Page 195 of Pretty Ruthless Monsters: Complete Series

ATLAS

It seems like the flames are everywhere, even reflecting off the windows of the neighboring houses. A strangled noise tears from her throat, and before any of us can react, she’s out of the car and running toward the inferno.

For a moment, I’m completely frozen, watching the fire consume everything. It takes me back to another day, another fire, the one that burned our clubhouse to the ground. The heat, the destruction, the feeling of being helpless to save any of our belongings.

The stark memory locks my muscles for a second before I realize what Quinn is about to do.

“Fuck!” I run after her, ignoring the growing heat and my own wounds in the process. My arms wrap around her waist just as she reaches the front walk, yanking her back against me. The movement pulls at my stitches, but I don’t give a shit. Better torn stitches than a dead Quinn.

“Vicious, goddammit!” I have to yell in her ear to get her attention as she thrashes against me. “You can’t go in there!”

“I need to—I have to! Let me go!” Her elbow catches me in the ribs, making me grunt in pain. But I don’t loosen my grip. I can’t. The thought of her trying to run in there and getting overtaken by those flames?

No.

Fuck that.

“The whole fucking place is about to collapse,” I tell her. My throat already feels scratchy from yelling and from the acrid smoke already filling the air. “I’m not letting you kill yourself.”

The heat intensifies as something inside the house explodes, sending a shower of sparks into the night sky. The force of it nearly knocks us both off our feet. Sweat runs down my back as I hold her tighter, every protective instinct I have screaming at me to get her farther away from the blaze.

She fights me like a wild animal, all nails and elbows as she tries to break free. “Let me go!” she screams, her voice raw. “My father’s things—I have to—” She chokes on a sob that rips straight through my chest.

Nico and Killian catch up, helping me hold her back as the heat from the flames scorches our skin.

I know the desperate need burning in her eyes, the pain that’s driving her to try to rush into certain death.

I’ve felt that kind of desperation and pain before, and it kills me that I can’t do a fucking thing to stop it for her.

I’d gladly absorb it all in a minute if I could.

“Please,” she begs, still struggling. “Please just let me go. You… you don’t understand…”

“I do, vicious. But it’s too late. There’s nothing we can do. We can’t save it.”

There’s nothing I want more than to give her some hope. If I thought we could make it five minutes in there, I’d be the first one charging in next to her.

“Fuck that!” She twists in our grip, tears cutting clean tracks through the fine layer of sweat and soot already clinging to her skin. “Everything I have left of him is in there! Everything!”

“I know,” I murmur against her hair, my chest aching at the raw pain in her voice. “I swear, I get it.”

I step to the side as Killian practically lifts her off her feet to put some more distance between us and the burning house.

“Think about what your old man would want,” he says.

His expression is hard as a fucking rock, but his tone is gentler than I’ve ever heard it.

“He’d want you to stay alive more than he’d want you to save his shit. ”

“He’s right,” Nico adds. “Your father would never forgive us if we let you go in there, mia cara.”

Quinn’s shoulders shake as another sob tears through her. “I can’t just stand here,” she whispers, the fight draining from her body. “I can’t just watch it all burn.”

She finally stops struggling, but her whole body is still trembling with emotion.

And from the look on her face, the confusion and pain is quickly being replaced by pure, white-hot rage.

“Ambrose,” she spits the name we’ve all come to hate with a shared passion.

“That fucking bastard did this. It had to be him.”

My jaw clenches as I realize she’s probably right. That piece of shit isn’t going to be satisfied until he’s taken everything from her. “I swear to god,” I grit out through clenched teeth, “I’m going to rip his fucking throat out.”

“You’ll have to get in line,” Killian growls. “I’ve got plans for that motherfucker myself.”

Before any of us can say more, Quinn’s phone rings. She yanks it from her pocket, nearly dropping it as she swipes to answer.

“You son of a bitch!” she snarls into the phone, but her face changes immediately. I’m close enough to hear the panicked voice on the other end, and it’s definitely not Ambrose.

