34. Chapter 34
Chapter thirty-four
JUDE GRAVES
Erik’s body hits the concrete like dead weight just before I step inside the basement, blood smearing beneath him as he slides across the floor.
The metallic scent of it floods the air.
My gaze locks onto the girls chained against the far wall, moving over them as I catalog every visible injury on Emma before I even fully breathe again.
Her face is flushed, one side of her jaw beginning to redden beneath the fluorescent lights, and there are faint marks blooming along her throat that make something murderous twist deep in my chest. But she’s alive, looking at me like she thought she might never see me again. My sweet girl.
Behind me, Micah and Nico rush past without hesitation, already beside the cuffs with Erik’s keys clenched tight in Nico’s bloodstained hand. The chains rattle sharply as they work to unlock them.
Emma stares at me with relief and wonder, and I can’t help the smile that pulls at my mouth.
Thank fuck she’s okay.
The relief barely settles before my attention shifts toward Adriana, and the memory of Erik’s words slams back into me from when I embedded that knife in his side upstairs.
I got her, motherfucker. And they’ll get your girl, too.
“Kill him,” I say quietly, my eyes locking on hers.
For a second, Adriana just stares at me like she doesn’t fully understand what I’ve said.
Then something inside her finally gives.
She lunges forward, straddling Erik’s barely conscious body as her fingers wrap around the knife still buried in his side.
Blood spills across her hands when she wrenches it free. Then she drives it back into him.
Again.
Again.
And again.
Her screams echo off the concrete walls while she stabs him over and over, her entire body shaking with every downward strike. Blood splashes across her arms and chest, but she doesn’t stop. Erik barely manages a sound before the knife sinks into him again.
No one moves to pull her away. No one even fucking tries.
I let it happen exactly as long as it needs to before my attention lifts toward Alexei.
For a moment, the rest of the room fades, and it’s just the two of us staring at each other across the basement like this was always where our story was going to end.
His expression isn’t calm anymore. The composure he wears like insufferable armor has cracked enough for me to finally see what’s underneath it.
His eyes keep sweeping over me in disbelief, taking in the blood on my clothes, the knife at my belt, the fact that I’m standing here at all.
“How?” he demands sharply.
A menacing laugh sounds behind me.
Rafe steps into the room with blood streaked across his hands and jaw, his icy eyes cold enough to freeze the fucking air. He looks less human like this. More like death finally arriving to collect what it’s owed.
“Your men,” he says casually, “weren’t nearly as protected at the gate as you thought. You forgot who I am, Morozov.”
Alexei’s jaw tightens, his gaze darting to the small metal table where he must have set his gun down. Within the next second, he’s lunging for it.
And then Rafe moves.
The dagger leaves his hand with brutal precision, cutting through the air before burying itself straight through Alexei’s hand.
A sharp shriek rips from him, but I’m already moving before the sound can even echo.
I cross the room in seconds and slam him back against the wall hard enough to rattle the chains bolted behind him.
My hand fists in the front of his shirt while my forearm crushes against his throat, pinning him there as fury tears through me so fast it almost feels euphoric.
And then I laugh. I can’t fucking stop it. The wild sound rips out of me, so unhinged that even I barely recognize it as mine. Alexei hears it too. I see the moment it unsettles him.
Rafe swipes Alexei’s gun off the table, standing just behind me in case I need him.
“You made this,” I tell Alexei, leaning close enough that he has no choice but to look directly at what he created. “Don’t act surprised that your fucking weapon finally turned on you, bitch.”
For the first time since I’ve known him, his composure slips visibly. His breathing turns shallow, and his pulse jumps hard beneath my arm.
Then he speaks.
“Подчиняться.”
The word hits me like a blade sliding straight into my fucking spine. My entire body jerks instinctively, the conditioning slamming into place before my brain can catch up. It only lasts half a second, but half a second is enough.
His fist crashes into my jaw. Pain explodes across my face as my head snaps sideways, blood flooding my mouth instantly while I stagger back a step.
“Убийство,” he presses quickly, voice sharper now as he points toward Emma. “Подчиняться!”
The entire room fucking tilts.
Something fractures open inside my head, and suddenly the monster he built starts clawing its way forward again, dragging instinct over reason until everything sharpens into command and target and obedience.
Kill. Obey.
My breathing changes, and my vision narrows. Before I can stop myself, my hand closes around Emma’s throat. I force her backward a step as my grip tightens, the command locking into my muscles so deeply it feels carved into bone.
The room goes dead silent.
“Jude—” Her voice breaks around my name as her hands grab at my wrists, trying to reach me through whatever the fuck this is. “Jude, look at me.”
“Убийство,” he bellows. “Подчиняться.”
I can’t.
I can’t fucking—
“Stop,” she gasps desperately, nails digging into my skin. “Please, stop.”
“Back off,” Rafe snaps, his own command clicking into place.
Darkness crowds the edges of my vision until all I can feel is the pulse fluttering wildly beneath my fingers and the sound of her breathing turning panicked. But her eyes stay locked on mine. And they aren’t afraid of me. That realization cuts through the conditioning like a fucking gunshot.
“Back off!” Rafe’s command is louder.
The sound of it shatters something open inside me, ripping straight through the conditioning, through the violence, through every goddamn piece of Alexei’s programming trying to drag me under.
I see her. She’s not a target. She’s Emma.
My Emma.
My grip falters before I rip my hands away from her. A fierce, strangled sound tears out of me as I stagger backward, dragging both hands through my hair while panic crashes into me all at once.
“No,” I breathe shakily. “No, you motherfucker.”
Then I turn back toward him. And this time, there’s no hesitation left in me at all.
I hit him hard enough to snap his head back against the wall, my fist slamming into his jaw once, twice, again, each impact splitting skin and spilling blood across my knuckles until something cracks beneath my hand.
“You don’t fucking own me anymore,” I snarl, grabbing him by the front of his shirt and dragging him toward the chains. “You don’t get to use me against the people I love.”
He tries to speak again, probably another fucking command, but I don’t give him the chance.
The cuffs snap shut around his wrists with a sharp metallic click, the chains jerking tight as I shove him hard into the wall. And for the first time since I’ve known the monster, Alexei Morozov is restrained.
Emma reaches me before I can even fully turn around, her hands grabbing onto me like I didn’t just hurt her, and I pull her against my chest, my entire body shaking as I bury my face against her hair.
“I’ll never let you go again,” I whisper hoarsely. “I’ll never forget you.”
Across the room, Rafe has Adela in his arms, one bloodstained hand cupping the back of her head while he kisses her like he was moments away from losing his fucking mind without her.
Which he was. Nearby, Heather is crying against Micah’s chest while he holds her tightly with one arm, his gun still raised in the other as his eyes remain fixed on the room around us.
“Kieran and Nico are upstairs,” Rafe says roughly as he pulls back just enough to look at Adela. “They’re watching the perimeter.”
Emma’s fingers tighten in the fabric of my shirt as she looks up at me. “Vlad is coming,” she says quickly, fear threading through her voice now. “He’s on his way.”
The words barely settle before shouting erupts overhead.
“Rafe!”
Rafe’s head snaps upward immediately. “What, Kieran?”
Footsteps thunder across the floor above us before Nico’s voice cuts through the house with urgency. “Multiple SUVs pulling up now!”