Chapter 48
Seth
Imove before my brain catches up.
I slam into Brooke and drive her sideways just as the shot cracks through the club.
Pain tears across my shoulder as the round grazes through it, but not enough to slow me down. I push through it and keep moving.
The room erupts.
Glass shatters, and someone screams. A man drops, clutching his neck as blood sprays across the marble. The music cuts out mid-beat, and for half a second everything stalls.
Then the panic hits.
Bodies surge in every direction as people shove, trip, and fall. Drinks hit the floor and shatter underfoot while someone disappears beneath the crowd.
I roll, come up fast, and scan.
Jackson is already shifting, trying to adjust his angle.
He doesn't get the chance.
Beau fires from outside, and Jackson’s body snaps back before dropping out of sight as the beam cuts out completely.
Gunfire cracks again, but this time it is sloppy.
One of them fires too fast and misses, the round tearing into a man trying to run. He drops instantly. Another shot follows and hits a woman near the bar, and she collapses before she even understands what happens.
They can't track us.
We are moving too fast.
Brooke drops low and slides under a table just as another shot tears through the space where she had been standing. The table flips from the impact, glasses shattering around her as she comes up on one knee.
I pivot in the opposite direction and cut through the crowd, forcing a bad angle while I bring my weapon up.
A guard moves in from the right, trying to intercept. I fire once. The round hits him clean, and he drops immediately. Another guard pushes forward behind him. I adjust and fire again. He spins and collapses against the bar, taking bottles down with him as they shatter across the counter.
More shots follow from above.
They're rushing now. They're missing.
Brooke rises from behind the table with her gun already up, her eyes locked on the second level. She finds Ava. Brooke fires once, and the shot hits her square in the chest. Ava staggers, shock flashing across her face.
Brooke fires again.
The second round drives her backward over the railing, and her body tips before crashing down onto a glass centerpiece below. The impact shatters it instantly, shards scattering as her body hits the floor and goes still.
Brooke shifts again without hesitation.
Ezra tries to retreat toward the hallway. I see it the same second she does.
She fires first.
The round catches him mid-step, and his body snaps back into the wall before sliding down, leaving a dark smear behind him.
I turn left. Diego is pushing through the crowd, using bodies as cover while trying to disappear. I track him through the movement and fire.
The shot lands clean.
He folds hard and goes down, taking two people with him as he hits the floor.
Another guard comes at me from the side, weapon already raised. I close the distance and fire twice. The first round hits his chest, and the second drops him before he can pull the trigger. A third guard tries to flank from behind.
I turn, catch the motion, and fire without thinking. He goes down mid-step.
Gunfire snaps again from above, wild and uncontrolled. A round tears past my head close enough that I feel the air shift. Another strikes a man behind me, dropping him instantly.
Beau keeps firing from outside, each shot landing with brutal precision. A guard on the stairs drops before he can raise his weapon. Another staggers and collapses, clutching his throat. A third tries to run and does n't make it more than a few steps.
I move through it, ignoring the burn in my shoulder, keeping my focus locked on what matters.
Elliot.
I find him halfway down the stairs. He pauses just long enough to take in the damage, the bodies, and the panic as it spreads through the club.
Then he runs.
He cuts through the VIP hallway, slams into the side door, and disappears into the private garage before I can line up the shot.
“Garage,” Brooke says, breath catching, panic bleeding into fury.
We tear through the hallway. People scatter as the alarms finally catch up to the violence. Red light pulses across the exit, washing everything in flashes of chaos.
We hit the valet ramp just as Elliot comes into view.
He moves fast, cutting through the panic. He reaches his car, yanks the door of his black Lamborghini open, and drops into the driver’s seat.
Then I hear that fucking engine roar to life, echoing through the garage as he slams it into gear and guns it toward the exit.
“Shit,” Brooke breathes. “He’s getting away—”
A valet attendant runs straight into my path, keys clutched in his hand, heading for a sleek black Porsche idling near the front.
I grab him by the front of his jacket and shove him hard into the concrete. He hits with a grunt, the keys slipping from his hand. I snatch the keys to the car, rip the driver’s door open, and drop into the seat.
Brooke is in the passenger side before I can even tell her to move.
