Page 119 of Forbidden Empire

I shoved Esme behind me. Zeno, Thal, and Ares fanned out, unleashing a torrent of bullets. Bodies crumpled, momentum lost, blood painting the walls as they fell.

“One battle down,” Ares growled, stepping over the fallen with ruthless purpose. Thal grabbed their discarded guns, arming himself and the others. We pushed deeper, hearts thundering, into Rhea’s stronghold, every sense straining for the next fight, the next threat, the next inevitable clash.

We didn’t slow down. We couldn’t—not now.

Esme tried to shove past me, but I blocked her path, stepping in front again. She let out an annoyed scoff, sharp, brittle, but I ignored her. I wasn’t about to let a fight with her distract me—not now, not here.

Our leadership circle was small: Ares, Zeno, Thal, and me. But with our soldiers supporting us, we were like a small militia. If I failed, I knew the others would do whatever it took to keep Esme safe. But until that happened, she was mine to protect. My responsibility.

We marched down a dark corridor, boots echoing as we turned a corner. The hallway opened suddenly into a cavernous two-story warehouse, shadows stretching high overhead. Boxes lined the walls from floor to ceiling. A balcony ringed the upper level, doors spaced evenly along the edge, the whole place wrapped in silence. The kind of silence that prickled the skin. Too fucking quiet.

Ares strode over to the nearest box and cracked the lid. Inside: six assault rifles, stacked with precision, strapped down, and ready to ship.

“There must be hundreds of these,” Ares muttered, sweeping his hand over the endless rows of identical boxes lined up along the warehouse floor.

“They’re all boxed up to go,” Zeno said, flipping open a lid with an impatient flick of his fingers. His eyes scanned the label. “Colombia.”

Thal drifted over. He didn’t bother opening the box. He read the shipping label taped to the cardboard.

“Honduras,” he said.

Esme tilted her head back, gaze skimming the web of thick steel beams overhead, the iron hooks, that ancient pulley system clinging to the ceiling like it was waiting for someone to give it purpose again.

“What did this place used to be?” Esme asked.

Ares answered without glancing her way, “Old lumber mill.”

“That’s what I’m smelling,” she murmured.

“Sawdust,” he told her.

In the farthest shadows, beyond the reach of the dirty light, I caught the shapes of rusted saws scattered across the cracked cement, half-buried in piles of wood shavings and splintered, rotting logs.

In the corner, lumber racks hunched beside a kiln so ancient it looked like it belonged in a museum, not a warehouse.

Ares’s eyes went up, tracking the metal stairs to the balcony overhead.

He jerked his chin at it. “She’s up there. Word is, she knocked down the old office walls to make herself a little suite.”

“God forbid Rhea settle for anything less than a luxury hideout,” Esme said.

Ares’s jaw clenched. “Always wanted to be a fucking Mafia princess,” he growled.

The smallest smile tugged at my mouth. I didn’t take my eyes off the balcony, not even as I spoke. One door at the end glowed faintly, the glass catching a thread of light.

Every other room up there was dark, abandoned, empty as a tomb.

“Something’s off,” I said, the unease crawling down my spine.

“Yeah. Too quiet.” Ares’s tone was low, all tension. “Where are her men?”

“That’s just what I was?—”

My words died on my tongue as the overhead fluorescents blasted the warehouse in stark, blinding light. The metallic zing of bullets ricocheted everywhere, slicing the air with a barrage of violence.

Instinct took over, I grabbed Esme’s arm and yanked her with me, pitching us both behind the closest stack of boxes as rounds tore through the shadows.

We hit the concrete hard, ducking low, my heart pounding so loud I could barely hear her furious whisper.