Chapter Twenty-Two
Leo De Luca did not believe in signs. He believed in contracts, leverage, and people showing their cards eventually. Signs were for mystics and mediums and Instagram captions.
Still, the fact that his smoothie lid popped off the second he stepped out of the shop felt personal.
“Fantastic,” he muttered, stopping just long enough to reseat the lid and wipe a streak of mango off his thumb. He glanced down at the cup of protein powder, berries, and something aggressively green that claimed to boost brain function. He needed all the help he could get lately.
He lifted his gaze toward the curb and stopped dead.
The space where he’d parked his black Range Rover not five minutes ago was empty.
Leo stood there, smoothie in hand. His brain stalled like an old laptop. The delay was brief but unmistakable, the moment before panic figured out where to land.
“No,” he said flatly. “That’s not funny.”
He turned in a slow circle, scanning the street as if the vehicle might materialize out of sheer audacity. It didn’t. The curb remained stubbornly bare. A minivan idled nearby, and someone laughed across the street. Life, apparently, was continuing as usual.
“Son of a—” He pulled his phone out, already dialing before the panic could fully set in. He didn’t call the police. He called Kayne.
“Hey, Leo,” Kayne answered, voice easy, Cajun warmth threading through the line.
“My car’s gone.”
There was a pause. The warmth vanished.
“Where are you?”
“Smoothie place on Delmar. I was inside for maybe four minutes.”
“I’m on my way. Don’t move.”
Leo let out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. “I’ll try to resist chasing after it on foot.”
“Leo.”
“I’m kidding. Mostly.”
The line went dead.
Leo stayed put, pulse ticking too fast now. He took a cautious sip of his smoothie, eyes constantly moving. He hated that his life now was measuring threats, replaying timelines, and wondering which small, stupid detail he’d missed.
He was halfway through composing a mental list of insurance calls when tires squealed.
Kayne’s SUV slid to a stop at the curb with controlled aggression. Chloe was in the passenger seat, face pinched with worry. Anja climbed out of the back before the engine had fully cut, eyes already sweeping the area.
Relief hit Leo hard and fast.
“Wow,” he said weakly. “You guys travel as a unit now?”
“Yep,” Anja said, already scanning the rooftops. “You okay?”
“Physically? Yes. Emotionally? I’ve just been robbed of my heated leather seats.”
Anja snorted, but her gaze never stopped moving. She reached Leo first, her presence solid. “Did you see anything or notice anyone watching you?”
“No. I was inside. Came out and,” he gestured helplessly at the empty curb, “poof.”
Chloe opened her door, concern etched across her face. “Leo, I’m so sorry.”
“It’s fine,” he said automatically. “It’s just a car.”
Even as the words left his mouth, an inexplicable prickle crept up his spine. That was when the world cracked open.
The sound was sharp, violent, and wrong.
Leo didn’t even register the shot, only the sudden explosion of plastic and fruit as his smoothie disintegrated in his hand. A hot spray hit his sleeve. Could be mango and kale, could be blood. He didn’t feel a hit, but sometimes shock had a way of muting pain.
Something yanked him backward hard enough to knock the breath out of his lungs.
Anja.
She slammed into him, driving them both to the pavement as another crack echoed down the street. People screamed and shouted. Glass shattered somewhere close.
“Down!” Anja barked, one arm locked over his torso, her body covering his without hesitation.
Leo lay stunned beneath her, heart trying to claw its way out of his ribcage. His mind screamed that she shouldn’t be protecting him; he should be the one protecting her.
“Oh, my God,” Chloe gasped from inside the SUV.
He heard another scream, this one higher-pitched and sounding panicked.
“He’s been hit!” a woman cried.
Kayne was already moving.
“Chloe, stay in the vehicle!” His voice cut through the chaos, sharp and absolute. “Do not get out. Please.”
Kayne sprinted toward the sidewalk where a man had gone down, blood blooming through his shirt. He dropped to his knees, hands steady, already applying pressure.
“Call 911!” he shouted. “Tell them we have a gunshot wound, male, conscious but bleeding heavily.”
Leo forced himself upright, Anja’s hand still braced against him.
“I’m okay,” he said hoarsely. “I think.”
She studied his face, quick and clinical, then nodded once. “You’re lucky.”
He looked down at the shredded remains of his smoothie cup scattered across the pavement.
“Yeah,” he said faintly. “That was supposed to be breakfast.”
Sirens wailed in the distance, growing louder.
