Chapter 45
LYRA
“Drop it!” Alex screams.
His hand is twisted so tightly in my hair that it takes every bit of my willpower not to cry.
But I keep calm. I don’t want to give him the satisfaction.
The gun is pressed to the side of my head, cold and hard. I can feel a slight tremor in his grip, a perfect blend of fear and adrenaline, along with whatever drugs he’s crammed into his system. His breath is against my ear, fast and shallow.
“I’m not dropping it, Alex,” Julian says. His voice is steady. “Not while you have her.”
“Then I pull the trigger right now, and—”
“Listen to me. Listen.”
Julian takes a step forward. My stomach tightens as soon as he lifts his foot, a gesture that could be all it takes to set off Alex. Strangely, I find myself wondering what it would be like if he did pull the trigger.
Would I feel anything? Or would everything just turn black?
“It’s over,” Julian says. “It’s just us in a warehouse. And you have one decision left to make. You have one final chance to do the right thing.”
“You don’t get to tell me what I’m going to do!” He presses the gun harder into my temple as he shouts, the pain enough to force a cry out of me. Julian hears it, his eyes flashing with anger for a moment before he forces back the calm.
“Alexander.”
“You don’t get to tell me what to do!” Alex shouts again.
“Brother. Listen to me.”
“Don’t call me that. You don’t get to—”
“You don’t want to do this,” I say.
“How the hell would you know what I want?”
“Because I lived with you for two years. I know you. But this person I’m seeing now isn’t the real Alex. This is the scared Alex, the one who knows he’s on the verge of doing something he can’t take back but doesn’t want to.”
I don’t know where the words are coming from. They’re just pouring out. “You’re not a killer. Especially not of pregnant women. That’s not who you are.”
It’s a risk, reminding him that I’m pregnant with his brother’s baby. But I have to take it.
“You don’t know who I am. You never knew me.”
I open my mouth to say more, but Julian arches his brow, silencing me.
“Lyra.”
He doesn’t want me to provoke Alex.
But I have a plan. I need Alex rattled enough that his grip shifts and his attention is diverted for half a second.
“You know what the worst part is?” I keep my eyes on Julian.
“It’s right there in front of you. Your brother, the man you’ve spent your entire life trying to beat.
And in the end, the only way you could think to hurt him was to grab his pregnant girlfriend and use her as a human shield.
Is this how you imagined it? You being reduced to this? ”
His hand is shaking, but he doesn’t say anything.
“There’s a word for the way you’re acting right now, Alex. Do you know what that word is?”
“Shut up.”
“Pathetic. What you’re doing right now is pathetic. And you know it.”
“Shut up!”
He takes several deep breaths through his nostrils.
Then he pulls my hair even harder.
“You bitch!”
It hurts, but I don’t react.
Then his grip shifts, just as I’d hoped. The gun slides from my temple.
I look at Julian, making sure he sees it. He does.
Years ago, I took a self-defense course in the basement of a rec center. It was taught by a retired cop named Marcus, who spent two evenings a week showing college girls what to do if they were grabbed.
At the time, I thought it was a little silly. But in Alex’s grip, time slows a little, and Marcus’s words come back.
If someone’s got you by the hair, don’t fight it. Drop. All your weight, all at once. Turn yourself into an anchor slamming down onto the ground. The grip will follow you down and change the angle, giving you half a second to break free.
Half a second is all I need.
I drop.
Just like I’d hoped, Alex’s hand goes down with me, forcing his torso to follow.
Then I hear him grunt in surprise as he loses his leverage.
The gun fires.
It’s close to my right ear, and it’s like a hot spike through my skull. A chip of concrete explodes off the floor near my left foot, and something stings my cheek. My vision blurs for a moment.
When it clears, the first thing I see is Julian.
I’ve never seen anyone move so fast. It’s a detonation of speed and power, Julian’s massive body flying toward us, he and Alex vanishing in the blink of an eye.
He hits Alex at full speed.
The impact is incredible. He’s driven backwards away from me; the pistol ripped from his hand by the power of the collision. The two of them crash onto the concrete floor in a tangle of limbs.
Free from Alex’s grasp, I land hard on my side. My shoulder takes the brunt of it, my temple scraping against the floor. For a moment, the only thing I hear is the ringing in my ears and the ragged sound of my own breathing.
“Ju—Julian.” My voice is barely above a whisper. There’s no way he heard me.
I roll over, pain flashing through my body. I force myself to look in their direction.
Julian is on top of Alex, pinning him down with one knee on the center of his chest. Julian’s weapon is on the floor out of reach. He’s made the decision that what happens next needs to happen with his bare hands.
“Julian, wait,” Alex’s voice is shredded with panic. “Wait! I’m your brother—”
The first punch breaks Alex’s nose. I can hear it, the crack of cartilage giving way. Alex responds with a feral sound of suffering.
Julians grab Alex by the collar, pulling him up a bit off the floor.
