Chapter 38
LUCAS
Icame through the doorway with my pistol raised, my heartbeat steady despite the adrenaline flooding my veins.
The scene registered in fragments—Lexi against the wall, blood on her shoulder, terror and fury blazing in her eyes.
And him. Hank Singleton. The fake aviator.
Gun pressed to her chest like he'd already won.
"Drop it!" I barked, my voice cutting through the chaos.
Hank's head snapped toward me, his eyes going wide. For a split second, he froze—caught between fight and flight, his brain trying to calculate his odds.
They weren't good.
"Put it down, Hank," I said, my tone dropping lower, colder. "It's over."
His face went pale, confusion mixing with fear. "How do you—"
"Hank Singleton," I said, taking a step forward. "Fake aviator. Likes the ol’ slight of hand over your drink trick. Friend to three losers who are probably just now waking up in a jail cell with piss-stained pants and broken faces."
That got him. His jaw clenched, the gun wavering slightly in his grip. "You don't know who you're messing with," he spat.
I almost laughed. "Why don't you tell me?"
I took another step, slow and deliberate, watching him mirror the movement—inching backward, away from Lexi. Perfect. Every step he took was one step closer to nowhere.
My eyes flicked to Lexi for half a second. Blood streaked down her arm, her shoulder torn where a bullet had grazed her. But she was standing. Alert. Her eyes met mine, and I gave her the smallest nod.
Everything's going to be okay.
"Look at me!" Hank screamed, his voice cracking with crazy. "I said look at me!"
I did. And that's when I started to understand.
"Let me guess," I said, my voice calm, almost conversational.
"Good looks only got you so far, right? Pretty face, decent build, but no substance.
Then someone came along and offered you a way to matter.
To be seen. They wanted you to harass Lexi Montgomery, and you jumped all over it. For what—attention? A shot at fame?"
His face twisted, anger and something darker bubbling to the surface. Then he smiled. It was the kind of smile that made my trigger finger itch. But I wasn’t ready to blow his head off in front of Lexi.
"You think you're so smart," he said, his voice dripping with venom. "But you don't know shit."
"Enlighten me."
He laughed—a sharp, manic sound that echoed off the walls. "It was Hannah Montgomery who hired me," he said, the words landing like a bomb. "Your precious Lexi's perfect little sister. She's the one who wanted this. She's the one who set it all up."
My eyes cut to Lexi. Her face went even paler, but she didn't deny it. She nodded, just once, confirmation settling like a stone in my gut.
Hannah.
The pieces clicked into place—the attack at her house, the phone call Lexi had overheard, the way Hannah had been on edge. She'd been pulled into this, or maybe she'd pulled herself in. Either way, she was tangled up in it, and now she was in a hospital bed fighting for her life.
I forced my focus back to Hank. "You're right," I said. "I didn't know that. But it doesn't change anything. No one's been seriously hurt yet. You walk away now, cooperate, and there's a chance you don't spend the rest of your life in a cell."
"Hurt?" He laughed again, louder this time, his voice rising into a shriek. "You think I care about that? You think any of this matters?"
He took a step back, his body vibrating with rage. I tracked his position, noting the angle, the distance, the way his hand shook on the gun. He was spiraling, losing control.
"I've got friends!" he screamed. "Friends in high places! They'll get me out of this. Lexi and all you fucking Danes can go fuck yourselves!"
He kept going, the words tumbling out in a torrent—threats, delusions, grandiose claims that he was untouchable. He really believed it. He thought someone was going to swoop in and save him, like this was some movie where the villain gets rescued in the final act.
That gave me pause.
"Who?" I asked, my voice cutting through his rant. "Who do you think is going to save you?"
His eyes went wild, pupils blown wide. "Someone bigger than you," he spat. "Bigger than Miss Hotshot over there. Bigger than the fucking Danes. You're all small-time compared to them. They know everything about you, Lucas Dane."
My blood went cold.
Not because I was scared. Because I believed him.
Whoever had set this in motion, whoever had pulled the strings—they weren't some low-level stalker with a grudge. They were organized. Connected. And they were still out there.
"Fuck this," I muttered under my breath.
I took another step forward. Hank's eyes snapped to me, his gun steadying in my direction. "Stop!" he screamed. "I swear to God, I'll—"
But he took another step back. Reflex. Fear. He couldn't help himself.
He opened his mouth to say something else—another threat, another empty boast—but he never got the chance.
The sound came first. A sharp clink of breaking glass, so faint I almost missed it.
Then Hank's head exploded.
Blood and brain matter sprayed across the wall behind him, a grotesque abstract painting that would haunt this room forever. His body crumpled, knees buckling, the gun slipping from his fingers as he hit the floor in a heap.
For a second, the world was silent.
Then instinct kicked in. I moved toward him, my pistol back in its holster. I didn't need to check for a pulse—half his skull was missing—but I kicked the gun away from his twitching hand, anyway. Never leave an enemy, even a dead one, with a weapon. Old habits.
"Lucas?"
Lexi's voice was small, shaky, but not gone. I turned to her. She was staring at Hank's body, her hand pressed to her mouth, eyes wide with shock. But she wasn't catatonic. She was present, processing, surviving.
"Noah," I said, nodding toward the shattered window across the room. "He’s a good shot."
Her gaze followed mine to the window, then back to the body. "He's dead."
"Yeah."
She pointed at him, her hand trembling. "His head—there's so much—"
"Don't look," I said, stepping toward her. "Just look at me."
Her eyes met mine, and I saw it—the terror, the relief, the disbelief that she was still standing. I pulled her into my arms. She collapsed against me, her body shaking, the handcuffs still binding her wrists pressing cold against my chest.
"You're okay," I murmured into her hair. "You're safe."
"He was going to kill me," she whispered.
"I know. But he didn't."
I pulled back just enough to look at her, my hands framing her face. Blood smeared her cheek—his or hers, I couldn't tell. "Let's get these off you."
I pulled my pick set from my pocket, working the cuffs open with practiced efficiency. They fell away with a metallic clatter, and she rubbed her wrists, wincing.
"Your shoulder," I said, my eyes dropping to the wound. It was a graze, clean but angry, blood soaking through her shirt.
"It's fine," she said, though her voice wavered.
"We'll get you looked at."
She nodded, but her gaze drifted back to Hank's body. "I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about Hannah. I wasn’t sure this morning . . ."
"It’s okay."
"Lucas, I don't—" Her voice cracked. "I don't understand. Why would she do this?"
"I don't know," I admitted. "But we'll figure it out."
Sirens wailed in the distance, growing louder. Footsteps pounded down the hallway—security, cops, medics, the whole cavalry finally catching up. But I didn't move. I just held her, my mind racing.
Hank's words echoed in my head. Someone bigger than you. Bigger than the Danes.
The ghost that had been haunting Dominion Hall. The one pulling strings, testing boundaries, leaving cryptic notes and escalating threats. Hank had thought he was untouchable because of them. And now Hank was dead—taken out by Noah's rifle before he could hurt the woman I loved.
I looked down at Lexi, her face pale but resolute, and felt something harden in my chest. This wasn't over. Not by a long shot.
But one thing was clear: I wasn't letting her out of my sight again.
"Come on," I said, guiding her toward the door. "Let's get you out of here."
She nodded, leaning into me as we stepped over Hank's body and into the hallway.
The chaos hit us like a wave—cops shouting orders, medics rushing past, Franklin yelling into his phone.
But I tuned it all out, my focus narrowing to Lexi and the sneaking suspicion that whoever Hank had been talking about was the same ghost that had been haunting Dominion Hall.
And they weren't done with us yet.