I start the engine and floor it. The tires scream as we launch out of the garage, just in time to see Elliot’s Lamborghini explode up the ramp ahead of us.
He clips the front end of a sedan near the curb, sending it spinning into the intersection.
Metal shrieks. Glass bursts across the pavement.
Drivers slam their horns, swerving, panicking as everything falls apart.
“There,” Brooke points. “That’s him.”
The tires bite hard, launching us forward. I weave through the chaos, nearly clipping a car that swerves too late. A light pole goes down behind us with a burst of sparks. People are still running from the club, screaming, shoving each other, trying to survive.
But all I can see is Elliot.
He drives that Lamborghini like he thinks it will save him. He tears through intersections, ignores every light, cuts across oncoming traffic. He forces an SUV into a fire hydrant that explodes upward in a geyser of water. He doesn't look back.
Every time I see his car twist through another red light, my grip on the wheel tightens.
I hate him. The sound of his voice. The smugness in every word. The videos he made. The footage of him torturing his victims. What he did to my girl won't go unpunished. He doesn't get to vanish into the night. He doesn't get an easy exit or a clean death.
He is mine.
Elliot cuts into a side street, buildings closing in. The street narrows. I keep after him, bumper to bumper. Brooke doesn't speak. Her eyes are locked on his car.
Elliot glances back, just once. His eyes meet mine in the rearview.
And he fires.
The shot lights up his car. The bullet cracks through our windshield, spiderwebbing the glass dead center. The cabin fills with the scent of powder and burning plastic. I line up my shot, lean just enough, and fire at his rear tire.
The bullet hits home.
The car jolts violently, skidding sideways in a spray of sparks. Elliot fights the wheel. I see it. The exact second he knows he has lost control.
The Lamborghini slams into a concrete barrier at full speed. The front folds in, steel twisting. The hood crumples. The windshield shatters in a single violent burst. One headlight bursts outward in a spray of debris. Smoke billows from the engine.
I hit the brakes and skid to a stop twenty feet behind him. I step out with my gun raised. I want him to crawl. I want him to beg. I want him to know what it feels like to lose control and choke on it.
Elliot fucking Grant is going to die.
For a moment, all I hear is the ticking of overheated metal and the hiss of smoke curling out from under the hood.
We move fast, weapons raised, eyes locked on the wreck. Elliot’s body hangs halfway over the steering wheel, his tailored blazer soaked with blood. It has poured down his shirt, splattered across the shattered windshield, smeared with the pattern of his face where it slammed forward.
Then the driver’s door flies open.
He collapses out of the car and hits the pavement hard. Blood spills from his mouth and nose in thick, dark streams. He coughs wetly, twists onto his side, and rolls to his knees, hands shaking. His face is cut open, jaw split along one side.
He raises the pistol and fires blindly.
Rounds slam into the side of our car. The windshield fractures again. A headlight explodes with a sharp pop, glass bursting across the street. Brooke drops low, fires back with clean shots. One hits him in the shoulder, spinning him, blood trailing mid-air. He stays upright.
Then he runs.
He limps toward the open street, dragging one leg, leaving a broken trail of blood across the pavement. His other arm dangles, dislocated or worse. He doesn't look back. He just moves.
We jump back into the car. I floor the gas.
The tires scream, and the frame jolts as we launch forward.
He tries to cut through the intersection. He makes it halfway across the crosswalk before I reach him.
The front end of the car smashes into his body with the full force of the engine behind it.
His body snaps backward, limbs whipping out of sync with each other.
His spine folds against the hood. I hear bones break in rapid succession.
His head slams into the windshield. The glass collapses inward, webbing instantly with cracks.
He rolls up and over the top of the car, thuds onto the roof, and bounces off the back, slamming onto the street like a dropped carcass.
I brake hard and skid to a stop. Smoke pours from the front grill. Fluid pools under the car.
Brooke is already moving, hair lashing in the cold air.
I step out and approach what is left of him.
Elliot twitches on the pavement. Blood spills from his mouth in long ropes, his lips peeled back from shattered teeth.
One leg is ruined, bent at angles that shred muscle.
Bone pushes out through one thigh, the skin split and gaping.
His shoulder is caved in. One arm lies folded under his chest. Chunks of flesh are missing from where he skidded across the asphalt.