Chapter 13
CASSIAN
I step out of the elevator into the tower.
The silence hits me first. It’s dead. The storm is raging outside, vibrating the glass walls, but inside, the air is stagnant. It feels like a tomb.
“Iris?”
She doesn’t answer.
I walk into the living room. My footsteps echo on the dark slate.
“Iris!”
The room is empty.
I check the bathroom. Empty. The closet. Empty.
I turn back to the main room, alarm growing. She isn’t hiding. She isn’t here.
The balcony door catches my eye. The latch isn’t seated.
I cross the room and stare at the floor near the threshold. A puddle of rainwater stains the slate, and a razor-thin shard of crystal from my decanter is jammed into the magnetic track. The lock is severed.
Fuck.
She didn't just walk out. She broke out.
I cross the room and shove the glass panel open. The wind slams into me, violent and freezing. Rain lashes my face like buckshot.
I step out onto the stone terrace, grip the railing, and look over the side.
The narrow, grated iron maintenance stairwell is howling under the wind. Going down these stairs in a storm like this is a death wish.
She could’ve fallen. Hell, she most definitely did.
“Varro!” I roar, tapping my comms collar. “Status!”
“Holding the line at the Main Gate,” his voice crackles, breathless. “We pushed them back to the fountain. We’re—”
“The girl is out!” I shout. “She breached the room! Sector 9. North wall!”
“What?” There’s a pause as keys clack furiously. “Scanning... Fuck. I have a heat signature on the service road. She’s moving fast.”
She’s alive.
Relief floods through me.
The service road. She’s alive and hasn’t gotten far.
“Is it clear?” I demand.
“Negative,” he says. “She crossed the perimeter line.”
“The convoy,” I say. “Are they moving?”
“One of the SUVs just went active,” he says. “Black Chevy. It’s moving to intercept her. It’s a trap, Cassian. They waited for her to come out.”
She isn’t running to freedom. She’s running straight into the kill box.
“They’ll have her in thirty seconds,” he warns. “You can’t get there. Stick to the protocol. Secure the house.”
“Fuck the protocol.”
I spin around and sprint.
I run for the private elevator in the west wing—the direct line to the garage—and smash the button. The doors slide open instantly.
I step in. “Garage level. Override speed.”
The car drops. I map the road in my head. The curve. The impact point.
The doors open on the lower level. My armored G-Wagon is waiting—four tons of matte black steel and bulletproof glass. Tonight, I need a battering ram.
I slide into the driver’s seat and hit the ignition, waking the V8 into a roar that shakes the concrete walls. I punch the remote. The heavy garage door begins to rise, but it's moving too slow.
The second it clears the roofline, I dump the gear and floor it. The tires break loose, screaming against the concrete before they bite hard and launch the truck forward. It clears the bottom edge by inches as I hit the wet asphalt, the massive weight of the vehicle fighting for grip.
The tires fight the rain, biting into the pavement. The rear end kicks out, fishtailing violently.
I wrestle the wheel, correcting the slide.
“Guide me!” I shout.
“Target vehicle has stopped,” Varro says. “They have her, Cassian. They’re loading her in. You’re too late.”
“Open the service gate!” I shout. “Clear my path!”
“Cassian, don’t—”
“Open it!”
I keep my foot pinned to the floor. The world blurs into streaks of rain and darkness. I’m doing ninety on a winding driveway designed for twenty. The trees are black blurs, rushing past like ink. The suspension rattles as I hit a dip, the car bottoming out, sparks flying.
I see the turn.
Jabbing the brake, I throw the wheel and the car drifts, sliding sideways across the wet turf, tearing up the manicured lawn. Mud sprays the windows. I correct the skid, punching the gas again. The headlights cut through the dark.
There.
Two hundred yards ahead. A black SUV. It’s turned around, facing the exit. The brake lights are red slits in the rain.
The back door slams shut.
If that car gets past the wall, she’s dead. She’s a loose end, and the Judge sent the scissors.
Not tonight.
The speedometer climbs. 70. 80.
The SUV driver sees me. He flashes his high beams, blinding me, and guns the engine.
This motherfucker thinks he can beat me to the highway.
I aim the reinforced grill of the G-Wagon directly at his front wheel. He yanks the steering wheel to the left, trying to dodge. The SUV’s tires hit the raised earth of the embankment, tilting the truck’s center of gravity.
Perfect.
I brace myself.
Impact in 3... 2...
I slam the brakes. The nose of the truck dips, shifting the four tons of momentum forward.
CRUNCH.
The collision is violent. The G-Wagon's heavy steel acts like a battering ram against the tilting SUV. I hit the vehicle just behind the front tire.