Leo’s gaze tracked to Kayne, kneeling in a pool of someone else’s blood, calm and focused amid the screaming crowd. To Chloe, pale and shaking but safe inside the vehicle, talking to the emergency dispatcher. To Anja, still crouched beside him, a human shield without a second thought.
His car was gone. Someone had just tried to kill him. And this was no longer a warning shot.
It was an opening move.
#
Anja’s hands didn’t shake.
That was the first thing she noticed once the adrenaline receded enough for her brain to catch up.
They were steady, braced on her knees as she crouched beside the curb, lungs pulling in air that tasted of burned rubber and fear.
Sirens wailed in the distance, closer now, threading through the chaos left behind.
Someone was crying. Someone else was swearing.
The world had slipped half an inch off its axis, and reality itself was still buffering.
But her hands were steady.
She swallowed hard. Anja had worried about this moment more than she’d ever admitted.
The sound of gunfire. That split second where instinct had to outrun memory.
The fear that her body might betray her and lock up, hesitate, and replay the worst day of her life instead of responding to the present one.
The fear that she’d be back there instead of here.
But it hadn’t.
The crack of the shot had hit her ears, and her body had moved before thought even formed. Tackle, cover, and shield. She didn’t freeze or second-guess, didn’t hesitate.
Leo.
Her fear hadn’t been about the gun. It had been about him.
She glanced over at him now. He sat on the curb a few feet away, one knee up, elbow braced on it, trying to look normal in a situation that was anything but.
His face was pale beneath his tan, mouth clenched tight and blue eyes tracking everything at once in that intelligent, lawyerly way of his.
He was trying to regain control through observation, the same way she always did.
Leo was alive and unhurt. Relief slid through her so fast it made her dizzy. Then it left her hollow in its wake.
She hadn’t frozen.
She’d protected him.
Whatever else she was feeling, whatever complicated, inconvenient thing had flared in her heart when she’d slammed into him, could wait. She shoved it into a locked mental drawer and turned the key. Feelings were a liability. She’d learned that lesson the hard way.
Later, Johansen. Deal with it later.
“Ma’am?” a police officer said gently, crouching near her. “I need to get your statement.”
Anja nodded, already switching gears. She was professional and composed.
This was familiar territory, even if the roles had shifted.
She gave them a timeline, positions, angles, the shooter’s likely elevation, and the sound signature.
She spoke clearly and precisely, as if she hadn’t just thrown herself in front of a bullet meant for someone else.
Anja watched the officers exchange looks that said the same thing she was thinking. It was a clean shot, meticulously planned, then the shooter was gone.
They canvassed the area anyway, knocking on doors, pulling store footage, and questioning shaken witnesses. No weapon was recovered. No suspect was detained. Just shell casings and fear and a whole lot of unanswered questions.
Kayne returned once the ambulance pulled away, blood smeared on his hands, eyes dark with fury he was holding on a tight leash. Chloe was still in the vehicle with the door open, arms wrapped around herself, her gaze locked on Leo. Anja thought she needed to keep him in sight to breathe.
Anja crossed to Leo before anyone else could stop her.
“You okay?” she asked quietly.
He looked up at her, something raw flickering behind the usual charm. “I think you saved my life.”
She shrugged, aiming for casual. “That’s my job.”
He didn’t argue.
The police wrapped up what they could at the scene, promises of follow-up already sounding hollow. One officer returned with an update, voice clipped and serious.
“We traced the stolen Range Rover,” he said. “It’s currently parked in a garage around the corner. No visual on the driver yet.”
Anja felt the familiar click in her head as pieces began sliding into place. The shooter hadn’t wanted the car for resale or transport. He’d wanted movement and distraction. Control.
She looked at Leo again, at the man who’d nearly died because someone wanted to watch the ripple effect. The shooter wanted to see who would react, and how fast.
Fear nudged at the edges of her consciousness, quieter now and manageable.
She wasn’t frozen.
She wasn’t broken.
And whatever this thing was, whatever had surged through her when she’d covered him with her own body, it hadn’t slowed her down.
Anja straightened, shoulders back, mind already moving ahead. Trauma didn’t get to decide what she did next.
Later, she’d think about her heart. Right now, she had work to do.
#
Chloe’s hands were still locked around the seat belt when the screaming stopped.
Not because she wanted to be restrained, because Kayne had made sure she was.
“Chloe, stay in the vehicle.”
He said it once in that unyielding tone, and when she instinctively lunged for the door anyway, he’d thrown out, please.