Chapter 46
Palmer
The pressure behind my eyes was almost unbearable, but I refused to let the tears go. I could not let Amos Anderson see me cry.
I desperately wanted to, though. The smell of smoke hung in the air, and I knew that Roman was here. The monster in front of me was trying to burn him alive.
Amos stood beside me, the tip of his knife lingering near my throat to keep me quiet and placid. Inside, though, flames raged hotter and brighter than the ones he’d orchestrated.
He stared at his phone screen, something he’d been doing since he let the brothers enter the factory. He’d barely paid me any mind since they’d come, intent on his prey through the camera feeds on his phone.
I laid there helplessly, unable to move or struggle.
I stared at the knife pointed at me, within my grasp if I could only reach for it.
Amos held it loose, his attention elsewhere, obviously not seeing me as a threat.
I bit down on my lip so hard I tasted blood.
If he hadn’t tied my wrists to my ankles, I might have had a chance to knock it out of his hands.
A cough escaped me, some of the smoke reaching us even all the way up here.
Anderson’s eyes cut to me at the sudden sound, and I went still; my heart ricocheted off my sternum. He hadn’t touched or hurt me yet, but it was there whenever he looked at me: a lust for blood and death looming like a storm cloud.
This man would kill me. I wasn’t sure why he hadn’t done it already, but once the threat of the Ramsey brothers was gone, he would do it.
Vomit burned at the back of my throat.
Roman.
I couldn’t let anything happen to him. This couldn’t be how things ended.
Anderson’s gaze went back to his phone and something shifted in his expression. A flash of excitement lit up his face. The knife he had pointed at me dropped a little more, his grip laxing in his distracted state as he leaned close to the screen.
I shifted, a movement so minute I’d hoped he wouldn’t notice.
He didn’t seem to.
I thought—maybe, if I used my head or body to collide into him, I could get him to drop the knife.
But then what? I wouldn’t know how to grab it after he dropped it, not with my wrists tied down.
I ran through different ways I might be able to get the knife and cut myself free, but every idea seemed so improbable.
But maybe a long shot was all that I had.
I tilted closer to the edge of the desk, readying myself to do something, when suddenly an earsplitting pop cracked through the building.
The world fell out from under me at the sound.
A gunshot.
Panicked, I looked at Anderson, and he smiled. Smiled.
My entire body went cold. My ears rang. I couldn’t stop imagining Roman—my sweet, grumpy fire chief—bleeding. Hurt.
Without thinking, I gathered all my strength.
Every muscle in my body coiled tight, and then I sprung.
Using my hands and knees, I shoved myself as hard as I could into Amos’s side.
He grunted as I collided into him, and we both tumbled to the filthy floor.
My temple cracked against the hard ground, blurring my vision, but I stayed coherent enough to focus on my task. I searched frantically for the knife.
Amos was already moving, too; adrenaline surged fresh and hot through my veins.
I didn’t have much movement—not with the ropes still constricting me—but I didn’t have to reach far.
I caught a glimpse of the blade mere inches from my fingertips.
I didn’t stop to think, didn’t give myself a second for relief or victory.
My fingers wrapped around the handle just as Amos rolled back toward me, cursing viciously.
I barely heard the vulgar things he called me as he lunged, and I thrusted the blade up. He made a small noise of surprise and attempted to dodge, but he wasn’t fast enough. The blade sank into his side. I had been aiming for his gut, but at least I’d hit him.
There was a suspended moment where neither of us moved, both staring at the knife buried in Amos’s side. Then a blinding pain erupted across the side of my face as he punched me, making me let go of the weapon.
“You fucking whore!” he seethed.
I collapsed backward, blinking hard as the throbbing pain exploded in my cheekbone. Dizziness washed over me, but I was vaguely aware of Amos muttering and panting.
A high, shrill beeping noise cut through my stunned haze.
I forced myself to focus through the pain.
The knife was still in Amos’s side; he had one hand steadying the hilt while the other fumbled for his phone that had landed on the floor.
It was the phone making the noise. Amos snatched it up and stared at the screen.
He went paler. Sweat glistened on his brow.
Something shifted in him. I wasn’t sure whether it was the knife inside him or whatever he saw on his phone, but he cursed again.
His head snapped up toward the dirty windows along the back wall, his eyes blowing wide. For a second, I wasn’t sure whether I was hallucinating as black-clothed figures moved outside them. They were like shadows, and I frowned, trying to make sense of what was going on.
A hand grabbed me by the hair, yanking hard. Sharp pain burst over my scalp.
