Like the world hasn’t just broken around us.
Because to me, she’s precious cargo.
She curls into my chest, her face hidden, and I carry her through the wreckage.
“It’s okay,” I whisper into her hair, my voice hoarse.“I’ve got you, Angel.I’ve got you.”
But even as I say it, I know it’s not okay.
Nothing is.
Not after this.
Not after what they did to her.
And definitely not after what I did to them.In front of her.
The warehouse is silent now, except for her hitched breathing and the distant, rhythmic beep of Kai’s comms.
Our backup is en route.
A cleanup team from Sigma.
Ambulance too.
But they’ll have to wade through the gore first.
Because this place?It’s a goddamn slaughterhouse.
The smell is thick—copper and smoke, mildew, and rot.Like the place itself was dying long before today.
Filthy concrete floors, rusting beams, shattered glass, and bullet casings glinting in the low light.
Water drips somewhere above, the steadyplink plink plinkechoing like a countdown to hell.
Blood paints the walls.
My bullets did some of that.
Theirs did the rest.
I’m guessing Marco was doing some sort of trade with Hammerfall when Chekhov stormed in.
We’ll sort it out later.
Right now it’s enough that the man who laid hands on her won’t be getting up again.
What’s left of him isn’t even whole.
He’s missing part of his face.
His head turned so violently with the gunshots that his spine juts out beneath the collar.
His twisted remains are still collapsed against the floor, chest cavity torn open by bullets like I clawed it out myself.
Maybe I did.
I don’t remember the details.
