“You’re not my father. A father protects, a father cares. You’re just a man who shares my DNA. That’s all you’ve ever been.”
“Then pull the trigger. Prove you’re stronger than me. Prove you can make the hard choice.” His eyes are dimming now, the shoulder wound worse than I thought.
“This isn’t hard, this is easy. You’re a monster. You killed Evangeline, you traffic girls, you destroy lives. The world is better without you in it.”
“Then. Do. It.”
I press the gun against his forehead.
“This is for Evangeline, for Mara, for every girl you trafficked. For every life you destroyed, for everything you took from people who couldn’t fight back.”
“Do it and become exactly what I made you.”
“I’m not doing this because you made me this way. I’m doing this because of whatyouchose to be—what you chose to do. This is on you.”
I pull the trigger.
He jerks once, then goes still. Eyes open.
I killed my father.
The thought tries to penetrate, tries to make itself real, but I can’t process it. Can’t fit that reality into my head.
I killed him.
And I don’t regret it.
Doesn’t that make me exactly what he said? Exactly what he made me?
“Dredyn.”
It’s Jasper’s voice, from the doorway. I turn, gun still in hand.
He’s standing there, covered in blood and soot, breathing hard. His eyes go to James’s body, then back to me.
“He’s dead,” I hear myself say.
“I know, but Edmund and Marcus got away. Talon went after them. We need to move.”
THIRTY-SIX
TALON
The passage is narrow—barely wide enough for my shoulders—with exposed pipes overhead, and concrete walls slick with condensation. I’m running blind, following the sound of footsteps that echo and distort in the enclosed space.
Behind me, Jasper’s footfalls match mine, stride for stride. We’re moving fast, weapons ready, but the two men ahead have a head start and know these tunnels better than we do.
The passage branches out and I take the right on instinct while Jasper peels left. We’ll cover more ground separated.
“Stay on comms,” I say into the radio.
His acknowledgment crackles back. “Copy.”
The tunnel slopes downward, then curves back up. My lungs burn, but I push harder. We came here to kill three men.
The passage widens into a junction—four exits radiating outward like spokes. I stop, listening.
There, coming from the left tunnel.