I cried out as Amos dragged me toward him, crashing me against his chest. There was a glint of something—another knife?
Or maybe it was the same one. Everything moved so fast I could barely see.
The rope connecting my wrists and ankles was cut, and Amos yanked me to my feet just as the back windows exploded.
Glass shattered, sparkling shards raining down inside the office.
Men in black tactical gear ran through the windows, but Amos was already pulling me back toward the door, holding a knife to my neck. A bloody knife. So it was the same one.
He used my body as a shield, backing us out of the office onto the metal catwalk outside of it. Heat from the flames eating their way through the dilapidated factory pressed in on us. I choked on the smoke, squinting at the men in black advancing on us.
My heart soared as my mind finally caught up.
The security team. August’s security team.
How had they gotten here?
They had guns trained in our direction, but it barely fazed me. They were here to help.
Amos kept moving, dragging me farther out onto the catwalk. The knife dug into my skin, right under my jaw.
“It’s over, Anderson.”
I knew that calm voice in my very bones. Could identify it in my sleep. Relief crashed through me so fiercely that my legs would’ve buckled if Amos hadn’t locked his arm around my waist, using my body as a shield.
My head snapped to the right, and there he was. Roman stood on the catwalk, Fox and Graham behind him, blocking the stairs down to the first level. Amos muttered profanities in my ear and started to edge us away from Roman, but then he stopped.
“You’re surrounded, Amos,” another voice said.
I turned my head to find August on the other side of the narrow walkway, gun raised and aimed right at the man holding me hostage.
Amos stilled. I could feel his chest rising and falling at my back—I felt something else too, warm and wet soaking into my shirt beneath his grip. Blood. He had to be bleeding from where I’d stabbed him.
Amos pulled me tighter to his chest, dug the knife in harder against my throat.
I hissed at the sting of the blade. Amos backed us up as the security team advanced from the office in front of us.
We retreated until the railing of the catwalk stopped us.
At the edges of my vision, I saw flames starting to encroach on the rusted machinery below.
“Stay back,” Amos commanded. His voice was surprisingly steady, but the hand holding the knife began to shake.
“Let her go!” Roman snapped.
His face was a mask of rage, but I was relieved. Roman was alive.
Amos’s breathing turned rapid, his breath hot and ragged in my ear. He was so close, there wasn’t any space between us. Everyone around us inched forward, closing in from all sides. He pressed harder against the railing, but there was nowhere to go but fall into the pit of burning machines below.
“You can’t win,” August said, his voice low and certain.
Amos growled under his breath like a rabid animal.
August was closer now, gun trained on Amos.
“I will always win,” Amos spat. “It doesn’t matter what happens to me. I will always haunt your dreams. I will always be a thought in the back of your little wife’s mind. I will live forever that way.”
August’s lips curled, disgust and hatred twisting his expression.
“You think too much of yourself,” he said, his voice somehow calm.
“If you don’t let her go, you will die today and you will rot in the ground.
You will be nothing, just like you were nothing to begin with,” August sneered.
“After this night, we will never think of you again, except maybe to reminisce about how your body is being eaten by worms and crumbling into dust.”
Amos tensed; his breathing hitched. “Liar,” he spat. “You will fear me.”
August laughed—a short, sharp sound—and Amos started to tremble.
“We do not fear cowards.” August’s grin widened. “All we’ll feel when you’re gone is victory. You don’t fear a roach you squashed beneath your shoe.”
Amos snarled in rage and moved from my head just enough to spit at August.
But the small separation was enough. There was another loud crack as August pulled the trigger.
I heard a dull, wet pop near my ear, and the tension in Amos’s body vanished.
He fell back, tipping over the railing of the catwalk, but his arm was heavy around me and the momentum pulled me back too—and I started to flip over the edge with him.
I screamed, the sound echoing around me as the world tipped and blurred.
For a split second, I was falling, and then firm, strong hands wrapped around my forearms and yanked me up.
I was weightless for one moment before I crashed into a solid, warm chest.
His scent surrounded me, grounding and comforting even through the choking stink of smoke.
Roman.
He wrapped his arms around me, crushing me to him. “I’ve got you,” he said, the words desperate and shaking. “You’re safe, Golden. You’re safe.”
I knew I was safe. I was with Roman.
But I needed to see.
Before Roman could take me away, I glanced down into the belly of the old factory.
Sprawled on the concrete, blood pooling around his broken body, was Amos Anderson.
The Shadow Stalker’s blank eyes stared up at me, but there was no life in them. There was nothing. He was nothing.
He would burn in this building and crumble into nothing but ashes to be blown away in the wind.