Shadows of Loyalty

Chapter 18

Alicia sat in the passenger seat of a sleek black Mercedes, her fingers tapping anxiously against the leather door handle as the glow of the laptop illuminated her face in the dark interior. Rain drizzled across the windshield, casting streaks across the wipers' rhythmic sweep. Ryan sat beside her, his frame relaxed but eyes sharp, fixed on the monitor propped between them.

"They've been off-grid for sixteen hours," Alicia said, voice clipped. She zoomed in on a satellite feed, watching a timestamped loop of Quinn and Sasha slipping out of a small port town in England.

"Calvin Murdock's boat," Ryan muttered, recognizing the blurred shape. "Figures. Bastard's still got friends."

Alicia glanced sideways at him, brushing a strand of wet hair from her face. "Quinn knows how to vanish when he needs to. But he’s not alone anymore."

"You mean the Russian?"

She nodded. "Aleksandra Volkov. She’s not just a bodyguard or a gun. She's something else. I dug into her background. Classified operations, phantom missions, and more kills than you’d believe. She's the ghost in every unsolved mess we’ve ever swept under the rug."

Ryan raised a brow. "That bad?"

Alicia scoffed. "Worse. I tried to follow a trail on her—there’s barely a fingerprint. But Quinn... he's always been thorough. I think he figured her out. And now they’re working together."

Ryan leaned back, hands laced behind his head. He studied Alicia, her tightly clenched jaw and the faint flicker of something in her eyes. Jealousy? Regret? Maybe both.

"You think they’re sleeping together?" he asked casually.

Alicia didn’t flinch. "No. Not yet. She’s dangerous. And she’s exactly the kind of danger Quinn doesn’t realize he needs until he’s in too deep."

Ryan chuckled. "Well, that makes things interesting. But it also makes things... messy."

He turned back to the screen. A map traced coordinates from the channel crossing to the waters outside Normandy. Another dot blinked near Paris.

"You think they know about the vault?"

Alicia’s fingers flew across the keys, bypassing firewalls and jumping into encrypted courier manifests. "They will soon. If Calvin got his hands on that decoy drive, then he’s already cracking it. And Quinn won’t stop. Not until he knows what we did."

Ryan’s jaw tightened. For a moment, the confident veneer slipped, revealing a glimpse of the man behind it—the strategist, the soldier, the killer.

"Then we can’t let him get to Paris. We intercept. We hit hard. We end this."

Alicia nodded, but hesitation flickered in her eyes. "I know what you’re thinking. But this isn’t just another op. Quinn is... different. He’s unpredictable. They trained him too well."

Ryan’s lips curled into a smirk. "Then we stop playing defense. We go offensive. Trap them before they reach the city."

"It won’t be enough," Alicia muttered.

Ryan raised an eyebrow. "Why not?"

She exhaled, leaning back in her seat. "Because of her. Aleksandra. You’ve never seen her fight. I have. She’s a f*****g hurricane. There’s a reason no one talks about her missions—because there’s no one left alive to talk. We don’t have the kind of muscle that can take her down without losing half our team."

Ryan tapped his fingers thoughtfully on the dashboard, the rain still beating softly against the glass. His eyes turned sharp, calculating.

"Then maybe it’s time we bring in someone who can."

Alicia turned to look at him. "What are you saying?"

Ryan’s smile returned—cool, slow, and wicked. "If they're playing with Russian fire... then maybe it’s time we get a Russian of our own."

Alicia’s eyes narrowed. "You’re not seriously thinking of him."

"Why not?"

"Because he’s insane."

"He’s effective. And we don’t need sane. We need someone who can neutralize Aleksandra before she wipes the floor with the rest of us."

Silence settled in the car. Alicia looked back at the map, the blinking dots inching closer to Paris. Then, finally, she gave a slow, reluctant nod.

Ryan reached into his coat, pulled out a secure satellite phone, and began to dial. "It’s time we level the playing field."

The screen on Alicia’s laptop flickered.

Destination: Paris. Midnight.

Target: Recover original drive.

Ryan held the phone to his ear.

"Get me Ivanov."

They pulled up to a hotel, they settled down in their room, Alicia stood by the window.

Alicia’s brow arched. “Ivanov? You think he can handle Aleksandra?”

Ryan leaned back in his chair, folding his arms across his chest as if savoring the memory of a monster. “Ivanov doesn’t ‘handle’ people. He devours them. He’s not like Aleksandra—she’s precision, elegance, a blade in the dark. Ivanov’s a sledgehammer to the skull. He was bred in the dark corners of the GRU, trained in the art of violence before he could even spell his own name. Word is, he was expelled from multiple black ops units not because he failed—but because he went too far.”

He paused, locking eyes with her. “He doesn’t care about sides, flags, or missions. He exists to break people. No conscience. No fear. No hesitation. Just cold, mechanical cruelty. You don’t deploy Ivanov unless you want someone wiped off the face of the earth.”

Alicia’s grip on the folder tightened. “So he’s a monster.”

Ryan nodded slowly. “A very useful one. He’s got history with the same program that made Aleksandra ... but where she clawed her way out, Ivanov embraced it. Became something worse than they intended.”

Alicia looked back at the footage of Sasha on the monitor. Her voice lowered. “You think he can take her?”

“I don’t think,” Ryan said with a chilling smile. “I know. And he’s not interested in mercy.”

Alicia closed the folder with a dull thud. Her tone was clipped, emotionless.

Outside, thunder rolled across the city.

The war was coming closer—and now it had teeth on both sides.

Later that night, the rain hadn’t stopped. The windows of the penthouse suite shimmered with streaks of water and neon reflections from the streets below. Thunder groaned in the distance like a restless beast.

Alicia leaned against the edge of the bed, tension in her shoulders, a drink in her hand. She watched Ryan through the reflection in the glass—a blur of movement and confidence, shirt undone, his tone low and teasing as he spoke to her.

She barely heard the words.

Her mind was somewhere else.

The liquor burned down her throat, grounding her just long enough for her to turn and face him. He came to her without hesitation—fingers sliding under her shirt, lips grazing her neck. His touch was rougher than Quinn’s. More demanding. Less searching.

She didn’t stop him.

They fell back onto the mattress, the sheets cool against her spine. Ryan’s hands moved with practiced rhythm—knowing what to press, where to grip, how to pull a reaction from her body. But as her eyes closed, another face flashed behind her lids.

Quinn.

That stupid, sincere look in his eyes when he used to kiss her like she was something he didn’t deserve. The way his hands would slow down—linger—like he wanted to memorize her shape, not just claim it. How he would breathe her name like it meant something. Like she meant something.

Her breath hitched—not because of Ryan, but because of the memory. She bit her lip, curling her fingers into the sheets, trying to force the thought away. But it refused.

Quinn’s voice. Quinn’s heat. Quinn’s whispered promises in the dark that she used to pretend she didn’t crave.

Ryan’s hand gripped her thigh harder. His body pressed closer, lips grazing her collarbone.

Alicia’s eyes fluttered open to the reality: a different man. A different moment. She stared at the ceiling, her chest rising and falling, tension flickering across her face like the shadows from the storm outside.

She didn’t say anything.

She just let it happen.

When it was over, Ryan collapsed beside her, satisfied and unaware. He reached for a cigarette and offered her one, but she declined. She rolled onto her side, facing away, eyes open and distant.

Raindrops drummed against the glass like a ticking clock.

And for the first time in weeks, she let herself remember what it felt like to be loved instead of used.

Even if it was just for a second.