No way! I’m not letting him go back in!
I can’t let him put himself in more danger. I won’t let him do that!
Not just the danger, but also to have him see the dead bodies, the people we killed… I can’t do it. I can’t have him defile his memories with even more of that.
I hold out my hand. “I’ll do it. Let me do this for you, and for Mathew. Let me bring all of it down.”
He keeps my gaze, serious, defiant. “I’m going with you.”
“Vera? Caleb? Derrick? Where’s Luca? Do you have eyes on him? I don’t want him to do something rash. He shouldn’t be anywhere near the building right now.” Mathew’s voice has taken on a worried tone, nervous.
I reach up. “I’m with him. I’ll make sure he gets out unharmed.” While I don’t want to take him, Luca knows this place the best and he deserves to have a hand in taking it down.
“Gets out?! He’s not supposed to be in there in the first place.” I’m sure that Mathew would love to barge over here and pull both of us away, but he’s not and the others are busy enough elsewhere.
“Vera? Don’t do anything reckless.” That’s Caleb, not telling me off, just worrying, as usual.
“I won’t. I’ll make sure we get out in one piece.” I tug on Luca’s hand, our fingers still entwined, back into the building. As soon as we’re back inside, the shots and sounds from outside are quieter, making it a little easier to think.
“Caleb!” Mathew isn’t so happy with this, clearly. “Get them out of there!”
That seems to be enough for Derrick, his voice stern. “No bickering. Stay focused.”
There’s a loud explosion, almost like a bomb went off, the sound seems to vibrate through the building.
“One of their vans blew up.” The woman from before speaks up. “No casualties on our side.”
If we want to make something happen, we have to do it quickly, before the people from the Hearts manage to come inside and before even more people arrive.
Luca pulls me into the basement, his eyes focused as he scans the area. He looks nothing like the scared guy I met that first night, but this is also the last time he’ll ever be around violence ever again. No matter what, he’s not coming with us again, just like Jorge. They are not made for this, this goes against every fibre of their being.
Never again after this. Because I don’t want them to get hurt more than they already are.
I let his hand go so he can find what he’s looking for while I look around the place to see if anything in here is important enough to save. It doesn’t look like it, but you never know. “I have a feeling that you’ve considered burning this place down before. Am I right?”
Luca’s way too focused and sure. This isn’t an impulse, this is a plan.
He glances my way before handing me a couple of empty boxes. “A few times while I was living here and many times since Mathew told me that we were going to take this place down.” He grabs a few boxes for himself, putting them under his arm.
“You’ve got everything?” The sounds from outside keep making me more and more nervous. I want to get this over as quickly as possible.
“Yep.” He glances around one last time and then goes up one of the other stairs out of the basement. The door on this side clearly opened with a key and not broken open with force like the one we came in through.
Another door at the top of the stairs lets us out into a regular hallway, not a secret one like Riley and I used before, on the side of the building that Mathew and Caleb looked through before.
“We’re lucky this is an older building and that they don’t take fire safety too seriously.” Luca walks to the front of the building and I stop him, my hand on his chest, he looks at me, almost annoyed. “I am going to do this. I thought you weren’t going to stop me?”
“I’m not stopping you. It’s just...” I glance to the doors to the front room. “There are a lot of bodies out there. Riley and I didn’t exactly leave the place in a pretty state.”
“I know.” He reaches into his pocket and pulls out the lighter, putting it in my hand. “Just in case I lose my courage.”
“Thanks.” I kiss his cheek, wishing I could hug him, but we don’t have much time and we’ve got our arms full. “You go in first, I’ll follow.” I put the lighter in my pocket and reach up to my earpiece. “Luca and I are about to walk into the downstairs front room. We’re going to start some fires. People should try pulling out as soon as is safe.”
Luca starts walking again, his steps less sure, but still steady. As we get closer to the doors, the sounds of gunfire get louder and louder and as he pushes open the door, the sounds hurt my ears.
Mathew’s people have pushed all the furniture against the doors and windows, creating a barrier to hide behind. One or two look at us, before focusing back on what’s going on in the streets.
Luca walks over to the nearest curtains, cuts up some of the boxes he’s holding and then puts the strips together so they’ll easily catch fire. These curtains are decorative, not actually near any doors or windows, so they’re the safest place to start.
