28. Lee
Lee
Lee
The black site is exactly the kind of place Fuller would pick. Bet Elliot thought the same thing. Boring abandoned warehouse, chain-link fence half-collapsed, security lights flickering. It’s just all gross.
I switch my comms to the private channel.
“ETA?” I ask, keeping my voice low as I crouch behind a rusted-out truck near the fence line.
“Five minutes, Lee. Do not go in without us,” Christian Vega says, his voice tight and full of authority.
“I’m with Zee and Keep. We are ten out. What Christian said, wait for us,” Calum adds. “Seriously, Lee.”
A gunshot crackles through the hazy night, and I lose my mind.
“I’m going.”
The line explodes with cursing. Christian yells something about backup while Calum barks at someone to drive faster. Their voices blur to white noise.
I can’t wait.
I slip through a gap in the fence where the chain-link has been peeled back. Headfirst, I climb through a busted window. Shards of glass crunch faintly below my boots on concrete. My heart hammers so hard I feel it in my teeth, but I keep my finger steady on the trigger.
Elliot is here. I haven’t seen him yet, but I just know when I’m in his vicinity.
Julian is somewhere doing God knows what with the Eligere. And I am done letting other people decide who lives and who dies for me.
Two guards at the inner door stand looking bored.
I take the first one from behind. My bullet goes straight through his head.
The silencer did its job. The second turns just in time to catch my boot to his balls, and then the bullet lands in his belly.
Blood wells up like a geyser as it pours out.
Gross and cool at the same time. I’ll have to tell Cal. I step over them without looking back.
My stomach twists. I recognize this place from Emily’s videos.
I take off running and hit the main floor in a sprint, skidding to a stop behind a stack of rotting pallets. The scene in front of me makes my blood turn to ice.
Elliot is on his knees in the center of the room, wrists zip-tied behind his back, and his face is a mess of blood and bruises.
Fuller stands over him like a king, gun loose at his side, smiling that same dumbass smile I’ve seen before when he wins. Bit premature, old man. You aren’t winning today.
Fuller’s voice echoes off the metal walls. “You really thought you could play me, boy? I know you. I picked you for a reason. I have to say, I’m surprised you let her pussy take over your loyalty.”
“Fuck you,” Elliot spits out.
“Naw, after all I’ve seen that bitch do, I’m going to fuck her. Before I kill her, of course. Maybe after.”
“You being a pervert was unexpected. Guess it fits the bill,” Elliot says with gritted teeth.
“Tracking you and watching you betray me wasn’t that hard. I have the whole FBI behind me, after all. I hacked into the cameras in your apartment. Girl must have some kind of magic pussy.”
Elliot laughs, wet and ragged, blood dripping from his split lip. “She’s coming for you, Fuller. You might have gotten the drop on me, but we both know you’re no match for her. Neither are the men you brought. And when she gets here… she’s gonna finish what I started.”
Aw, my sweet boyfriend. He’s so proud of me, and he hasn’t even seen me yet.
“I was on my last circle for Eligere. She’s fucked everything up. Getting her other boyfriend to sell his soul to the Eligere helped but not enough,” Fuller says to Elliot.
Elliot doesn’t school his face. Guess he wasn’t in on his brother husband’s little stunt then. God, I hope Riley has him by now.
Fuller turns away, checking his phone and loading more weapons into his vest. At least he knows this is going to turn into a war.
I’m so sick of the fucking Eligere. Every time I hear more about them, it’s like their power and crimes just keep growing. Maybe it’s time to stop letting them get away with so much.
Fuller continues his monologue, clearly impressed with himself for all he’s achieved. It will be short-lived. See, that’s funny because he’s not going to live much longer. I can be the funny one when I want to be. Elliot seems to think he’s the only one with a sense of humor.
“I debated offering Leighlan to the Eligere after we lost our skins,” Fuller says, smug. “But someone inside wouldn’t let it pass.”
Val, I bet. Good for her. She’s already fucking their shit up. But skins? Fuck, I didn’t know they were trafficking.
