The alley opens beside the club like a mouth.Dark. Narrow. Wrong.
No.
My feet scrape against the pavement as he pulls me back. I try to dig my heels in, but he tightens his hold, and the knife presses closer. “Don’t,” he growls.
Another man appears at the edge of the alley, just a shape at first, then a face under the weak spill of a streetlight. He’s watching the street, not me.
The first man laughs low against my ear. “I bet you thought that dumbass biker could keep you safe.” The words hit harder than they should. Not because of the insult. Because of the certainty in his voice. Like they planned for Cobra. Like they expected him. Like this wasn’t random.
A second man sounds behind us. “We need to move.”
“I know.”
“Now.”
The man behind me starts pulling faster. We’re too far from the street now. Too far from the noise. Too far from anyone looking the right direction.
My heart slams against his arm.
The knife stays steady.
I try to think.
What would Cobra would do?
He’d say not to leave the damn building in the first place.
The thought almost breaks me, but I shove it down. My phone is still in my hand.
His grip has my mouth, not my wrist.
If I can drop it. If I can make a sound. If I can…
Movement appears at the mouth of the alley.
Eli.
He comes around the side of the building fast, like he’s searching, and for one second his eyes sweep past us without landing. Then they snap back. His face changes. Everything in him freezes. Half a second. That’s all. Then he roars, “COBRA!” The sound rips through the alley and the street beyond it. Everything fractures.
The man behind me curses, ugly and sharp. “Fucking assholes.”
The second one yells. “Too late. We need to go now.”
The hand leaves my mouth. “See you soon babe.”
I suck in a breath, ready to scream, ready to fight, ready to do anything. I’m shoved. Hard. I hit the pavement before my hands can catch me. Pain explodes through my head. Sharp. White. The world cuts out for a second. Then comes back wrong. Sound goes distant first.
Eli’s voice. Footsteps. A door slamming. Someone yelling from the street. It all stretches thin, like I’m hearing it from under water. My cheek is against cold pavement. I blink. Once. Twice.
The alley light smears above me.
I roll onto my back slowly, nausea twisting through me. My head throbs so hard my vision pulses with it.
“Olivia!” Eli drops beside me, his face swimming into view. He looks too young suddenly. Too scared. Too guilty. “Fuck. Fuck, don’t move,” he says, one hand hovering near my shoulder like he wants to help but remembers he shouldn’t touch me without thinking. “Cobra’s coming. He’s coming.”
Cobra.
My eyes shift toward the alley mouth. He appears like violence given a body. Not walking. Not running exactly. Moving with a force that makes the space around him seem too small. I’ve seen Cobra controlled. Silent. Watchful. Dangerous in a way that felt contained behind his eyes. This is not that. This is something stripped raw. His face is hard, but there’s a crack in it I’ve never seen before. Something sharp and terrible beneath the rage.
