Page 30 of Fired at the Heart

Behind me, Raphael speaks in terse commands, directing the captive Omegas, contacting our support teams through his concealed comms unit to ensure our extraction plan proceeds smoothly. Always the strategist, the commander. Some things never change.

Then I’m out in the service hall, and I spot Vince up ahead, dragging his bleeding leg across the polished floor, leaving a trail so obvious a child could follow it.

“Where are you going, Vince?” I pass darkened rooms with closed doors. “I thought you wanted to play with me.”

He peers over his shoulder, the whites of his eyes showing in his panic, and he limps faster.

Then, doors open on either side as guards emerge ahead of him.

I shoot the one on the right before he can even focus on me.

Raphael appears at my side, shooting the one on the left, filling the hall with the scent of gunpowder and blood. “Extraction team is two minutes out. The others are secure.”

“Excellent.” Another guard steps into view, raising a sawed-off shotgun, but hesitates when he spots his boss standing in the way.

Raphael responds without hesitation, my smaller pistol extending in his hand as he fires twice in rapid succession. The guard crumples, his weapon discharging into the ceiling as he falls, but Raphael pulls me down, protecting me instinctively.

A scuff comes from behind us, and I pivot to fire over Raphael’s shoulder. The guard drops, choking on blood as it spills through his fingers. Another dives behind a doorframe, firing blindly, and plaster explodes beside my head.

Adrenaline floods through me, and everything sharpens. Raphael’s pheromones spike, blood stings the air, and gunpowder burns my throat. My ears pick up the panicked breath of the guard behind the wall, the distant shouts of our team, and the wet drag of Vince’s escape.

Another shot screams past as I duck and return fire in three quick bursts. All hit their mark. The guard gurgles once, then silence.

Raphael turns, still kneeling, flushed and breathless, eyes blazing with the same high running through me. Our gazes lock, just for a second, but it stretches forever. Then he grins, that old, feral smile I haven’t seen in years, the one he wore when we were deep in the chaos, bleeding and alive.

I grin back, sharp and unfiltered. No pretense. No walls. Just us. For a heartbeat, we’re exactly what we’ve always been.

Perfectly matched.

Perfectly lethal.

“Just like old times,” he says, the words muffled by the ringing in my ears.

I don’t acknowledge the comment, already pushing to my feet to continue the pursuit. But warmth unfurls in my chest, along with a dangerous longing.

We move forward in tandem, covering each other as we advance through the corridor. Two more guards appear from a side room. Raphael takes one while I take the other in perfect synchronicity.

I catch glimpses of Raphael in action from the corner of my eye, fluid and efficient, with no wasted movement. He’s always been beautiful when he fights, a contradiction of grace and brutality, causing my heart to race for reasons beyond fear or adrenaline.

It still does, traitorous organ that it is.

Ahead, Vince has reached a set of double doors, and he fumbles to punch in a code on the keypad beside the frame, his hand shaking so hard he errors out on the first try.

I move into a sprint, Raphael right behind me.

Vince checks our location, his face pale from blood loss, and frantically punches the code in again. If we put another bullet in him, he might die, and we still need him for questioning.

The doors begin to slide open, revealing a glimpse of what appears to be a larger warehouse space beyond.

Vince lurches through the narrow opening, then reaches for a lever on the other side. An emergency override.

I push myself faster, ignoring the burn in my thighs and my dress tangling around my legs.

“Avery, down!”

A lifetime of working together triggers an automatic response that overrules conscious thought, and I drop. A bullet whizzes through the space where my head was a split second earlier, fired by a guard I hadn’t noticed in an alcove to my left.

Raphael returns fire, three shots that find their target with devastating accuracy. The guard slides down the wall, leaving a smear of red in his wake.

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