Chapter 5 Knives Behind the Curtain

Chapter Five: Knives Behind the Curtain

The rain stopped at 8:17 a.m.

Zara stood at the edge of Leo's rooftop balcony, watching the sky bleed pale blue between torn clouds. Below, Lagos crawled to life-horns, movement, noise. The chaos that masked truth in sound.

Behind her, the door clicked open.

Chika's voice cut the silence like a blade. "We have a problem."

Zara didn't turn. "You'll need to be more specific."

Chika stepped forward, her boots loud on the wet stone. "Leo wants you in the east wing. Now. Someone sent a message through the burner network. They used your clearance code."

Zara's blood turned to ice.

"I didn't authorize any message."

"That's the problem."

The east wing of the estate was cold-unfinished. No cameras. No guards. A place for secrets and scorched-earth decisions. Leo paced there now, phone to his ear, jaw tight with rage.

When he saw her, he hung up.

"You've got ten seconds to explain why SIRS received a coded request from you three hours ago asking for early extraction."

Zara's heart sank.

"They forged my key."

"Can they do that?"

"Yes," she said. "But not easily. Someone high up would've had to sign off on it."

Leo stared at her. "Someone who wants you out. Or wants me dead."

Zara nodded.

And then it hit her-this wasn't just sabotage.

It was a setup.

Someone was trying to burn her from both ends.

"Leo, this isn't SIRS protocol," she said. "This is off-book. Rogue."

He stepped closer. "Then you'd better tell me fast: who's coming for us?"

Zara met his eyes, steady. "Not us. Me."

Leo's hand curled into a fist at his side.

"If they're coming for you," he said, "they're coming through me."

Zara had burned bridges before. It was part of the job-play the role, gather intel, leave before anyone realized they'd handed you the blade you'd gut them with.

But this was different.

She wasn't just being burned.

She was being erased.

The false extraction signal wasn't just a betrayal-it was a trap. Someone inside SIRS wanted her out of the field and out of the way. And Leo? He was collateral. Or bait.

Maybe both.

She followed Leo down the corridor without speaking. He moved like a man preparing for siege-quick, sharp, eyes flicking to every window, every corner.

They reached the main operations room on the lower level. Several of his men were already there, hunched over monitors. A map of Lagos was projected across the wall, marked in red and green pins.

Leo gestured to one of the screens.

"Thirty minutes ago, we picked up signal distortion near Ikoyi. Satellite relays blocked. That's not just a storm. It's tactical interference."

Zara's stomach dropped.

"Surveillance blackout," she said. "They're prepping for movement."

"Whose men?" Leo asked.

She hesitated. "Could be a private contractor."

"Could be SIRS?"

"...yes."

He nodded, jaw tight. "Then they're not just pulling you. They're planning to take me with them. Or put me down."

"I don't think they know how close we've gotten," Zara said. "To them, I'm compromised. You're compromised. And people like us-"

"-aren't allowed to leave loose ends," Leo finished.

He turned away, muttering something in Igbo too quiet for her to catch. When he looked back, his voice was steel.

"We need to move."

"To where?"

"A secondary safe house. Underground. Off-grid. No comms, no trackers."

Zara folded her arms. "And what? Hide forever?"

He stepped close.

"No. We don't hide. We draw them in. And then we tear the mask off whoever sent that signal."

She studied him.

"You're going to use me as bait."

Leo didn't flinch. "I'm going to use us as bait."

They left the estate within the hour-no guards, no convoy. Just the two of them in an unmarked car, windows tinted, plates swapped twice before sunrise. Zara kept her eyes on the road, trying not to look at the rearview too often.

She wasn't sure what she feared more: SIRS catching up to them...

...or what she'd have to do if they did.

The safe house wasn't far-buried beneath a crumbling bookstore that doubled as a front for one of Leo's oldest laundering fronts. From the outside, it looked like ruin. Inside, it was steel and concrete. Cold. Clean. Hidden.

