Page 45 of Axel Martin

She hung up.

I stared at the phone, hand trembling slightly. This was happening. I wasn’t sitting on the sidelines anymore. I was stepping in.

Willa watched me from across the kitchen, calm and steady. “You good?”

“No,” I said honestly. “But I will be.”

“Good,” she said. “Because we’re about to turn this kitchen into a war room.”

Fifteen minutes later,a knock at the door.

Eloise stepped inside like a woman on a mission—jeans, boots, hair tied back, a military-style duffel over her shoulder. She’s been hanging around the SEALs too much.

“Jack’s getting the team on standby,” she said. “But you and I are going to figure out exactly what Marley triggered and what kind of mess Axel might be stuck in.”

She spread out a folder on the table and started pulling up files on her tablet. Surveillance photos. Marked maps.Coordinates I didn’t want to ask how she had access to any of this.

Willa handed us both coffee and pulled her hair into a ponytail. “I’m staying too. You’re not doing this alone.”

Eloise glanced at me. “You sure you’re ready to learn this SEAL stuff, Lark?”

“I don’t have a choice,” I said. “He came for me. Now it’s my turn.”

Eloise smiled—fierce, proud. “Good. Because I think we just found where the message came from.”

She turned her tablet toward me.

There, on a blurred map of desert roads and abandoned compounds, was a glowing red dot labeled:

Last known Marley contact. Timestamp: 21 hours ago.

And beside it… another marker, dimmer. Labeled:

AXEL MARTIN – SIGNAL LOST.

41

Lark

The red dots on the map pulsed like tiny heartbeats—one for Marley, one for Axel.

Both too far. Both fading.

I stared at them like I could will the signals to stay strong. My hands were clenched so tightly around my coffee mug that the ceramic threatened to crack.

“Okay,” Eloise said, her fingers dancing over her keyboard. “This is what we know: Marley’s last transmission was sent from outside a coastal checkpoint near the Jordan-Israel border. Not a safe zone. The area’s flagged for black-market activity and deep surveillance overlap.”

“And Axel?” I asked.

She looked at me. “His signal died at a known extraction staging area—half a mile north of Marley’s ping. Lena says Bishop confirmed the drop. But after that, nothing. Radio silence.”

“So what’s the plan?” I asked.

“Jack’s got a contact with transport access,” Eloise said. “Military-adjacent, friendly. They can get us within twenty miles. After that, we hike.”

I blinked. “We?”

“Okay, sweetheart, you know you are not going anywhere,” Jack said. He looked at me. “I talked to Fraiser. He’s ready to strangle Marley. He knows where Axel is, but he has to wait until it calms down over there before he can get to him. Marley is going crazy because she said you will kill her for getting Axel involved.”

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