavier every day, the fear that she wasn’t, or worse… that she was out there and choosing to stay away.

That thought gutted him more than the knife in his ribs, the wound throbbing beneath his T-shirt and vest. He swore he could still feel her hands trying to stem the flow of blood.

The others saw it.

They didn’t say much, but he caught it in their eyes.

Then they came.

Tex first, boots heavy across the clearing, arms crossed. Behind him came Dagger, Brawler, Twister, Shark, Easy, Bondo, the whole damn pack.

They didn’t say they were worried.

They just stood with him.

Silent.

A wall of presence and loyalty, a brotherhood anchoring a man unraveling in quiet grief.

Flash swallowed hard, and looked at the sky again. Clouds shifted overhead. A bird wheeled high above, maybe a hawk, maybe nothing.

But in his mind, he saw her again. The last time. That moment scorched into his memory.

Lechuza led the charge, her silhouette emerging through the smoke like a silent shadow on wings. An owl in descent, golden eyes blazing, blades flashing as she moved.

Her braid snapped behind her, sleek and sharp, a feathered lash of motion and menace.

She wasn’t alone. Beside her came a dragon wreathed in smoke, fire smoldering behind his eyes, every step measured like judgment itself. On the far flank, a tiger, all muscle and myth, moved like the jungle had given him shape and purpose, silent, heavy, inevitable.

Flash hadn’t understood it then. He still didn’t. But the memory felttoo sharpto be false. Too vivid. A shiver rippled down his spine. The kind you feel when somethingrealbrushed too close to the skin of your reality. He exhaled hard. “Blood loss,” he muttered to himself.

Had to be.

He felt it like a bruise beneath his ribs, a memory so vivid it hurt to breathe.

She’d haunted him before. He'd been marked by her, and she owned him.

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