Page 97 of Ignite

Why do I already feel like I’ve fucking lost him?

Parked a half mile from the targeted estate, my teams spill into the woods.

I rush the grand doors at the back of the home. Forest covers me as I pick the lock. We sweep in, clicking on flashlights to illuminate the dusty, abandoned interior.

The silence eats away at my nerves. I run statistics in my head. It hasn’t even been twelve hours. I saw Ezra this morning before work. It’s not like he’s been missing for days.

He’s okay. I’ll make sure he’s okay. We just need to get him out.

We scour the first floor, winding through pitch-black, boarded up rooms and hallways littered with old furnishings. The light on my gun catches several pairs of footsteps in the dust coating the floor like a light snowfall.

I wave Forest closer, motioning to a staircase that leads down into what looks like a cellar. It makes my chest tighten as I recall Ezra’s admission about being held in a basement.

My blood boils as we hurry down the stairs, guns raised. The shoe prints lead us to a stack of wooden crates in a damp, windowless room that feels more like a crypt.

I glimpse a lit-up phone on the corner of one of the crates. When I step closer, I see that it’s Ezra’s phone, and it’s connected to a FaceTime call.

My entire world comes crashing down around me.

Faintly, my brain registers the scent of sulfur and the ticking of a timer, but I’m glued to the visual of Ezra,my Ezra, on the phone—half-naked, blind-folded, and tied to a chair in the middle of a plain white room. Dried blood covers his chest.

I’m going to murder a lot of people tonight.

My focus hones in on a cross hanging behind his head. A church? But which one? There are hundreds of fucking churches in this godforsaken city.

Forest nudges my arm, bringing me back to reality. I wave him up the stairs with my gun and tap my comm piece. “Place is rigged to blow. Everyone out now.”

I snatch Ezra’s phone, pocketing it, then bolt up the stairs. Hearing Rev’s curses echoing from the second floor as he yells orders to his team, I linger on the back porch.

The word fuck replays like a mantra in my head. I was so quick to dispatch these teams, we barely had time to run through plans. If someone gets hurt, this is on me. All because I got too emotionally attached to someone. Again.

“Move your ass, Rev,” I roar.

Seconds tick by, and my pulse thuds harder beneath my too hot skin.

Rev slides into view and we bolt for the tree line. He lags behind me on shorter legs, so I grab him by the arm, yanking him faster.

The instant the detonation goes off, I throw my body over Rev’s. Heat sears my back. I grunt as something hits my thigh, bringing with it a pain I haven’t felt since I’d been shot.

“Cain!” Rev eases me off his body, shielding me from the raining debris. Black plumes of smoke and hungry flames climb the gray sky behind him.

“Fuck, don’t look at your leg.”

“Call Alaric,” I force the words out, handing him Ezra’s phone. “We need him to find Ezra. Church. He’s in a church.”

Rev ignores my demand, working to rip his belt off and strap it around my burning thigh. When he pulls it tight, I lean up enough to glimpse the chunk of wood sticking four inches out of my leg. Judging by the volume of blood escaping me, I’d say quite a bit of the wood is hidden inside my body.

I hiss. “That’s not great.”

“No shit. We’ll storm the fuck out of those churches, but first we need to get you to the doc. I don’t think it hit a major artery, but there’s a ton of blood, so I guess we’ll find out in a few minutes.”

Rev and his morbid fucking humor.

“I’m not dying from a fucking splinter.”

Rev hauls me into one of our armored vehicles. Salem climbs in with us and positions my head on her lap. She keeps a warm hand resting on my cheek.

Warring against dizziness, I mumble, “Alaric. Call him. Now.”