Page 100 of Rose
“Who the fuck are you?” Savior asked, voice tight and eyes cold. His tone wasn’t personal, but he didn’t do strangers. Especially not ones limping into Carter territory like they belonged.
Cain didn’t flinch. Instead, he coughed, chest shaking with the effort. Olivia quickly passed him a cold water bottle, which he accepted with a nod of thanks.
“It’s hard to speak too long these days without my lungs betraying me,” Cain said dryly. “Some days I’m amazed I’m still breathing.”
He took a long sip, then set the bottle down.
“I’m a survivor of the Joyful Hearts massacre,” he said quietly. “Four years ago. Atlanta, Georgia.”
The room fell still.
“The terrorist attack?” Olivia asked, her voice sharp with recognition. “At the children’s charity festival?”
Cain nodded.
Savior remembered it clearly. Everyone did. It had dominated national headlines for weeks. Explosives planted throughout the park had detonated in synchronized waves, wiping out over a thousand lives—half of them children. The world called it a tragedy. A random act of terror.
But it wasn’t random.
It was a message. A brutal warning to a private weapons contractor who tried to double-cross a ghost. A man named Lazarus.
The name sent shivers down even the coldest spines. A shadow with no face. A myth that became real. He orchestrated mass death and disappeared without a trace. Presumed dead.
“What can we help with? Why are you here?” Sincere asked, his tone even, but his body coiled with alertness.
Savior didn’t speak. He just watched the man—Cain—with that sharp, unreadable stare of his, analyzing everything from the tremble in his hands to the pain behind his eyes.
“I lost my entire family,” Cain began, his voice tight with grief. “Because a son of a bitch who called himself Lazarus set explosives under a children’s charity event. I watched my wife… my baby girl take their last breath.” His jaw quivered, and he swallowed like it hurt. “I couldn’t move. I was already on fire. Burned. Crushed. I should’ve died with them. But God left me here.”
His hands trembled slightly as he pulled the water bottle to his lips again.
“Every day since then has been hell. Learning how to walk. Eat. Sleep. Breathe. Even take a fucking shit. I live with those screams in my head.”
The room remained silent, the weight of his pain pressing down on everyone.
“They said Lazarus died,” Cain continued. “But I never believed it. So I dug. Hard. For years. Eventually, I found out he moved here. Changed his identity.”
Lazarus. Savior had heard that name before. It struck a nerve—familiar, haunting—but he couldn’t place it. Not yet.
“How do you know he’s still alive?” Savior finally asked.
Cain leaned forward. “Because I saw him. Walking down the street like a fuckin’ civilian. Like he ain’t a mass murderer.” His voice shook. “He goes by William Davis now.”
He shook his head, fury flashing in his tired eyes.
“It took everything in me not to shoot him right there. But look at me. I can’t take him alone. I don’t have the strength. But Idohave the money.”
“You got a picture?” Olivia asked, voice low. Suspicion clear in her tone.
Cain reached into his jacket and pulled out a photograph, sliding it down the table toward Savior.
Savior’s fingers paused just before grabbing it. The second his eyes landed on the image, his chest tightened.
He’d seen this man before.
He was one of Savior’s past contracts. A high-level assignment from the mayor of Atlanta himself. Savior was certain his team completed the job—watched the fire consume everything. The mission had been classified as successful.
But Lazarus wasn’t ashes. He wasn’t buried. He was walking freely.