I shift silently along the rotting wood beam, trying to get a better angle. Elliot spots me through the shadows. He smirks.
I blow him a kiss.
Fuller’s voice keeps rolling, satisfied and pleased with himself. He thinks he’s won. But he’s not walking out of here.
Elliot spits blood at his feet. “She’s going to put a bullet in your head before you finish that sentence.”
I don’t wait for Fuller to answer.
Easing out, I scoot just far enough out of the pallets to aim. My arms lock once I raise the gun.
I pull the trigger, but something reaches for me from behind. The force makes the gun swing. The shot is about an inch short when it cracks through the warehouse.
Fuller jerks sideways with a shout as the bullet tears off part of his ear and rips into the side of his face. Blood sprays across his shoulder. For one heartbeat, I think I’ve got him.
Then an arm slams around my throat from behind and yanks me off my feet.
The gun goes wild, the bullet sparking off metal framing from above us before it’s ripped from my grip.
The guard’s forearm crushes against my windpipe, thick and unyielding.
I drive an elbow back into his ribs, but it’s like hitting a wall. He doesn’t even grunt.
Fuller straightens, face twisted with pain and rage. Blood soaks down the side of his face.
“Sorry. I interrupted right in the middle of your villain monologue.” He tilts his head like he’s in shock I’m here. “Oh, should I speak up? Can you hear?”
Bash laughs crackles through the comms. He’s here. The butcher boy will paint this place red. It makes me really happy inside.
“You stupid bitch,” Fuller snarls. He stalks toward Elliot, who’s still on the floor, hands bound. “You’ll die right after your boyfriend.”
I kick back hard at the guard’s shin. He curses but doesn’t loosen his grip.
“One,” Calum’s voice says calmly in my ear.
They are here already, counting the bodies they’re dropping. It gives me some hope.
I just need to hold on a little longer.
A sharp cry echoes from deeper in the warehouse. Fuller’s head snaps toward the sound, panic flashing across his face. He doesn’t aim. He just raises his gun and fires.
The shot is deafening.
Elliot jerks backward and hits the concrete hard. Blood blooms fast across his chest, dark and spreading. His mouth opens, but no sound comes out at first. Then I hear “Lee—” but it's garbled behind the blood that pours out.
I lunge forward without thinking, and my air is cut off when the guard’s arm tightens. My vision tunnels. Everything narrows to the red spreading under Elliot’s body and the way his fingers twitch against the floor like he’s still trying to reach for something.
Fuller wipes blood from his mouth with the back of his hand and smiles through it, teeth stained red.
“Dead man’s switch,” he says, lifting his wrist. A slim black band is strapped there, thumb hovering over a recessed button. “A simple touch and the whole warehouse cooks. Your boyfriend included. So maybe you stop moving before I decide to test it.”
I go still. The guard’s breath is hot against my ear.
Fuller steps closer, barrel still trained on Elliot.
“You cunt,” he spits out and sneers at me. “Jack Vega’s death already cost me everything. They wanted blood for blood. Now I have to kill you all to prove my worth.”
Elliot grunts, and his eyes find mine. He tries to say something I can’t make out. His fingers twitch slightly, and the zip tie slips off his wrist.
My legs go weak. Emily’s face keeps cutting in through everything else. Her laughing in the kitchen, then the last video, and the last hug she gave me, it all plays like a movie in my mind. I can hear her voice like she’s standing right behind me.
Love you, sissy.
I can’t move. The guard’s arm is like an iron weight against my chest. Fuller is still talking, but the words are sliding off me. Elliot is bleeding out because of me. Fuck.
Fuller notices I’m frozen. He sees the crack in my composure. A slow, ugly smile spreads across the half of his face that’s still attached to bone. He lifts the gun again, this time pointing it at Elliot’s head.
“Let’s finish what we started,” he says. “You watch. Then I decide if I make it quick or let you live long enough to regret every choice that brought you here.”
I can’t breathe. Panic claws up my throat so fast it feels like I’m drowning.