“You were my brother,” Julian says, “but you stopped being my brother the second you pulled a gun on her.”
“Julian, please—”
The second punch lands on his cheekbone, splitting the skin. Blood sprays against the concrete in a dark arc.
“Please—”
Julian pulls him up again. “Every word you used against her, every insult, every time you told her she wasn’t enough… I’m going to make sure you never speak again long enough to say any of it to anyone else.”
The third punch lands.
I hear a noise I know I won’t forget for the rest of my life, a horrible sound somewhere between a crack and a tear.
It’s the sound of a jawbone breaking.
A strange skittering noise follows. I’m confused what it is at first, but then I spot them a few feet away—two teeth, stained with blood. I gasp.
Julian could kill Alex with his bare hands.
I can sense his hesitation as he weighs the pros and cons.
Alex goes silent, his eyes wild and fearful, his chest rising and falling in ragged breaths.
With the damage Julian has done to his face, I don’t think he could speak even if he wanted to.
He coughs, a bit of blood spraying onto his chin and shirt.
Julian stops hitting him. His breaths are full, even, and steady, his knuckles red, raw, and already swelling. Alex’s blood covers the front of his shirt. He stays there, straddling his brother on the concrete, leaning down until his face is inches from Alex’s ruined one.
When he speaks, it’s so quiet that I almost can’t hear what he says.
“You touched what’s mine.”
He stays there for another second, as if letting Alex soak in the words and the pain. Then he lowers Alex down, the punishment over. He stands and walks to where his gun still lays on the ground. He picks it up. Then he looks at Alex with an expression of disappointment.
I find myself wondering what’s on his mind. Is he angry? Vengeful? Or is he wishing things had turned out differently, that Alex and he could just be brothers again?
I don’t have long to ponder it.
“Take him,” Julian says. “Keep him alive. I want him alive.”
Two of Julian’s lieutenants close in and haul Alex up by the arms. He groans as they drag him toward the warehouse doors, his feet scraping limply on the concrete.
I turn to see Sophia crying, her body shaking with big, heaving sobs.
“Her, too,” Julian says.
Yang nods to two of his men and they dutifully hurry to Sophia, easing her off the ground and to her feet.
She turns to me. “Lyra, please.” She reaches her hands out toward me. “I didn’t… I didn’t know things would… please, Ly, you have to tell them.”
I don’t say a word.
“Ly, please. We were friends, best friends! Please!”
Julian nods to the men holding her. “Get her out of my sight.”
She wails and cries as the men lead her out of the warehouse. I can tell by her sobs that she knows it’s over, that whatever happens next will be a punishment that she’s earned, and one that there’s no escaping from.
I watch her disappear through the doors. I will not give her the forgiveness or mercy that she’s begging for. The sight of her grabbing that pistol off the ground, pointing it at Julian and firing—whatever sympathy I might’ve had for her—ended when she made that decision.
The warehouse doors close, cutting her sobs off.
My gaze lands on Yang. He stands in the center of the space, glancing around as if surveying the carnage. He looks tired. He meets Julian’s eyes across the room and nods.
Julian nods back, then turns, approaching me with optimistic caution.
He drops to his knees in front of me. His bloody hands—the same hands that beat Alex to within an inch of his life—come up to my face with contrasting tenderness to the violence I just witnessed.
His thumbs trace my jaw and my cheekbone, lingering on a small stinging cut across my cheek where a chip of concrete hit me when the bullet ricocheted.
“Let me look at you,” he says. “Let me… are you hurt?”
“No. I’m okay.”
Amazing after surviving a car crash, a kidnapping, and a gunfight.
“Your head. You hit your head when you fell.”
“Julian, I’m okay. I promise.”
His gaze flicks down to my stomach.
“And the baby?”
“I don’t know. I think so. I hope so.”
He closes his eyes and presses his forehead to mine.
“I’m so sorry,” he whispers. “I’m so sorry, Lyra. I should’ve been faster, I should’ve gotten to you sooner. I’m so sorry.”
“Julian, look at me. You came. That’s what matters. You came for me.”
“I will always come for you.”
He pulls a knife from his pocket and cuts off the zip ties. The blood rushes back into my hands as his arms wrap around me and I fall into him.
He pulls me tight to his chest and tears form in my eyes.
I breathe him in, his scent, his warmth, grounding me in every way that I need.
Yang approaches us. He dips his head in my direction—a polite, formal gesture.
"Ms. Thibodeaux, I'm glad you're safe."
"Thank you, Mr. Yang."
"And the child?"
"I don't know yet."
"My people have a helicopter standing by to transport you to the hospital."
"Thank you," Julian says, his voice cracking slightly with emotion.
Yang nods knowingly. "It is mutual, Mr. Volkov. Be well."
Julian's arms tighten around me once more, then he helps me to my feet. I lean into him.
"Come on," he says softly against my temple. "Let's get you out of here."