Lieutenant Marcus Vael’s boots had marched through minefields in Kosovo, kicked down warlord compound doors in Syria, and stood firm in the blood-soaked dust of a dozen failed states. Now they scuffed against polished marble as he trailed her through a shopping mall.

The brass called it a “rehabilitation assignment.” Marcus called it purgatory.

After the Al-Khafra incident—after saving that screaming girl instead of pulling the trigger on High-Value Target #3, after watching two brothers bleed out because he’d hesitated—they’d handed him a new weapon: a laminated security badge with the mayor’s seal. His mission? Babysit the city’s most notorious brat.