66. Kaos
Camilla slips out of my hold and rushes toward the main warehouse before I can get ahold of her, and I have no choice but to follow her.
The panic in her eyes matches what’s beating in my chest, but I refuse to show her that. One of us needs to keep our shit together, and seeing as this is the second time in a week she’s been in a situation like this, I think it has to be me.
Screams and chaos fill the space as people desperately try to find an escape route, but by the look of it, all the exits have been blocked, meaning we’re about to have a hoard of people coming right for us.
I grasp Camilla around the waist and lift her from the ground before turning us back toward the exit. I need to get her out of here. The others will kill me if they find out I let her stay in the midst of this shitshow to look for them, and I don’t want her in that kind of danger. Not again.
Her body flails in my arms as she fights me with everything she has, but lucky for me, my size means she doesn’t get anywhere.
“Kaos, they’re in there!” she screams. “I can’t leave without them.” The agony in her voice tugs at something in my chest that I thought was long dead, but I don’t have time to think about it right now.
I need to get her out, and then I can work out the rest.
“They’ll be okay,” I assure her, even though I’m not certain of that. I’m not certain of anything.
“You don’t know that,” she cries.
I don’t. But that doesn’t change anything.
I reposition her in my arms, holding her tight against my chest bridal style, and move us toward the back exit, but when I push at the door, the handle is immobile.
Fuck.
“Kaos?”
“It’s okay, Princess.” I swallow around the lump in my throat as I carefully place her down. “You stay right there. If you run back into that chaos, you’ll have four very angry boyfriends to deal with.”
She sighs but nods her agreement as I turn my attention back to the door and slam my foot into it as hard as I can manage.
Three more hard kicks, and whatever’s jammed beneath the handle crashes to the ground, and I take Camilla’s hand, tugging her into the cold, dark night.
I look over my shoulder to make sure the door has remained open, but when she stops in her tracks, her hand tightening in mine, my focus is turned back ahead of us.
“You,” she whispers at the same time I see him.
My entire world tilts on its axis, and my breath stutters in my chest.
“Dad?”