58. Trigger
TRIGGER
Hersh moved before anyone could stop him.
One second he stood beside Flick?—
the next he was storming toward the shattered barn entrance like death itself.
“Hersh!” Flick cried.
Too late.
Gunfire exploded instantly.
The Hollow Men opened up from outside the barn.
But Hersh was already moving through it.
Fast.
Precise.
Terrifying.
He fired twice into the storm.
Two bodies dropped near the fence line.
Another mercenary swung around the side of the barn?—
Hersh caught him with a brutal elbow to the throat before snapping the man’s rifle away and putting a bullet straight through his chest.
Pure rage.
Years of it.
Shepherd had finally unleashed the wrong monster.
“MOVE!” Rook barked.
Shadow Division surged forward immediately.
Wolf and Trigger poured fire through the breach while operators pushed out both sides of the barn under cover of darkness and rain.
The Hollow Men scattered into tactical positions instantly.
Red laser sights danced wildly through the storm.
Thunder cracked overhead.
Mud exploded around my boots as bullets ripped across the ranch.
I grabbed Flick hard, dragging her behind an overturned tractor tire near the stall entrance.
“Stay down!”
But her eyes never left Blaze.
Neither did mine.
Because Jesus Christ?—
the man looked unstoppable.
One Hollow Man rushed him near the horse corrals.
Bad mistake.
Hersh slammed him into the fence hard enough to break wood, ripped the knife from the man’s vest, and drove it clean between his ribs without slowing down.
Another came from the right?—
Hersh fired from the hip.
Dropped him instantly.
No hesitation.
No mercy.
Outside the loudspeaker crackled again.
“Shepherd to all units,” the calm voice ordered. “Kill McDougal first.”
Huge mistake.
Because the second those words echoed across the ranch?—
Hersh smiled.
Not normal.
Not sane.
The kind of smile that belonged on battlefields and nightmares.
Wolf saw it too.
“Oh hell,” he muttered almost admiringly.
Trigger grinned viciously from behind cover.
“Shepherd really should’ve kept his mouth shut.”
Another explosion rocked the side of the barn.
Flames burst upward near one of the convoy SUVs.
Rain hissed against the fire.
Rook moved through the chaos with frightening calm, firing controlled bursts while shouting orders into his comm.
“South side flank now!”
Two Shadow Division operators vanished into the darkness immediately.
The Hollow Men were getting pushed back.
For the first time since arriving?—
they were losing ground.
And Shepherd knew it.
The loudspeaker clicked again.
“Fall back to perimeter positions.”
The surviving Hollow Men started retreating toward the tree line with military precision.
Covering each other.
Disciplined.
Fast.
Cowards running.
Hersh saw it too.
And took off after them.
“Hersh, no!” Flick screamed.
But he was already disappearing into the rain.
Straight into the darkness.
Straight after Shepherd.
Rook cursed violently.
“Blaze!”
No response.
Only thunder.
And gunfire deeper in the trees now.
Flick shoved away from me instantly.
“I’m going after him.”
I grabbed her arm.
“Absolutely not.”
“He’s going to get himself killed!”
Yeah.
Probably.
Because whatever happened in that canyon fifteen years ago?
Hersh wasn’t chasing Shepherd anymore.
He was chasing ghosts.
Then suddenly?—
a single gunshot echoed through the valley.
Everything stopped.
Even the storm somehow felt quieter after it.
Cold settled in my chest instantly.
Because the gunshot came from the trees.
Exactly where Hersh disappeared.