Marshall lifted his comm. “Stephen. Now.”
A mechanical thrum rolled through the walls like the building inhaling. Red beacons lit overhead. Klaxons screamed. And then the suppression system dumped.
Fog exploded along the ground from waist-high vents—thick, white, cold. It rolled fast across the floor, swallowing pallets and crates and men’s legs in seconds.
Marshall shoved the door open and pulled Norah into the chaos.
The fog came up to his knees, then his thighs. Vision warped. Feet blurred. Muzzle flashes stuttered in the haze like heat lightning. Shouts collided with the alarms, echoing off metal beams.
Morris’s men faltered at the loss of their sight lines. Sidarov’s mercenaries adjusted quickly, but even they had to slow.
“Go!” Marshall barked.
He drove forward, dragging Norah with him, Landon covering their flank.
A guard appeared out of the fog—close, too close. Marshall slammed his forearm into the man’s rifle, knocking it aside. A sharp knee to the ribs, a twist, and the man folded.
Another shooter came from the right. Landon caught him with two fast strikes, dropping him cleanly.
“Left!” Landon yelled.
Marshall pivoted—to see Hale materialize out of the haze like a nightmare made of satin fog and gunmetal.
Hale’s hand clamped around Norah’s arm.
She cried out, stumbling as he yanked her backward.
Marshall’s vision tunneled.
He lunged.
Hale fired a wild shot—too high, blinded by the haze. Marshall hit him low, smashing his arm aside. The pistol cracked against the concrete and skittered away.
Hale tried to twist, but Marshall didn’t give him the chance.
Two moves. Brutal. Final.
The man collapsed in the fog, eyes going wide, then glassy as he exhaled his last breath. Marshall’s gut twisted with the realization that he’d taken another life.
Norah staggered backward into Marshall’s chest, breath breaking, tears cutting clean paths down her cheeks.
“I’ve got you,” he said, dragging her behind him as rifle fire tore through the haze where Hale had stood seconds earlier.
“Move!” Landon called. “They’re regrouping!”
The fog was thinning. Their window was closing.
Marshall wrapped an arm around Norah’s waist and pushed them toward the left bay door, the one cracked open to the alley. A burst of rounds hammered the steel behind them. Another snapped past Marshall’s shoulder. The fog lit with brief, violent light.
They broke into the cold air of the alley. Sirens bounced off brick.
And headlights—cutting sharp through the haze.
A dark SUV skidded to a stop, slewing sideways, brakes screaming. The passenger door flew open. Connor leaned across the seat, eyes wide. “Get in!”
Marshall shoved Norah into the back and dove in after her. Landon hit the front seat just as gunfire erupted from the loading dock behind them.
“Go!” he shouted.
