Chapter 42

Rubble and Ruin.

Sage

I watched from the edge of the hallway, half in shadow, as Naomi leaned dramatically against Liam’s arm like a bored starlet and he tried, with visible effort, not to implode from secondhand embarrassment. Or arousal. Maybe both. Probably both. She was still riding the tail end of whatever sedatives they’d pumped into her earlier, loopy and lethal, a volatile mix that made her both a liability and a spectacular distraction. Liam hadn’t figured out yet that she was just as dangerous on drugs as she was off them. Maybe more. It was like giving a knife to a bear. Sure, it might be confused, but it’s still a bear, with a knife. I leaned a shoulder against the crumbling wall, arms crossed, lips twitching as Naomi poked at him with some half-flirty, half-accusatory rant about kill-stealing and romantic debt. He said something back, dry and exasperated, and she laughed, sharp and wild, eyes glittering. It was nice. Almost too nice. My gut twisted. Instinct, old and well-earned, flared up like a warning siren. Too quiet. Too soft. Too fucking-BOOM! The world shattered. A flash of orange-white light tore through the far corridor, followed by a blast wave so hard it lifted me off my feet and threw me like a ragdoll. The roar hit me a heartbeat later, like the sky itself had cracked open and screamed. Then…Nothing. Or maybe just everything all at once. Ringing. A high, piercing note vibrating through the hollow of my skull. Like someone had shoved a tuning fork straight through my eardrum. My back had slammed into concrete. Hard. The air was punched out of my lungs. I tasted dust and blood and the metallic tang of adrenaline. My ears screamed. My vision swam. Somewhere in the distance, alarms started to wail, distorted, warbling, like underwater sirens. Debris rained down around me. Smoke rolled like a living thing, thick and black, devouring light. The heat from the blast lingered like breath against my cheek. I blinked. Once. Twice. Shapes moved through the smoke. Friend or enemy? I reached for my sidearm automatically. Fingers closed on the grip. Muscle memory overrode disorientation. I rolled onto my side, coughing hard, eyes burning. My left ear throbbed. Blood. Shit. Probably burst something. Didn’t matter. Had to move. Had to get eyes on the others. Naomi. Liam. They were somewhere ahead and had been just past the blown corridor. My pulse jackhammered as I scanned the rubble. Concrete dust hung thick in the air, but I could make out movement now, staggering figures, one limping, the other hunched low.

“Naomi!” I rasped. No answer. Too loud. Too much static in my head.

I pushed up onto one knee, head spinning, and forced myself upright. My body screamed in protest, ribs bruised, shoulder singed, ears ringing like a fucking fire alarm, but I moved anyway. I always moved because standing still gets you killed. Another distant explosion echoed through the belly of the compound, smaller, more controlled. Not ours. Not friendly. They were closing in. Someone had triggered a failsafe. The whole op just went to shit. I stepped over shattered concrete and broken rebar, scanning through the haze until I caught sight of them. Naomi had dragged herself halfway onto Liam’s lap, still laughing, a wild spark in her eye as blood dripped from her temple. Liam was cradling her like she was glass, but his own face was streaked with soot, bleeding from a gash over his brow. They were alive. Shaken, but alive.

“Move,” I barked, staggering toward them.

Naomi turned her head toward the sound of my voice, smile dazed and bloody. “Was that you or me?”