Page 189 of Phantom Mine

He doesn’t look at me as he runs past the car, fast and desperate, and runs towards the thing he fears the most.

His feet pound the pavement but he doesn’t look back and he doesn’t hesitate.

I snatch his phone and flip it over.

Open on his screen is a text from Valentina, except she’s clearly not the one who sent it.

It’s a photo of her, passed out.

Her head is lolled to the side, her long brown hair flung partially over her face in her unconscious state.

And she’s gagged, her arms and legs tied to a chair.

The bottom falls out of my stomach when I recognize the bar area and the velvet chairs behind her.

The VIP room.

She’s insideFirenze.

The windows shatter and people shriek. Shrill screams echo as the flames burst through the frames, instantly sending a wave of blazing heat into the atmosphere.

“Fuck!”

I exit the car and run after Matteo. I try to catch up with him, but he’s too fast, too far, moving at a speed that I’ve never seen towards the doors of the burning building.

“Valentina!” I hear him scream again.

I watch as he bursts past the cop who puts a hand up at the tape to try and stop his advance, and subsequently clashes with two firefighters who bar his passage. They grab his arms and shove him back to try to stop him.

Matteo takes only one step back before he rips his right arm out of its hold and clocks the firefighter still holding his left, sending him sprawling to the ground.

“Stop him!” I shout at the remaining firefighter when I realize what he’s about to do.

It’s instinctive. Ever since he saved my life when we were kids, I’ve always protected Matteo.

This time, I’m too late.

The flames are monstrous, the heat nearly unbearable this close to the fire.

A blur of desperation against the growing inferno, Matteo doesn’t slow and he doesn’t hesitate. With Valentina’s name like a battlecry on his lips, and without a care or a sign of the fear that’s haunted him for twenty years, Matteo runs right into the flames to save the love of his life.

Chapter Fifty-Two

Matteo

As I erupt into Firenze, the change in temperature slams into me like a truck. It sends me stumbling back a step, my forearm coming up to shield my eyes from the nearly blinding brightness of the massive fire.

Flames eight feet tall and climbing gather in an unnatural circle in the center of the dance floor and extend to the far sides of the club. They lick up the walls with astounding violence, all at once beautiful and destructive.

This is no accident.

Those perfect circles indicate an accelerant was used.

The fire consumes everything in its path with insatiable hunger. Tables, chairs, chandeliers, sconces, drapes, they all clash with the flames and lose, turned to scorched ashes in seconds. My stomach weighs down in fear seeing how littleresistance the club puts up to its destruction, how quickly the fire moves.

Valentina is on the second floor.

I ignore the survival instincts telling my body to run away and push deeper into the building. Those instincts pale in comparison to the primitive fear crashing through my veins knowing Valentina is in danger.

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