She followed him down two flights of stairs into a bunker lit by generator buzz and flickering halogens. The air smelled of earth and something older-like secrets stored in vaults too long.

Leo keyed in a passcode and opened a steel door. Inside was a room with a small cot, weapons locker, two screens linked to independent feeds, and a desk littered with maps, old files, burner phones.

Zara glanced around. "You've done this before."

He nodded. "More times than I want to remember."

"And what happens now?"

Leo turned to her. "Now, we stop pretending we're on different sides."

Zara leaned against the wall, arms crossed. "That's not what this was?"

Leo stepped close-close enough she could feel the heat of him, the weight of what they hadn't said.

"I didn't bring you here because I need information," he said. "I brought you here because I don't trust anyone else to watch my back."

She met his eyes.

"You're either the last ally I have, or the one who'll finally kill me."

Zara didn't move. "That's a risk you're willing to take?"

Leo smiled faintly. "It's the only one that makes sense anymore."

Zara didn't sleep.

She sat cross-legged on the floor of the bunker, watching the monitors cycle through muted footage. Street cams, drone feeds, interior thermal scans-nothing looked out of place.

And that terrified her more than red flags would.

Leo moved quietly around the space, reloading clips, checking supplies, disassembling weapons. He didn't ask if she was okay. He didn't need to. They both knew neither of them were.

"You think they'll come tonight?" she asked.

"I would."

He placed a loaded pistol on the table beside her. "And I'd come through the front, all polite. Just long enough to get in close."

Zara picked up the gun and examined it. "And then?"

Leo shrugged. "Depends. If I trusted the target, I'd negotiate. If not..."

"You'd put one in their skull and dump the body in the ocean."

Leo didn't answer.

But he didn't need to.

A few hours later, Zara's burner buzzed.

Only one message.

From a code name she recognized instantly.

OBSIDIAN: She gave the order. Confirmed. You're both ghosts now.

Zara stared at the screen.

Obsidian-an internal analyst inside SIRS. Quiet. Paranoid. Accurate. He didn't send false warnings. Ever.

She showed Leo.

He read the message and exhaled sharply through his nose.

"She," he said. "The deputy director?"

Zara nodded. "Ayanda Bassey."

Leo paced slowly. "Why would she do this?"

"Because she knows too much. She knows you have dirt on everyone-military officers, corporate funders, even SIRS informants. She was never comfortable with this mission. I wasn't supposed to get this close."

"You were supposed to kill me, then walk away."

Zara looked up at him. "Yes."

"And now?"

"I'd kill for you."

The words hung in the air between them like a loaded gun. Not romantic. Not soft. Just honest. Brutally honest.

Leo didn't flinch. He nodded slowly.

Then handed her a fresh magazine.

"We're not ghosts," he said.

"We're war."

At 4:16 a.m., the camera outside the building shorted.

No alarm. No sound.

Just a flicker.

Then a static screen.

Zara stood. "They're here."

Leo didn't ask how she knew. He was already moving to the panel, flipping a kill switch that dropped the bunker's doors into lock.

From a shelf beneath the desk, he pulled a steel briefcase. "If I don't make it out of this-"

"You will."

"If I don't," he repeated, "this goes to a contact in Geneva. It's insurance. Names, accounts, leverage. It can buy you new life. Or end someone else's."

Zara took it without question.

"Don't be noble now," she said. "It doesn't suit you."

Leo gave her that dark, sharp smile.

"Wouldn't dream of it."

Footsteps above.

Then-

Boom.

The first door blew inward.

Dust rained from the ceiling.

Leo grabbed his rifle. Zara cocked hers. No words.

Just breath.

Just heartbeats.

They stood side by side as the second door rattled. Sparks shot from the lock.

And then-

Silence.

The calm before the storm.

Zara reached for Leo's hand without thinking.

He took it.

Just for a second.

Then the lights went out.

And the war began.