Page 50 of Fierce Protector

“Marcus, over here,” I yell, before pulling my gun out of its holster and slamming the door open wide. I blink away the darkness, trying to get my eyes to adjust to the low light. My pulse races as the saw’s steady whirr increases, getting suddenly more aggressive as if it’s being ground against something. Its ominous whine leaves a knot of tension in my chest. I follow the noise to the back of the room, where a sliver of light seeps out from underneath a set of double doors.

Running towards it, I waste no time in shouldering my way through them, gun drawn and raised, readying myself for whatever is on the other side. Marcus’s footsteps thunder behind me, and his voice booms in the corridor as he makes a call, ordering our men searching the other floors to come to our location.

The scene before me has my brain short-circuiting. I can’t possibly be seeing what I think I’m seeing. There’s a doctor in the room who flinches at my interruption, tightening his grip on the scalpel in his hand.

My beautiful Katerina is laid out on a surgical table,strapped down and covered with bright green surgical sheets that are saturated in blood. Her blood. I blink, but the image of the gaping wound in her chest is burned into my brain—a sight I will never be able to unsee. When my eyes open a fraction of a second later, I focus them on anything that will tell me if she’s still alive.

There’s a slow, steady beep of a heart monitor and a series of clunks from the pump on the ventilator that’s breathing for her. If it wasn’t for these two sounds, I’d be convinced from the glassy grey pallor of her skin that I’d already lost her.

But that’s simply not a thought that I’m willing to concede.

I didn’t spend a lifetime waiting for her, only to lose her now.

Lasering my attention in on the doctor hunched over her body, I catalogue the blood-covered gloved hands and the tip of the scalpel hovering over Katerina’s still beating heart, stopping me from taking even one step closer.

A single flick of that knife and he could end her.

A near-volcanic fury chases a path through my bloodstream when I look up and see the sadistic pleasure shining in his eyes at the torture he’s putting her through. It’s in that moment that I understand my enemy. See him for who he truly is, both literally and figuratively.

I recognise the callous stare of Doctor Jenkins, and while I can’t fathom how I never saw it before, I see it now. The cold, soulless eyes of a monster.

Both he and I flinch as Marcus crashes through theswinging doors behind me, prompting the doctor to move the blade, holding it closer to Katerina’s heart as I hold out an arm and shout for Marcus to hold his fire.

“Stay exactly where you are,” Doctor Jenkins orders, flicking his gaze between Marcus and me, the panic in his eyes displaying his realisation: he’s outmanned and outgunned.

“You ruined everything. She was always meant to be mine.” Jenkins looks half crazed, like a wild animal, eyes wide and pupils the size of pinpricks. He drops his focus to the beating heart beneath his blade. “Just look at it. Her heart was always meant for me. It’s perfect.” Some delusional imitation of emotion overtakes him, causing a hitch in his voice as he casts his gaze to her open chest.

I keep my focus on Doctor Jenkins, forcing myself to block out the horror he’s so entranced by. His expression shifts, suddenly darker somehow, like he’s lost touch with what little reality he had a grip on. He’s more dangerous now than he was only seconds ago.

Firming up my grip on my gun, I aim between Jenkins’ eyes. “Step away from her,” I roar, my voice cracking under the weight of the anguish I feel.

My world stops when he lowers his hand, the edge of the blade almost touching her exposed heart, making my next decision both the easiest and hardest choice of my life.

I squeeze the trigger, aiming the muzzle squarely at his chest, hoping and praying that the force of the bullet will be enough to push him away from Katerina. The bullet hits on target and he falls backwards. The reliefthat consumes me when the scalpel clatters onto the floor is greater than any I’ve experienced.

I yell at Marcus to get help with no real comprehension of the words I’m saying as stalk around the table, fall to my knees, and seize Doctor Jenkins around the throat.

He’s not dead yet, but he’s clutching his chest where the bullet ripped through his scrubs and left a small wound that’s now surrounded by an ever-increasing patch of blood as his heart continues to pump. I stare down at him, making sure that the last thing he sees as the light fades from his eyes, is me.

His executioner.

“I made a promise to the woman I love that I’d kill the man who made her cry with my bare hands. And it’s a promise I intend to keep,” I bite out with a vicious grin.

My fingers tighten around his neck, and he gapes like a fish out of water, fighting for breath and staring back at me pleadingly, although we both know I’m never going to allow him out of this room alive. The light fades from his eyes and the second I know he’s gone, I release my hold on him and scramble to my feet.

It’s impossible not to be affected by the carnage that fucking psychopath has wrought on her body. I’m as horrified as I am transfixed staring down at the woman I love. Her heart exposed and vulnerable. I can’t reconcile this reality, bearing witness to something I never should have seen, but I can’t look away. I hear the steady beep of the monitor beside me, but it’s the staggered pulsing of the chambers of her heart that tells me she’s still alive and give me some small hope.

As devastating as it is to witness, I have to stand by her side but I can’t fathom how she’ll ever forgive me for not protecting her.

She was mine to protect. And I failed her.

When people begin to flood into the room, Marcus tries to drag me away from Katerina. I’m surrounded by a hurried mob of people in scrubs shouting out things I don’t understand, and all I want to do is kill anyone who dares touch her. More hands wrap around me, and I struggle against them as I’m pulled out of the room. The last thing I hear as the door closes is,“What the hell did he do to her?”

I lurch to try to get back to her, only for Marcus to wrench me around to face him and take my head in his hands, forcing my focus onto him. “You have to let them help her. There’s nothing you can do.” His voice is harried, begging as much as he’s ordering.

I’m hit with the reality of the situation. There’s truly nothing I can do now. Her life is in their hands, and I’m helpless. I want time to stop. I’m petrified that any second now, the rhythmic beat I can hear through the doors will descend into a continuous monotone and take her away from me.

Marcus rests his forehead to mine as he whispers, “I need you to breathe for me, Stefano. They’re doing everything they can.” The genuine care in his tone drags me back to my senses and I nod, closing my eyes and letting my lungs take their first full breath for what feels like an eternity.

---