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I wanted to burn Lassiter. But Enzo wasn’t finished. He didn’t rage. He didn’t scream. He just told the truth. And that was somehow worse.

“It wasn’t me,” Lassiter wheezed, trembling, eyes wide with desperation.

Enzo didn’t hesitate. He grabbed the steel pipe again and drove it across Lassiter’s face with a sickening crack. The man’s nose burst open, blood pouring down over his lips and chin. A second blow caught his cheekbone, splitting the skin and painting his collar in red.

Lassiter screamed, then choked, then whimpered. “Please—please stop?—”

Another blow silenced him.

Every time he begged. Every time he denied he knew anything. Enzo swung again.

By the time the pipe clanged to the floor, Lassiter was a mess—head lolling, drool and blood spilling from his mouth, breathing in ragged gasps.

“You used pipes, the same as this, on him, didn’t you?” Enzo’s voice was cold. “Shoved objects in him. Made him bleed. Scarred him.”

“Please— "

He stepped forward, gripped Lassiter’s hair to tilt his head back, then waved the pipe as he stared Lassiter in the eye. “Maybe I should do that to you.”

Lassiter whimpered and coughed, thick and wet. No more denials. Just pain and fear and blood.

And still… not enough.

That was where Rio came in, crouching beside Lassiter and waving a harsh-smelling ampoule under his nose—something Caleb had sent, meant to jolt the body back from the edge. Lassiter groaned, shaking his head in frantic movements.

“No, no, no. I’m sick. I’ll get help. No, no,” he whispered, voice raw. “He’s dead now. It wasn’t my fault. No more… please… I’m sorry. Don’t hurt me. I’m sorry…”

Enzo knelt again, close enough that Lassiter could feel the heat of his breath.

“Roman’s not dead. He’s very much alive, and I love that man,” Enzo said, low and steady. “He’s the other half of my heart. And for what you did to him, you’re dying today. You get that, right?”

Lassiter made a sound, more animal than human, and Enzo held out his hand.

Rio, solemn now, handed him a blade—no hesitation, nothing but grim understanding.

“Some nights, he can’t stop crying, and even though I hold him, it’s not enough.

He tells me he’s okay, but he’s never going to be okay for real.

It breaks my heart.” Enzo wrapped his fingers around the hilt and turned it slowly in his palm, then leaned in and sliced into Lassiter’s wrist—slow, deliberate, not deep enough to kill, but enough to terrify.

He sawed through skin, shallow layers of flesh, and Lassiter screamed, head jerking.

“He’ll die too soon,” I warned.

Enzo stepped back, breathing hard, nostrils flaring.

He knew.

He just wasn’t ready to let the bastard off that easy.

Enzo tipped his head at me. “Do it.”

I pointed at the rough circle in the dirt, extending ten feet each way to Lassiter, and both Enzo and Rio stepped back.

Lassiter was messing with my peace, sobbing and begging.

I needed quiet. Because this next part? This was mine.

The spiral I’d drawn in the dust wasn’t symbolic—it was the burn path.

I’d spent hours setting it up: fuel line soaked into the dirt, measured accelerants, triggers wired to a single button hidden in my jacket.

Once lit, the fire would trace that perfect spiral inward, closing until it reached the center. Until it reached him.

The entire warehouse would go as well, long after we’d gone, but the design meant the center—Lassiter—would burn the longest. The hottest. He would see it coming. He would feel it close. And by the time the heat kissed his skin, there’d be no escape.

This was the hell I had made.

And it was what he deserved.

I pressed the button.

The fire didn’t explode—it awakened. It sparked from six ignition points at once, racing toward each other in a perfect circle that closed in like a noose. And when the flames met, joining with a hiss and roar, the trap sealed. That was Lassiter gone. Caged in fire.

I didn’t linger for the screams. I didn’t need to. For me, the act was complete, and now, I wanted to watch the building burn. I stepped out into the cold air, Rio close at my back, the door open behind us.

We stood at a distance, watching the first licks of flame reach the wooden siding. It was slow at first, then greedy. The fire clawed its way upward, licking the walls, spreading wide. It swallowed the warehouse like it had been waiting to devour it all along.

Enzo emerged next, smoke curling around his silhouette. He’d stayed just long enough. I’d warned him how long he had.

He stayed because he needed the certainty of a death that couldn’t be denied or covered up or erased.

For Robbie.

“She’s beautiful,” I murmured to my friends, as the roof groaned and buckled, the beams bowing, the structure beginning to fall in on itself.

Lassiter was long since ash.

But the fire was still dancing.

And all I could think was how much I wanted Killian here with me—to see this, to understand what it meant.

I wanted to lace our fingers together and show him that this fire wasn’t just destruction.

It was cleansing. It was justice. It was the same wild peace I felt when I was wrapped around him, when he looked at me like I mattered.

Fire and Killian—they burned the same inside me.

But I didn’t want to stay here any longer. Not with the smell of smoke on my skin and ash curling around my boots. I wanted Killian. I needed to see him, touch him, know this was really done.

But first… Robbie .

We arrived back at Redcars, and Enzo was out of the truck before it had even stopped moving. He strode inside like a man possessed, and Rio and I were close behind.

Robbie stood in the middle of the garage, and it was obvious he’d been waiting. His arms were crossed over his chest, his eyes red, tears tracking down his face.

“Enzo?” he asked, voice shaking.

Enzo didn’t answer with words. He scooped Robbie up in his arms. “It’s done,” he whispered, holding him as if he’d never let go. All that was left now was pinning down Kessler and finding this Lyric guy; only then would Robbie have peace, but for tonight, this was enough.

I saw Killian then, lingering near the office doorway, his expression unreadable until he caught my eye. Then he smiled, just for me.

I crossed the space without hesitation, and he met me halfway, lifting me clean off my toes as if I weighed nothing at all.

“Hey, Pretty,” he murmured, pressing his lips to my temple. “Did it go okay?”

I pressed a kiss to his neck, inhaling the scent of my man, my safety.

He was the breath I held onto when everything else burned.

The moment my lips touched him, the chaos dulled, and my heartbeat steadied.

Like Enzo had said about Robbie, this was more than love.

Killian was the other half of my heart, the fire inside that didn’t consume me, but kept me alive.

“Yeah,” I said. “It was beautiful.”

From a cell phone on the table on speakerphone, Caleb’s voice echoed dryly. “And done! I’ve sent the Lassiter data to the relevant people. It’s everywhere now.”

For Robbie.