Chapter 79
CHAPTER SEVENTY-NINE
Drago
Song- Live Like Legends, Ruelle
The air in the tunnel underneath the church is damp and stale. It clings to the back of my throat as we move, boots scraping softly over the uneven ground, our breaths the only sound between us.
No one speaks.
They don’t need to.
Not when the message on my watch still burns behind my eyes like a brand.
LILY HAS ENTERED PANIC ROOM.
That’s not a notification. That’s a fucking siren.
It means my girl is locked inside steel because the world outside it is no longer safe. And that I have to do everything I can to stop it. To stop anyone from hurting her. Just like I vowed to always do.
No matter the consequences to myself.
Conan is at my left, shoulders broad, eyes dead ahead. Finn is behind him, silent in that dangerous way he gets when he’s trying not to feel. Declan is at the front like a general, his posture calm, but his hands flexing like he’s already counting bodies.
Reggie and Rowan trail close, two shadows moving as one, the kind of men who don’t need daylight to find a target.
The tunnel narrows, the ceiling dropping low enough that the air presses in around us like a coffin.
Halfway down, Declan lifts his fist.
We stop instantly. Stillness. The kind where even breathing sounds loud.
I know what’s here: a hidden steel hatch, welded into the wall behind a sheet of old plywood and dirt-stained tarpaulin. It doesn’t look like anything. That’s the point. A cache you don’t find unless someone wants you to.
I step forward, peel it back, and twist the lock.
Metal groans quietly. Inside, the weapons gleam faintly under the dim tunnel light. Black and clean and waiting.
I reach in first. A rifle. Then the next. A shotgun wrapped in oilcloth. Mags stacked and labeled. Silencers. A small case of explosives packed so neatly it looks almost holy. This isn’t the first time we’ve prepared for war. But it’s the first time it’s felt inevitable.
“Take what you need,” I say, voice low.
No one hesitates.
Reggie grabs two pistols and a spare mag belt like it’s muscle memory. Rowan slides a blade into his boot and checks the chamber of a rifle with a calm that borders on psychotic. Finn takes a handgun and a suppressor, his face unreadable.
We’ve all got someone we could lose. We’ve all got to put our lives on the line to ensure they make it out of here.
Declan looks at me. “We going loud?” he asks.
I stare into the cache for half a second longer, my jaw tight. Then I pull out the last thing. A small comms burner.
I flick it on. And I call Enzo.
He answers on the first ring. “Drago, what the fuck went on?” he says, voice already strained.
“Listen carefully,” I say. My voice doesn’t shake. It doesn’t break. “I want Decadence surrounded.”
A pause.
Then Enzo’s breath turns sharp. “Understood.”
“Every entrance. Every exit. Roofline. Underground access. Street perimeter.” I shove a mag into a handgun until it clicks home. “I want eyes on every shadow and a gun pointed at every throat.”
“I think the Preacher is in my house,” I confirm.
We keep moving while I talk.
“What?” He hisses. “How?”
“Lily’s Mom. I don’t know if she was another decoy to let the Preacher in, or Tatiana’s men.”
“There’s no fucking way?” Enzo whispers.
“I don’t believe in coincidences,” I cut in. “Tatiana’s men are part of it. The peace talks were a decoy, whose to say they didn’t set another trap to go after the necklace and use Lily’s mom as bait.”
Silence.
Not because he’s surprised. Because he’s calculating. We anticipated the decoy angle. We played that out.
But then I diverted off track. We didn’t need the decoy to lead us to the Preacher, because she’s already in my fucking house.
Enzo exhales slowly, like he’s swallowing whatever emotion is rising. “Copy.”
I step away from the cache, the tunnel suddenly feeling too small to hold what’s coming.
“Get the Sterlings out,” I order. “Get every Quinn soldier in motion. I want as many people as possible surrounding Decadence. I want it to look like the fucking apocalypse.”
“Already moving,” Enzo replies. “Hunter and Beau are in position for a tunnel breach. I’ll get them out hunting more of Tatiana’s men after.”
“Good.” I rack my weapon with a clean, final sound. “Now listen—Charlotte.”
Enzo goes quiet instantly.
I can hear him shifting environments, stepping somewhere private.
“I need her on high alert,” I say. “House lockdown. Women and children in a secure room. No windows. No doors. Go down into the bunker on your call.”
“Charlotte is armed and ready,” Enzo confirms.
Good.
Because Charlotte doesn’t freeze. Charlotte fights. Just how I taught her to. To spill enough blood to make any man fear her.
Not for herself. Not for pride. For Isabella.
She won’t just survive. She’ll turn this house into a graveyard before she lets anyone lay a hand on her babies.
“ETA four minutes,” I say. “Tell her she does not move. She does not open that door for anyone except Declan.”
“I’ll tell her,” Enzo says immediately. “What about Lily?”
My grip tightens on the phone so hard the plastic creaks. “She’s in the panic room,” I say, each word like a blade. “That means Lev saw it coming.”
“Fuck,” Enzo breathes.
“Fuck,” I agree. “And if Lev had to trigger that door, then he worked it out before it was too late.”
Silence.
Then Enzo’s voice turns cold. “You, Conan, and Finn go to yours. Declan and the twins to Declans. Romeo is heading into defend Decadence gates.”
The end of the tunnel approaches, the air shifting. It’s cooler, fresher, carrying distant sound.
A muffled pop. Then another.
Gunfire. Sharp and echoing through the stone.
We pause for half a heartbeat, listening.
A deeper boom rolls through the earth, dust raining softly from the ceiling.
An explosion. The tunnel shakes.
Conan grins again, teeth flashing in the dark. “Sounds like the party started without us.”
Declan’s eyes cut to me. “Go.”
I surge forward, every muscle coiled, my heart beating steady and violent in my chest.
The exit hatch is ahead.
Hunter’s voice crackles in my ear through comms. “Breach is live.”
Another burst of gunfire echoes. Screams. Shouting.
Then a second explosion that makes the walls tremble, as if they’re afraid.
We hit the ladder. One by one, we climb, weapons tight, breathing controlled.
I go last, because I’m the one who has to walk out into hell and make it kneel.
I push the hatch.
Cold night air slams into my face.
Smoke. Fire. Chaos.
And when I step out of the tunnel… the world above isn’t a meeting.
It isn’t peace.
It’s war.
Bodies on the ground. Blood in the dirt. Men scrambling. The sound of automatic fire ripping through the night like an anthem.
Lights flashing.
Alarms screaming.
Decadence burning at the edges, flames licking up somewhere far enough away that I can’t see it, but close enough that I can smell it. Looking at the scale of this, there is no way it’s just the Preachers men. This has Tatiana’s help written all over it.
And Madame Eve is trapped in the basement there, not the best way for her to finally go, but at least she suffered.
I raise my gun.
My brothers raise theirs.
And somewhere, through all the noise and ruin, my watch feels like a heartbeat against my skin.
Lily is locked behind steel. Lev is out there. And Maria is about to learn what happens when you touch what’s mine. When you cause pain to my girl. When you mess with our fucking future.
And if anything happens to my baby, Maria is going to wish she never existed.
“Let it burn,” I say again, to no one and everyone.
Then I step forward into the fire.