Chapter 10 - THE ENDLESS WARThe private jet tore through the midnight clouds, banking hard toward the snowy peaks of upstate New York.
Inside the cabin, the atmosphere was thick with quiet determination. Vincent sat across from Zara, sharpening the edge of a tactical combat knife with rhythmic, methodical strokes. Ghost slept soundly across the aisle, his massive chest rising and falling in steady, powerful rhythms, ready to wake at a moment's notice.
Zara looked out the window at the endless expanse of dark mountains below. Three months ago, she was just a social worker trying to make a difference in Baltimore, believing that love and law could fix a broken world. Now, she stood at the center of a global shadow war, wearing armor she never asked for, fighting alongside a mafia boss and a war dog who had become her truest family.
She realized then that there was no going back to normal. The old Zara Coleman had died the night the champagne glass shattered across the marble ballroom. In her place stood something much more dangerous: a woman who refused to be a victim, and an empire that would burn anyone who tried to take her world away again.
Vincent looked up from his blade, catching her reflection in the dark airplane window. He offered a slow, knowing smile—not of a mob boss looking for power, but of a partner ready to face the apocalypse at her side.
"Ready, Zara?" he asked softly.
Zara locked her holster into place, pulled her hair back into a tight tactical knot, and looked back at him with eyes as cold and steady as steel.
May you like
"Always," she said.
The jet dove down through the clouds toward the hidden bunker, vanishing into the storm like a ghost.
