Chapter Twenty-Eight
NITRO
“No, no, no.” Panic claws at me, but I shove it down. Panic means Queenie dies, and that’s not a fucking option.
Think. THINK!
The window.
I spin toward the window, still cradling Queenie tight against my chest. The window is small, too small, but it’s hope.
I don’t know what’s on the other side.
Could be a garden bed.
Could be a concrete drop.
Could be certain death.
But staying here guarantees death.
I shift Queenie higher in my arms, bracing her weight against me with one arm and my chest. My legs plant wide, steady as I can manage in the smoke-thick air.
Then I raise my boot and kick the window.
The glass cracks but doesn’t give. I grit my teeth, adjust my stance, and kick again, harder.
The pane splinters, a spiderweb of fractures spreading across it. “Come on, come on…” My lungs burn, my eyes sting, Queenie wheezes weakly against my neck.
I haul in one more breath and slam my heel into the center of the glass. It explodes outward, shards raining down like jagged hail onto whatever waits below—a rush of cold night air blasts into the room, sweet, sharp, and life-saving.
I don’t hesitate.
I hook one arm under Queenie’s legs, hold her tight to my chest, and step toward the open frame, toward our only chance.
Below, I can see people. Firefighters and my brothers. They’re setting up something, an air cushion, maybe, or a net. I don’t wait to see. There’s no time.
The ceiling above us groans. A deep, ominous sound that I feel in my bones.
“Heads up,” I scream down at them. “We’re coming out!”
I hitch Queenie higher against my chest, one arm wrapped securely around her. She’s so still. Too still. But I can feel her heartbeat against mine, and that’s all that fucking matters right now.
“Hold on, Queenie. Just a little longer.”
I haul myself onto the window ledge, glass grinding into my skin, slicing a sting across my back, but I don’t care. I don’t stop, I can’t. Heat lashes at us from behind, a searing force that feels as though it’s reaching for my spine, hungry to drag us back in.
The air shifts, a booming exhale as the fire surges into the bedroom we just escaped, the air from the window fueling the fire and devouring the bedroom whole. The walls crack. Something collapses behind me with a sound that shakes the frame under my feet.
There’s no time left.
I tighten my hold on Queenie, feel her frail fingers curl weakly against my chest.
“Hold on,” I whisper, though she may not even hear me.
The heat snaps at my heels, and I push off the ledge, hurling us into the dark. For one horrible moment, we’re suspended in midair. Falling. The ground rushing up to meet us.
Protect her, protect her, protect her.
I twist my body, making sure I’ll hit first, making sure she’s cushioned against me.
We slam into something, the air cushion the firefighters deployed. It’s not a gentle landing. My back hits hard enough to knock the wind out of me, stars exploding across my vision. But Queenie is on top of me, protected from the impact.
Hands are on us immediately.
Firefighters are pulling Queenie away from me.
“We got her! We got her!”
“Careful with her.” I try to get up, but my body won’t cooperate. Everything hurts. My lungs feel like they’re filled with broken glass. “Her lungs, she wasn’t breathing right.”
“Sir, stay down. You need medical attention.”
I spot my brothers as I groan. “No!” I roll onto my side, coughing so hard I taste blood. Through watering eyes, I see them laying Queenie on a stretcher. A paramedic is already putting an oxygen mask over her face, checking her vitals.
She’s so still.
Please, please move. Open your eyes.
Something. God, Anything!
I try to get up again, and this time someone physically restrains me. “Sir, you need to stay still.”
“Get the fuck off me!” I shove at the hands holding me down. “That’s my grandmother. I need…”
“Brother.” Sin’s face appears in my line of sight, and the worry lines are clear through the soot on his cheeks. “Let them help her. Let them help you.”
“She’s not moving,” I choke out. “Sin, she’s not…”
“She’s breathing. Look.” He turns my head gently, forcing me to see the rise and fall of her chest under the oxygen mask.
It’s shallow, but it’s there.
“She’s breathing, Nitro. You got her out. You saved her.”
The adrenaline that’s been keeping me upright suddenly drains away all at once. My vision blurs, and I realize I’m crying. Full-on sobbing, my shoulders shaking with it.
“I couldn’t… if I lost her.”
“But you didn’t.” Sin’s grip on my shoulder is the only thing keeping me grounded. “You didn’t lose her. We thought you might have trouble finding a way back out the way you went in, so we got the firemen to set up the air cushion under Queenie’s window just in case.”