The force launches the SUV into the air. It tips, teetering on two wheels, then crashes to the ground on its side with a deafening, earth-shaking boom. It slides across the wet asphalt, sparks showering the night, before slamming into the stone wall of the perimeter.
My car spins out, the front end crushed. Steam hisses from the radiator in a white cloud. I collide with the embankment.
The airbag deploys, punching me in the face.
Darkness washes over me for a second. Then pain. Sharp and bright.
The seatbelt locks, biting into my shoulder with the force of a sledgehammer. The world spins, a chaotic blur of shattered safety glass and hissing engine coolant. My ears ring with a high-pitched, sustained whine that drowns out the storm outside.
I blink against the stinging dust, forcing my brain to reboot. I’m dazed. I spit blood, clearing my airway. I push the deflating bag aside to kick the door open and stumble out into the rain.
The world is tilting. My nose is broken, but I push the pain down. There isn’t time for it.
The SUV is lying on its passenger side in a crumpled wreck. The engine is still running, a high-pitched whine that sounds like a dying animal.
The driver’s side door, now the top door, pops open. A man climbs out.
Big. Tactical vest. Scarred face. He’s bleeding from a gash on his forehead, but he’s moving fast. He pulls himself up, standing on the side of the wrecked vehicle. He raises a pistol with a long suppressor.
I drop into a crouch, drawing my SIG in one fluid motion. I don’t aim for the chest. He’s wearing armor. Muscle memory takes over.
Double-tap.
Crack. Crack.
The sound is deafening, cutting through the roar of the storm. The first shot takes him in the throat; the second, in the eye. He drops like a puppet with its strings severed. He falls back into the cabin of the truck.
I move forward. Gun up. Scanning. The rain washes the blood from my face.
“Iris!” I scream.
No answer.
There’s movement in the front seat. The passenger. The windshield is shattered. A large hand clad in a black tactical glove reaches out, gripping the frame. A gun barrel follows it.
I fire through the glass.
Pop. Pop. Pop.
Three rounds. Tight grouping. The hand goes limp, and the gun clatters onto the hood.
I climb up the undercarriage, grabbing the roof rack. Inside the cabin, the driver and passenger are both dead, the interior painted red.
I look into the back seat. It’s a tangle of limbs and white airbags.
“Iris!”
She’s suspended in the air by the locked seatbelt, covered in glass, her hands instinctively shielding her face. There’s blood on her forehead. Her eyes are fixed on the dead driver hanging above her, mouth open in a silent scream.
“Iris!”
I reach down, slash the belt with my knife, and catch her as she drops. She flinches, then kicks at me.
“Get off me! Get off me!”
“It’s me!” I shout. “Iris, look at me!”
Her eyes flick to me, fixating on the gun in my hand.
She freezes.
“Cassian?” she whispers.
“Give me your hand.”
She hesitates, trembling, then reaches up. Her fingers are shaking so hard she can barely coordinate the movement. I pull, hauling her out of the wreckage. I lift her clear of the glass and jump down to the asphalt.
She stumbles, but I catch her. She grabs the front of my shirt—my wet, ruined shirt—and holds on.
“They...” she gasps. “They said... my father...”
“They weren’t his men,” I say.
“But they stopped,” she sobs, the words spilling out. “They stopped the car. They smiled.”
I look at her. She’s in shock. She wants to believe the lie because the lie feels safe. The lie means she is loved. The truth means she is prey.
I can’t let her keep the lie. The lie will get her killed next time.
I grab her chin and force her to look at the wreck.
“Look at the car,” I command.
“No,” she whimpers, trying to turn away.
“Look at it!”
I turn her head. The passenger’s arm is hanging limp out of the shattered windshield. His gun, the suppressed VP9, is resting on the crumpled hood.
“Look at the gun,” I say. “Does that look like a rescue weapon?”
She stares at the silencer.
“He pointed it at me,” she whispers. “He pointed it at my ribs.”
“If he was here to save you,” I say, my voice harsh, cutting through the rain, “why did he need a gun to make you get in the car?”
She stares at the dead man, her breathing ragged.
“He was going to take you,” I say. “He was going to drive you to a hole in the ground, chain you to a pipe, and use you to bleed your father dry.”
She crumbles, her legs giving out.
I catch her before she hits the ground. She buries her face in my chest and screams.
I hold her. I wrap my arms around her shivering body, shielding her from the rain, shielding her from the sight of the bodies. She presses her head against my shoulder.
“I’ve got you,” I say. “I’ve got you.”
Varro’s voice cracks through my earpiece. “Cassian! Targets neutral. Perimeter is locked down. We’re scrubbing the road. Do you need a medic?”
“Negative,” I breathe, the adrenaline finally cresting. “Secure the breach. I’m taking her back. Don’t disturb me.”
“Understood.”