Page 65 of Glitter Rose
The woman I found in that penthouse four months ago is vanishing by the day, and there’s not a goddamn thing I can do about it without blowing my cover.
Not yet. But soon.
“You could be more subtle about it.” Ramirez, a stocky man with calculating eyes that contradict his easy smile, slaps my shoulder hard enough to jolt me back to reality. “Stalking the boss’s sister again?”
I tear my gaze away from her. “It’s nothing.”
“That what we’re calling it now?” He’s smaller than me, but no less dangerous. Acting as Gabriel’s second-in-command, his security uniform carries extra insignia that the regular guards lack. “Man, if I didn’t know better…”
“Good thing you know better.” I adjust my rifle strap. “What’s on the schedule today?”
“Perimeter patrol, then escort duty for the supply runners.” Ramirez pulls a protein bar from his pocket. “You eat yet?”
I shake my head. Food is the last thing on my mind.
“Then get your ass to the mess. Can’t have you passing out on duty.” He checks his watch. “Report back in twenty.”
I allow myself one more glance at the Research Building. Did she even get the box? Or did that motherfucker Mike intercept it?
Four months ago, I left her sleeping for a quick supply run before our journey to Iron Gate. I’d been planning to wake her with breakfast, to tell her again how much I needed her to come with me. To give her the blue box I’d searched for, remembering how her eyes sparkled when she talked about it.
But when I returned, a pickup truck was driving away from her building. I recognized the insignia immediately.
Green Industries.
Gabriel had found her.
I’d sprinted up those twelve flights, heart hammering against my ribs, already knowing what I’d find.
Empty fucking rooms.
The blue box sat heavy in my pocket, useless. The thing I’d wasted precious time retrieving while she was being taken.
I failed her. Again.
Getting back to Iron Gate took two days of hard travel, fighting through three herds and running most of the way. When I told Gavin that Gabriel Green had Paris, that she was immune to zombie detection, that she was his sister, his face went slack with shock.
“We need to get her back,” I’d said. “Tonight.”
Sofia had placed a gentle hand on my arm. “Knox,we can’t just charge in there. Gabriel’s compound is a fortress. We need intel, a plan.”
“Then I’ll get it.”
It took three weeks to get inside Gabriel’s growing army. Gavin wanted to send Walsh, said I was too emotionally compromised. He wasn’t wrong, but I wasn’t budging.
“If she sees a familiar face—” Gavin had argued.
“She won’t. I’ll stay clear until it’s time.”
Three months I’ve been here, working my way up from perimeter guard to trusted team member. Three months watching the woman I love walk to that lab every morning, returning thinner, paler, emptier each time. Three months gathering intel on guard rotations and security protocols.
Three months of seeing Mike follow her, his hand always a little too low on her back, making my trigger finger itch.
Three months of praying to a God I stopped believing in that she hasn’t broken. That some part of the woman who wore glitter in the apocalypse still exists beneath the hollow shell Gabriel’s created.
Yesterday, I finally managed to access her room while she was in the lab. Left the blue box on her nightstand as a message, a promise, a reminder that I was coming for her. That I’d burn this place to the ground to get her out.
But this morning, seeing her… something’s wrong. She looks worse, not better. Like whatever hope she had left has been extinguished.