Letting out a relieved exhale, I slap his shoulder. “Thanks, brother… good thinking.”
Around us, the scene is chaos. More stretchers are loaded into ambulances. The fire is still roaring, turning Sunset Manor into a collapsing, burning skeleton. Firefighters shout over the inferno, hoses blasting arcs of water that instantly turn to steam.
And then I see the bodies.
Not firefighters.
Not survivors.
Bodies.
White sheets lined in a row, fluttering faintly in the smoke-thick breeze like ghosts trying to rise.
Mrs. Henderson, the butterscotch queen.
Harold, who never once got bored with asking about bikes.
Mr. Patterson, ninety-five and smarter than all of us with his pen-and-ink puzzles.
And countless others…
Gone.
Something inside me cracks, loud and violent, like a splitting bone.
My vision blurs at the edges.
My lungs seize.
My knees lock as if trying to hold me upright against a tsunami of grief.
But they can’t.
My world tilts. Hard.
A ringing starts in my ears, shrill, piercing, drowning out the shouted orders from firefighters, the sirens, the chaos. My stomach twists, a brutal wrench like I’ve been punched in the gut by a heavyweight, and suddenly I’m choking on air that won’t go down.
No.
No, no, no!
My throat tightens.
My tongue tastes like smoke and metal.
My heartbeat is a rapid-fire pulse that feels too fast, too loud, too wrong.
The smell hits me next.
Burned wood.
Melted plastic.
Human loss.
It hits my body like a sledgehammer. My hands shake violently as I stumble backward, one, two steps, before my knees give, and I hit the ground. Grass and dirt rush up to meet me, and I barely get my hands braced before the first heave tears out of me.
It’s not a neat gag.
It’s a full-body revolt.
My stomach claws upward, my ribs contracting so hard it feels as though they might crack. Vomit spills onto the grass, hot and acidic, and another wave hits before I can even breathe.
“Easy, brother.” Sin is suddenly beside me, voice rough, hand steady between my shoulder blades. “Get it out. You’re all right. I’ve got you.”
But I’m not all right.
I can feel the tremor in my arms, the burn in my throat, the pounding in my skull. I taste bile and smoke. My eyes sting. My breath stutters in ragged, broken bursts as my body fights to empty itself of everything it can’t hold—fear, grief, shock, horror.
I spit, cough, gag again.
Another heave.
Another spasm.
My body is trying to purge the whole fucking world.
Sin keeps his hand on my back, solid, grounding, quiet except for the occasional soft words of comfort, “Easy… you’re okay… breathe, brother… breathe.”
I try, but breathing feels wrong.
Feels too thin, too sharp.
Feels like every inhale drags loss deeper into my lungs.
I wipe my mouth with the back of my shaking hand, my vision still wavering, my gut twisted into knots. The fire behind us roars louder, a burning monster that ate an entire building full of people I cared about.
And all I can think is, I didn’t save them.
I should’ve gotten here sooner.
I should’ve—
Another dry heave pushes me forward.
Sin tightens his grip. “You’re not alone in this,” he murmurs. “We’re here.”
But I feel alone.
Gut-wrenchingly alone.
Because while I’m choking on grief and bile, the thought that I could have lost Queenie if I were minutes later, fuck, seconds later, reminds me that without her, without Queenie, and now without Marley, I’d have no one left to love.
Sin’s voice cuts through the chaos, sharp, commanding, “Nitro.” I look up. His jaw is clenched, his eyes hard with worry that he doesn’t bother hiding. “You’re getting checked out.”
“I’m fine,” I rasp, even though my lungs feel like sandpaper and my vision sways.
“The fuck you are,” Ghost growls from somewhere behind Sin.
“I said… I’m fine!” I snap, trying to push to my feet.
Sin steps in front of me, blocking my way, his voice turning cold.
President cold. “You don’t argue with me on this.
You breathed in more smoke than a goddamn chimney.
And you’re puking your guts up, it might just be from the stress, but it can also be a symptom of smoke inhalation. Get in the ambulance. Now!”
“Sin…”
He leans in, his forehead almost touching mine, his eyes glaring. “I’m not asking. I’m giving a damn order.”
The brothers go quiet.
Sin’s orders are final.
I grit my teeth but stagger toward the open ambulance door. Sin climbs in right behind me, standing guard. He’s not leaving until a medic signs off that I’m still alive.
