Micah leans close, lips almost touching Tommy’s ear, and whispers something I cannot hear over the gunfire still echoing through the warehouse. Whatever he tells him makes Tommy’s dying gaze fill with naked terror in his final moments.
Then, as if flipping a switch, Micah’s focus shifts entirely to me. He abandons Tommy’s twitching corpse without a backward glance. He crosses the distance to where I am with single-minded determination, ignoring bullets flying and men dying around us. His movements are economical despite obvious urgency, hands steady as they work to free me from my restraints.
When the zip ties finally give way, pain floods my wrists as circulation returns to numbed extremities. I nearly collapse as I try to stand, muscles cramped from hours in the metal chair. Micah catches me without hesitation, one arm circling my waist while his other hand cups my face with startling gentleness given the violence he dispensed moments ago.
His eyes search mine, cataloging every detail of my condition. The knife wound at my throat—shallow but still bleeding—catches his eye. His expression darkens as he gently tilts my chin to better assess the damage.
“I’m alright,” I manage, voice raspy from dehydration or sheer terror—perhaps both. “It’s not deep.”
Relief washes across his features, and it momentarily erases the hardened enforcer behind the man. His thumb traces my cheekbone in tender caresses that feel surreal amid the firefight surrounding us.
“I thought I’d lost you,” he says, the admission wrenched from somewhere deep. “When I saw that knife at your throat—”
He doesn’t finish the sentence, doesn’t need to. The raw vulnerability in his eyes tells me everything words cannot—how thoroughly I’ve breached his defenses, how completely I’ve integrated myself into the life of a man who spent decades avoiding such connection.
A burst of gunfire nearby shatters the moment. Micah’s expression shifts back to professional assessment as he surveys our surroundings. The situation has evolved around us. Francesca’s security is engaged with the intervening force in multiple firefights throughout the warehouse, creating a gauntlet of potential threats between us and the nearest exit.
His grip on me tightens protectively as he calculates our best move. Then his gaze falls on Sandra, still bound to her chair, her expression vacant despite the violence erupting around her. For a moment, I see conflict in his features—leave her behind or help.
“We have to take her,” I say, the words escaping before I fully form the thought. “We can’t leave her here.”
Micah’s expression suggests he disagrees but also recognizes the futility of arguing. With resigned acknowledgment visible only in momentary eye contact, he turns his attention to Sandra’s restraints, working quickly despite her unresponsive state.
When she’s free, Sandra remains in her chair, unaware of her changed circumstances. Micah lifts her bodily, draping her overhis shoulder in a fireman’s carry that would be comical in less dire circumstances. This imperious woman who once terrorized my marriage is now reduced to a limp burden across my lover’s back.
With his free arm still protectively around my waist, Micah guides us toward the nearest exit. Feeling is returning to my limbs, making it easier for me to move. He anticipates threats before they materialize, selecting routes that maximize cover while minimizing exposure. Despite Sandra’s added weight, he maintains a protective position that places his body between me and the most likely sources of danger.
We’re halfway to freedom when Francesca appears from behind a support column, weapon raised. Her designer suit remains impeccable despite the chaos, her expression coldly professional as she levels her pistol at Micah’s head.
The fraction of a second between her appearance and potential firing stretches into eternity—a suspended moment where multiple futures exist simultaneously.
I stare death in the face and feel something snap inside me.
No more. Not again. Not him.
Before conscious thought forms, my body is already in motion. I break from Micah’s protective grip and charge directly at Francesca, surprising everyone—most of all myself—with a reckless counter.
Francesca’s eyes widen. In her world of calculated power plays and strategic violence, a victim charging directly into danger represents incomprehensible behavior. This crucial hesitation—this split second where her weapon remains trained on Micah while her brain processes my unexpected movement—costs her everything.
I slam into her with every ounce of strength my adrenaline-fueled body can muster. We crash to the concrete together, her pistol discharging harmlessly into the ceiling as I knock her armaside. I’m no fighter, have no training or technique, but fury and desperation lend me temporary strength as I grapple with her on the warehouse floor.
“You bitch,” she spits, perfectly manicured nails clawing at my face as she tries to regain control of her weapon.
I don’t waste breath on words, focusing instead on keeping her gun hand pinned while I drive my knee into her stomach with more enthusiasm than skill. We roll across the concrete, a tangle of limbs and hatred and sheer survival instinct.
The fight lasts only seconds before intervention arrives. Eli appears. His weapon discharges with professional accuracy, the shot echoing through the warehouse with definitive finality.
Francesca’s body goes slack beneath me, blood blossoming across her pristine white blouse in a rapidly expanding crimson bloom. Her eyes register shock and fury in equal measure as life drains from them. There is no fear, no pleading, no recognition of mortality, just rage that her carefully constructed empire ends here, on a dirty warehouse floor, at the hands of people she considered beneath her.
I scramble backward, away from the spreading pool of blood, my hands shaking uncontrollably as the full impact of what just happened crashes through me.
Francesca Barone—powerful, ruthless, seemingly untouchable—lies dead mere inches from where I kneel. The woman who orchestrated my abduction, who threatened everything I hold dear, who nearly took Micah from me, eliminated with a single bullet.
Eli offers his hand, pulling me to my feet with surprising gentleness given his intimidating appearance.
“We need to move,” he says, voice low and urgent. “This place is about to become very crowded with people asking difficult questions.”
Micah steps up beside me, Sandra still slung across his shoulder but his free arm immediately circling my waist again with protective urgency.