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A slow clap echoes from the entrance. This time, my body doesn’t react. I feel nothing. A numbness settles inside me, dull and distant. I’ve run out of fear and am ready to face whatever bullshit this life throws at me next. Then Avery steps forward and hope sparks through the haze, shoving away the numbness. The entire energy of the garage shifts the moment he enters. He walks in cold and composed, like he already owns the place. Eugene, by contrast, still unravels at the seams.

“I never wanted to be the leader. I didn’t care enough to, and it was far more fun to watch you huff and puff and scurry around as my form of entertainment. Then you went too far. Did you know people refer to us as dregs? How funny of a word.”

“What about it?” is Eugene’s only response.

Avery continues. “It’s not a compliment.”

“What are you even doing here? Like you said, you never wanted this.”

“I didn’t want this. Until you hurt something that I foundI care about. I know, surprise to me, too. Turns out I still have a heart, albeit a small one.”

Damon’s grip on me tightens.

Eugene throws his head back in a skin-prickling laugh. His hands tug at his hair, pulling out loose strands. “Why does everyone keep trying to steal what’s mine? I’m going to kill you all, right here, right now.”

“Give it up, Eugene. You’ve lost.” Avery steps further into the light, his expression unreadable.

A muscle ticks in Eugene’s jaw. “You don’t fucking know that.” His voice wavers, and he gestures to all the dregs who standing with him. “I built this. It’s all mine. You think I’ll just hand it over because you ask? You didn’t even ask nicely.”

“All you have to do is stand down, and we won’t have a way,” Avery says.

For a few long moments, neither of them speaks, and nobody moves.

Avery smirks. “Look around you, Eugene.”

He does, and that’s when the shift happens. His own men refuse to meet his gaze. They don’t even look at him at all. Instead, they watch the dirty pavement, their own boots, anywhere but him.

The first raindrops begin to fall. Fat droplets leak through the fractured ceiling and tap against rusted hoods and shattered windshields. The scent of damp earth thickens the air.

Eugene’s fingers twitch when he realizes he’s losing them. Desperation tightens his expression. His control slips, and I see the moment it breaks. He grabs a crowbar with a furious snarl and strikes one of his own men.

The man stumbles and curses in pain.

“You’re supposed to stand by me, and you hesitate?” Eugene swings again, but the man catches the crowbar mid-air and rips it from his grip. Then he steps away from him without a word.

More follow. They cross the divide to join Avery, and that unravels the last thread of Eugene’s empire.

Avery takes another step forward. His voice is like smoke and steel when he speaks. “You feel it, don’t you? That slip beneath your feet? You’re falling.”

“Shut the fuck up.”

Avery ignores him. “Fear doesn’t work anymore. Your men don’t respect you. When fear fades, the only thing left—” his gaze flicks to the remaining dregs still back away toward Avery “—is choice.”

Eugene’s body shakes with rage. Damon’s grip on my turns almost painful. Then Eugene snaps. “No.”

Greg steps out of the shadows and stands in front of Eugene. His face morphs into something inhuman. He snarls at Avery. “You left. You have no right to take it back. Now show some damn respect?—”

A knife protruding through the chest cuts him off. He falls to the ground, dead. I spin around and see Cole shrug. “Found it on the ground. Figured it needed a home. He wouldn’t shut up.”

Eugene’s snarl is animalistic and his voice raw, cracking around the edges. “You think you can take everything from me?” His shoulders shake and his voice rises. “I’m in charge here! I run this place! She belongs to me!”

When Eugene’s eyes snap to me, Damon lets go of me and steps between us. Before he can block me from view, Eugene rips the gun from the nearest dreg’s holster and aims it at Damon. “Stop right there.”

Damon lifts his chin and stands tall. My heart hammers against my chest, and fear clouds my vision. Before anyone else can react, Eugene lunges. His arm snaps around my waist, and he yanks me back against him. Cold steel presses against my shoulder.

The entire garage freezes.

Thunder rumbles overhead.