A door slams open on the far side of the warehouse. Fuller’s head snaps toward the sound.
Julian steps out from a stack of discarded boxes, gun pointed at Fuller, and fires. The first shot cuts clean across the back of his head, taking off the other half of his skull. He goes limp, falling to the floor.
Elliot launches his body at Fuller, taking him to the ground. I have no idea how he has the strength. A shot goes off. Then another.
“He’s got a bomb,” Elliot grunts, blood dripping from his mouth as he fights for control of Fuller’s wrist. “Kill switch—”
The guard starts dragging me backward, using me as a shield.
Elliot rolls, bloody fingers closing around the slim black band on Fuller’s wrist. He rips it free with a pained snarl.
“Got it,” he rasps.
The guard holding me freezes for half a second in shock.
“Duck, Lee,” Bash says in the comms. I drop my head as low as I can.
A second later, blood splatters hot across my face and hair. The guard’s body jerks once, then his weight drags us both down. The floor knocks the breath out of me. I shove his arm off me and scramble free, chest heaving.
Then it gets really chaotic. The guys are up to fourteen.
“Fifteen. Merry Christmas, Lee. Don’t say I never got you anything,” Riley says. A body plunges from the rafters at my side.
“Sixteen.”
“See, Riley, another missed opportunity. 'Welcome to the party, pal,’ would have really landed right there,” Calum says.
“Damn,” he whispers in the comms.
I stagger to Elliot.
Please be okay. Please be okay.
Knees buckling, I scoot next to him. His eyes are bloodshot. Maroon pulses between my fingers when I press down on his chest trying to slow the bleed.
“Stay with me,” I say. My voice sounds wrong. “Elliot. Look at me.”
Julian is suddenly there, dropping down on Elliot’s other side. His hands move with steady purpose as he checks the wounds, but when his eyes lift to mine, his face is wrecked.
He reaches for me, grabbing my face between his palms. They’re warm and sticky with blood as they run over my head, my neck, my shoulders.
“Where are you bleeding from?”
“It’s not mine.” I cover one of his hands with mine. “Hey. I’m okay, baby. I’m okay.”
A shuddered breath leaves him. For a second, his forehead rests against mine, like he needs the contact to believe it.
Elliot coughs wetly beside us. Julian immediately turns back to him.
“Hold his head up, Ettie.”
I scoot behind Elliot and carefully lift his head into my lap. His left eye is swelling shut. The hole in his shoulder is deep and ugly. Julian has already torn off his belt and cinched it tight around Elliot’s thigh, where a deep gash is still bleeding.
Seeing them both torn up and bleeding because of me makes my eyes sting.
I yank my shirt over my head and ball it up, leaving me in just the bulletproof vest underneath. The cold air hits my skin, but I barely feel it.
“Elliot, stay awake,” Julian says, voice sharp and lethal. “Tell me where you’re hit.”
Elliot mumbles something incoherent.
My eyes cut to Julian. “What happened?”
We killed a lot of people tonight including a high-profile member of the bureau. Prison is most likely in my future. I run through a million ways to try to cover this up. Nothing is going to work.
Julian doesn’t look up from Elliot as he answers. “Val’s got us covered. She’s Eligere now. It’s a long story. Killing Fuller kind of fucked part of the original deal anyway.”
I want to believe this could all just go away, but I doubt that. Elliot’s hurt, and I can’t shake the feeling prison is waiting for me.
Elliot coughs, and one eye opens. He smiles with crimson teeth and says, “And that is how you bring down the FBI.”
“Your blood loss is making you cocky,” I say, pushing his hair off his forehead.
“Nope. My blood runs for you, kid.” He chuckles at his own joke then flinches, and his eyes close.
“Shut up,” I whisper, trying to make air fill my lungs.
Julian’s eyes find mine for a second, and my heart stops.
“Julian, please help him,” I beg. Just then, Riley dumps a medical kit beside him, and Julian immediately starts tearing it open.
“I’ve got you,” he says quietly, voice steady as he works fast. “Both of you.”