Chapter 24 Mercy #2
Troy was fighting three at once, his size and strength overwhelming them, but he was taking hits.
Blood streamed from a cut above his eye and another across his cheek.
He didn't slow. He just kept moving, kept hitting, kept breaking things.
He grabbed one man by the head, slammed it into a marble pillar, and the man crumpled.
Luka's knife flashed in the chandelier light—another man down, clutching at his opened stomach, then another with blood spraying from a severed carotid.
But a fourth caught Luka from behind and got an arm around his throat, cutting off air.
Luka slammed his head backwards and broke the man's nose with a wet crunch, then twisted free.
Ash moved to help, and together they dismantled five men in under thirty seconds, Luka's knife work deliberate and methodical, every cut disabling exactly what it needed to.
Adrian caught one man's punch, redirected it into another man's face, and followed through with a series of strikes that dropped both of them. His expression showed nothing but focus.
Noah had abandoned the gun and was fighting hand-to-hand now, moving with surprising grace for his build, using leverage and technique to drop men twice his weight.
But more kept coming, pouring through the doors.
I spotted one raising a weapon toward Dom, flipped forward with both batons extended, and caught him across the jaw mid-flight. I landed, spun, and drove the batons into his ribs. He went down choking on blood.
A flash grenade detonated. The explosion was deafening—white light, ringing ears, and a disorientation that stripped the room of all reference.
I rolled on instinct and came up with my eyes closed, fighting by sound and sense.
I heard someone coming from the left, and the first baton caught something solid, an arm or a weapon.
The second followed. I heard the impact, heard the grunt of pain, and opened my eyes to see the man falling.
Through the chaos and the smoke, I saw Dom fighting two men, his injured arm hampering him but not stopping him. He caught one with an uppercut that snapped the man's head back hard enough to lift him off his feet. But the second had a baton. It caught Dom across the ribs. He grunted and stumbled.
I moved without thinking. I launched myself off the bannister, flipped over the first man with both batons striking as I passed, landed behind the second, and drove the batons into his kidneys. He collapsed.
Dom looked at me, breathing hard. “I said stay down—”
“And I said forget that—”
We fought back-to-back for a moment, his fists and my batons moving in sync. Three men down in as many seconds.
Viktor had six unconscious bodies around him now and was engaging three more.
His white shirt was splattered red, none of it his.
He moved without pause, caught one man's throat and crushed it, drove an elbow into another's temple, brought his knee into the third man's spine with enough force to end the fight instantly.
Troy had grabbed a fallen weapon and was using it as a club, crushing and breaking with relentless forward momentum. Six men lay at his feet, some moving and some not. He roared and charged into another group.
Luka and Ash had become a single unit of violence, Luka's blade opening arteries while Ash broke limbs. They moved through the attackers like something inevitable, leaving bodies in their wake.
Adrian caught a man's punch, broke his arm at the elbow, and followed through with a palm strike to the nose. The man dropped instantly.
Noah was covered in blood but still fighting. He caught one man in a chokehold, held it until the body went limp, dropped it, and moved to the next.
The fight was turning. The attackers were starting to realise they'd underestimated who they were walking into. Some were already trying to retreat.
I vaulted over a fallen body with both batons spinning and caught two men trying to flank Viktor—first baton to a knee to drop one, second to the other's throat. Both went down.
Then I saw one of Harrow's men standing apart from the main fight, separated and steady, his weapon raised. Not at me.
At Dom.
Dom's back was to him, engaged with two others, completely unaware of the threat behind him.
Time slowed.
I watched the man's finger tighten on the trigger.
I didn't think. I just moved.
I launched myself across the space with the batons already falling from my hands and positioned my body between Dom and the barrel.
The weapon discharged.
The impact was strange—not pain at first, just force. Like someone had punched me in the chest hard enough to steal my breath, hard enough to lift me completely off my feet.
I hit the marble floor and slid.
Then the pain came. White-hot and enormous, spreading from my chest outward like fire finding fuel.
I looked down. Blood spreading across my shirt, below the ribs on the left side. So much blood.
My legs wouldn't respond. My arms felt distant and unreliable. The batons lay somewhere I couldn't reach.
“CAL!” Dom's voice came from somewhere that was both very far away and directly beside me. He dropped down next to me, his hands already pressing. “No, no, no—CAL—”
The fight still raged around us. Troy had the shooter now and was breaking him with methodical patience, working through ribs, arms, legs. Viktor, Luka, and Ash had cleared their sections of the room. The remaining men were retreating, running, finally understanding what they'd walked into.
But I couldn't focus on any of it. All I could see was Dom's face, bloody and terrified.
“Stay with me,” he said, his hands pressing hard, coming away red and soaked. “Noah! NOAH!”
Noah appeared beside us, took one look, and his expression shifted into something professional and urgent. “Damn it. Adrian—we need a medic, now!”
Adrian was already on his phone, his voice clipped and furious.
“Cal. Look at me. Stay awake.” Noah was working fast, ripping fabric away and applying pressure with steady hands. “Talk to me. Stay present.”
I tried. I forced my eyes to focus on something fixed.
The fight was ending. Troy stood over a cluster of bodies, breathing hard and covered in blood and sweat. Viktor, Luka, and Ash had formed a perimeter, ensuring no one got close. Adrian was coordinating with emergency services on the other side of the room.
But I was fading, the darkness pulling at the edges despite Noah's hands and Dom's voice.
“Cal—” Dom's voice was breaking, and there were tears cutting through the blood on his face. “Stay awake. Please. Just hold on—”
I wanted to tell him I was trying. That I didn't want to leave. That these past weeks had been everything I hadn't known I needed.
The words wouldn't come. There was only blood, and pain, and the darkness closing in from every edge at once.
“Dom...” I managed, barely a whisper.
“I'm here. I'm right here.” His forehead pressed against mine. “Help is coming. Just hold on. Please, Cal. Stay. Stay with me.”
His face was the only thing still in focus. Everything else had blurred, darkened, pulled away from me like a tide going out.
I tried to tell him I loved him. That he'd reminded me what living actually felt like. That he was worth fighting for and worth staying for, that I was sorry I hadn't said it sooner, that I was sorry for all of it.
The words drowned in blood and failing breath before any of them reached the air.
The last thing I heard was Dom screaming my name, raw and desperate, the sound of a man watching his world come apart.
Then nothing.
Just silence, and the distant, fading echo of everything I'd fought for, slipping away into the dark.