They ducked around a corner.Kayne thumbed the detonator.
For one suspended heartbeat, the world held its breath.
Then the explosion tore through the concrete with a brutal, concussive roar.Dust and debris blasted down the corridor as the reinforced slab gave way, chunks of wall collapsing inward.The shockwave rattled his teeth and thundered through the tunnels.
When the dust began to clear, there was no longer a wall, only a jagged, smoking hole leading into darkness.
Kayne didn’t wait.He surged forward through the debris, weapon up, lungs burning, and heart hammering with one singular purpose: get to Chloe.
Now.
#
“Ididn’t know.”
Chloe said it again, louder this time, because Aiden was pacing now, the calm veneer cracking, words tumbling over each other in jagged bursts.His control was fraying, and the room felt smaller with every step he took.
Her soul wept for Aiden the child, and the horrors he’d been forced to endure, but that boy was long gone, replaced by a stone-cold killer with no conscience.A man who’d crossed too many lines, who had a gun and nothing left to lose.She couldn’t let her compassion get in the way of survival.
“You worked there,” he snapped, spinning back toward her.The sound of his boots on the ground was angry.“You smiled at them.You trusted them.”His nostrils flared.“You smiled at me.”
Confusion flickered through her fear.“What are you talking about?”
His mouth twitched, humorless.Then he crossed the room and yanked down on a thin cord hanging beside a column.Metal rings whispered as fabric slid aside.Chloe’s breath left her in a rush.
The gym stared back at her.
It was so familiar, with the logo Sandy and her team had designed hanging on the wall.The free-weight section.The row of treadmills.Everything was exactly as it should be—except for the mirror.
It wasn’t a mirror at all.Her reflection didn’t stare back.The glass was dark and flat.
Her stomach rolled.“That’s impossible,” she whispered.
“You kept them,” he said, watching her face instead of the glass.“All the renovations you did, from the new floors to new equipment to fresh lighting.You ripped everything else down to the studs.”His voice sharpened.“But not the mirrors.”
Her throat closed.She remembered standing in the empty gym after she bought it, thinking the mirrors were fine.They were expensive and perfectly aligned.Why waste money replacing something that already worked?
“They were one of the few things I didn’t change,” she breathed.
Aiden smiled then, and it wasn’t kind or triumphant, just knowing.“If you had,” he said softly, “you would’ve found this room.”
Her blood turned to ice.Robin, Sandy, her husband, and Joel might still be alive.And Evan.
“I could see everything,” he continued.“Everyone, including you.You stood there lifting weights, smiling at me in here.”
Tears burned, hot and sudden.“I didn’t know,” she whispered again.
“But you did,” he cut in.“You smiled, and then you trained clients as if nothing was wrong and demons didn’t live in front of your face and under your feet.”
The words hit harder than his anger.
Chloe wrapped her arms around herself.The gym, the place she’d poured her soul into, suddenly felt like a macabre crime scene she’d unknowingly helped preserve.
“I’m sorry,” she said, the apology inadequate but real.“I’m so sorry.”
For a moment, something naked flashed across his face.Hurt.Loss.Then it shuttered.
“Sorry doesn’t undo it,” he said.