I sit on the edge of the stretcher, hands braced on my knees, head hanging as I choke on the taste of smoke and bile.
The medic steps forward, shining a light in my eyes. “Sir, can you—”
Suddenly, something tugs at my peripheral vision.
A shape.
A silhouette just beyond the barricade.
I turn my head quickly, making it spin. Sin notices the shift and follows my gaze. At the edge of the chaos, partially hidden by shadows and emergency lights, stands Derek.
Watching the fire.
Watching the bodies.
Watching me.
His face is lit by the flames behind us, his expression carved into something monstrous.
And the fucker is smiling.
Not shocked.
Not horrified.
Fucking smiling.
My stomach plummets. My skin goes cold. My pulse spikes so violently it hurts.
“Son of a bitch,” Sin mutters under his breath.
Derek’s gaze locks with mine. His smile widens, slow and satisfied. That dickhead is proud of what he’s done.
Proud of the destruction.
Proud that he almost killed Queenie.
Something snaps inside me, sharp and white-hot. I jump to my feet before the medic can blink, ripping the oxygen mask off, rage tunneling my vision until it’s just me and that smug fucking grin across the lot.
“Nitro!” Sin barks, grabbing my arm, but it’s as if his voice is underwater.
Because Derek just tipped two fingers to his brow in a mock salute, then turns and walks away into the smoke.
And I swear on everything in me, he won’t walk away next time.
“He killed them.” My voice breaks. “He killed them, and he’s walking away.”
“Not for long.” Sin’s grip tightens. “We will get him. We will make him pay. But right now, right here, we take care of Queenie. That’s what matters. Taking care of her and you.”
The fight drains out of me all at once.
He’s right.
As much as I want to hunt Derek down and tear him apart with my bare hands, I know that Queenie needs me.
The paramedics are loading her into an ambulance. Her face is still too pale, her breathing still too shallow behind the oxygen mask. I watch them secure the stretcher, watch the doors start to close, and something inside me fractures.
“I’m going with her.” My voice is hoarse, barely recognizable as my own.
“Sir, we need to check you out.”
“I’m. Going. With. Her.” I meet the paramedic’s eyes, and whatever he sees there makes him nod.
“Okay. Get in.”
Sin helps me to my feet. My legs barely hold me, but I make it to the ambulance. Before I climb in, I turn back to look at my president.
My brother.
“Find him,” I demand. “Find everything. I want to know every move he’s made, every breath he’s taken. When Queenie is stable, when I know she’s going to live… I’m coming for him. With every-fucking-thing I have.”
Sin nods slowly.
His mismatched eyes are set hard as stone.
“We’re already on it. Ghost will pull everything… security footage, phone records, financial transactions. We’ll know where he is and what he’s done by tomorrow.”
“Good.” I climb into the ambulance, taking the seat next to Queenie’s stretcher. I reach out and take her hand, so small and fragile in mine. Her skin is cold, and her fingers don’t grip back.
But she is alive.
And I’m going to make sure she stays that way.
The doors close. The ambulance lurches forward, sirens wailing. Through the small window in the back, I watch Sunset Manor disappear into the distance, flames still reaching into the sky like grasping fingers.
People died tonight.
Good people who didn’t deserve to die.
Who were living out their golden years in peace until Derek decided they were acceptable collateral damage in his vendetta against me.
I look down at Queenie.
At the woman who raised me.
Who taught me about honor, integrity, and love.
The woman who sacrificed everything so I could have a better life.
“I’m so sorry,” I whisper. “This is my fault. All of this is my fault.”
Her eyes flutter open, just for a second. And even through the oxygen mask, even through the pain and the smoke inhalation, she manages to squeeze my hand. Just once. Weak but deliberate.
Not your fault, the gesture says.
Fresh tears burn down my face. I press Queenie’s hand to my forehead and let myself break. Just for a moment. Just for the length of this ambulance ride.
Tomorrow, I’ll be strong.
Tomorrow, I’ll be the VP who helps his club hunt down the asshole who did this.
Tomorrow, I’ll be Nitro, fierce, unrelenting, and capable of terrible things when the people I love are threatened.
But tonight, I’m a grandson sitting beside his grandmother, praying to every god I don’t believe in that she’ll survive this.
And swearing that Derek will pay for every second of her suffering.
The ambulance races through the pre-dawn Vegas streets, sirens screaming.
While in the distance, Sunset Manor goes up in smoke.