One foot in front of the other, I stalk toward the mill, my eyes constantly scanning, my body filled with so much adrenaline I might burst at the seams.
I enter the building, and Chase steers me upstairs and to the left, where I find the bodies of the security guards Koen dropped.
In a sick way, it's like being close to him.
I can feel his energy here. It's as if he’s the Grim Reaper, and he left behind echoes.
"Continue up," Chase commands as I approach another set of stairs.
The mill is dead silent, and my heartbeat is almost too loud in my ears, overpowering Chase’s signals.
A couple of times, he tells me to focus, thinking my mind is elsewhere, but that's not the case at all. I just can't fucking breathe.
I'm covered head to toe in tactical gear, and the cold metal of the gun in my hand is warming against my skin as if we're becoming one, and I don't like it.
But there's a reality bearing down on me, reminding me that this might be my life now. This will be my world if I stay with Koen. If I continue to love Koen.
I reach the rooftop door and pause, praying that what I find on the other side is something that I can handle.
"Open it," Chase orders, and his tone has deadened, like he, too, is having to steel himself for what comes next.
"Please, be alive," I whisper before pushing open the door.
What lies beyond has a scream curdling in my throat like scalding milk.
Running for Koen, I drop to my knees beside him.
His eyes fly open at the movement, but his hands remain at his side, his left side, where he maintains pressure at a gushing wound.
"I'm hit," he whispers.
"Chase! What do I do?" I sob, tears blinding me as I put the gun down beside him.
Brian is lying in a pool of blood beside Koen, and I can't look.
He's not my priority right now, I remind myself.
"Help him hold pressure. A lot of pressure. I've got someone en route."
Koen hisses when I press my hands over his.
His gloves are slick with blood, and I try to keep from dwelling on that fact.
"Are you hit anywhere else?" I ask him, eyeing the wound at the base of his bulletproof vest.
"No."
"Okay. Has Brian moved recently? Spoken?"
"He's gone, G." Typically, when he uses Allison's nickname for me, he sounds incredulous.
Now, his voice has a sympathetic note to it, like he hates having to tell me his friend is dead.
"I'm so sorry." Hot tears continue to fall, raining down on his Kevlar.
"It's the reality of this life we live. Shit, all three of us have survived well past our expiration date."
“That’s for fucking sure,” Chase says, having heard Koen on my open com.
