BULLETPROOF HEART

BULLETPROOF HEART: THE COMMANDERS GHOST

BULLETPROOF HEART - CHAPTER 4: THE COMMANDER'S GHOST

Amara held the photo like it would burn her.

Marcus in uniform, younger, clean-shaven, shaking hands with Chief Dele Cole - her ex. Her billionaire monster ex. Both men smiling in front of an oil platform.

"Explain," she said, her voice suddenly steel. Not the scared girl from the safe house. The woman who stole 5 billion dollars of evidence.

Marcus didn't reach for the photo. He sat on the edge of the bed, pressed a small towel to his bleeding side.

"Dele Cole hired my unit in 2022. Private security for his rigs in Bayelsa. My commander was Colonel Price. Good man. Or I thought he was."

"What happened?"

"Price started taking side jobs from Dele. Off the books. I asked questions. Then my convoy got hit. Only two of us made it back." He looked up at her. "Price said it was militants. I never believed him."

Amara's hands were shaking. She turned the photo over. Handwriting on the back: _P.HOLDINGS - 5B - PRICE - D.C._

P Holdings. Port Harcourt Holdings. Dele's shell company.

"This hard drive," she whispered. "It's not just fraud evidence. It's every payment Dele made to foreign mercenaries. For three years. Including..."

She slid the hard drive into Marcus's old laptop from his bag. He had a satellite adapter - no internet needed.

The drive opened. One folder. One video file. Date: 11-09-2022.

She clicked play.

Grainy drone footage. An oil field. A convoy. Two American flags on the vehicles. Then - explosion. Gunfire. And a voice off-camera, calm, Nigerian-accented:

"Make sure Price's team doesn't leave that field."

Dele's voice.

Marcus went completely still. His face lost all color.

"That's my team," he said, voice barely audible. "That's my team dying. Dele ordered it. Price let it happen."

The room was silent except for the rain and the video playing - men shouting, gunfire.

Amara didn't say sorry. Sorry was useless. She did something else.

She knelt in front of him, in his oversized shirt, took his scarred hand, and placed it over the hard drive.

"Then we were never a coincidence, Marcus. I didn't just hire a bodyguard. I hired the one man in the world who wants Dele dead as much as I do."

Marcus looked at her - at this woman who had lost everything, who was being hunted, and was now kneeling in front of a broken soldier offering him revenge.

His other hand, without thinking, came up and cupped her face. His thumb wiped away rain, or maybe a tear.

"Amara, if we use this drive, we don't just run. We go to war. Against Dele, against Price, against everyone in that video. You understand?"

"I stopped running when I stole this," she said, leaning into his hand. "I want them to pay."

Outside, the rain stopped. Sudden, unnatural silence.

Marcus's head snapped to the window. He heard it before she did - soft footsteps on the stairs. Not the old woman's.

Too many. Too careful.

He pulled the curtain a centimeter. Three shadows at the bottom of the stairwell, rifles down.

They'd found them.

Marcus killed the laptop, shoved the hard drive and photo back into the bag, and zipped it.

He grabbed his pistol and looked at Amara.

"Remember when you said perfect about the one bed?"

She nodded, terrified but trusting him.

"Change of plans," he whispered, opening the small bathroom window that led to the rusted back fire escape. "We're leaving through the roof."

He went first, then reached down for her. As she put her hands in his, he pulled her up hard, her body sliding against his, her legs around his waist for balance on the narrow ledge.

For a second, nose to nose, three floors up, guns below them.

"You good?" he asked.

"I am now," she said.

Then the bedroom door below them exploded inward.

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*END OF CHAPTER 4* 🔥