The color drains from her face as she listens. Her hand grips my forearm so tight I can feel her nails breaking the skin. “I’m on my way,” she says, ending the call. Her eyes meet mine, wide with a fresh round of fear. “Blood and Ink—he hit that too. Some of my people are trapped inside.”

Blood rushes in my ears as the implications sink in. This isn’t just about destroying Quinn’s home. Ambrose is trying to burn down her whole fucking world.

“That sick fuck,” Nico says, already moving toward the car. “He’s gonna fucking pay.”

I remember the sound of Ambrose’s laughter as he tortured me, and I can only imagine he’s laughing the same way now. And yeah, we are gonna make him fucking pay.

There’s no time for that now though. Quinn and her gang are our only priority in this moment.

“We need to move,” I say, guiding Quinn toward the car. “Now.”

We leave Quinn’s house to burn as Nico floors it toward Blood and Ink. Quinn is pressed against me in the backseat, her body thrumming with tension. I can feel her fighting to keep her shit together, to be the leader her people are going to need as soon as they see her.

“Call everyone,” she orders into her phone, her voice steady despite the tremor I can feel running through her. “Get whoever’s nearby to Blood and Ink. Now.”

The burning in my chest intensifies as we take a corner too fast, but I keep my mouth shut. This isn’t about me or my fucking injuries. We round the last bend, and my stomach drops.

Blood and Ink looks like a fucking torch, with flames already pouring from the broken windows. The fire hasn’t taken hold as completely as it did at Quinn’s place, but it’s only a matter of time.

“Fuck,” Killian mutters from the front seat. A crowd of Quinn’s people mill around outside, some trying to fight the flames with extinguishers that aren’t doing shit against a blaze this size.

“He really wants to burn it all down,” Nico says, his knuckles white on the steering wheel. “Fucking psychopath.”

Quinn is out of the car before we’ve fully stopped, and this time I don’t try to grab her. I know that look in her eyes. She’s not running toward danger blindly now—she has a purpose. Her people need her.

I follow her out, ignoring the sting in my lungs as smoke starts to fill them. The heat hits like a wall, making my skin prickle and sweat instantly bead on my forehead. Shouts and the crackle of flames fill the air as we approach the burning building.

“Jasper and Damon are still inside!” someone shouts over the roar of the flames. “They went down to the basement to grab some guns, and something collapsed?—”

“Fuck!” Quinn starts forward, but I catch her arm. Not to stop her this time, just to make her think for a second.

“If you go running in there half-cocked, you’ll get yourself killed,” I shout. “We need a plan.”

She whirls on me, eyes blazing brighter than the fire behind her. “Like hell you’re stopping me from going in there,” she snarls. “I’m not losing anyone else. Not one more fucking person.”

The raw determination in her voice hits me in the gut. I know that feeling, that desperation to protect what’s yours, no matter the cost. I’ve felt it every time I’ve looked at her since the day she got under my skin.

“I wasn’t planning on stopping you,” I say, meeting her gaze. “But I’m going in with you.”

“We all are,” Nico adds as he and Killian step up beside us.

Quinn looks between us for a moment, then gives a sharp nod. “We need wet rags,” she says, already pulling off her jacket. “And we need to know exactly where in the basement they were headed.”

One of her people points out the most likely spot while another runs to get rags from the bar next door. My chest tightens as I watch the flames eating away at the building. Time is running out fast.

The moment we have the wet rags over our faces, we enter through the front door, where flames are already licking up the walls and across the ceiling. The smoke is thick enough to make my eyes water instantly.

Every breath feels like swallowing razor blades, but I push through it, keeping close to Quinn as we navigate the burning shop. Thank fuck we’ve all spent enough time here to know every corner, but the heat and the smoke are making even the familiar layout seem disorienting.

“This way!” Quinn shouts over the roar of the flames, leading us toward the basement door. A burning beam crashes down behind us, showering sparks and making me grab her waist, yanking her forward just in time.

“Careful, vicious,” I rasp against her ear. “This whole place could come down any second.”

The memory of the night Ambrose ambushed the tattoo parlor hits me hard—Quinn was drugged, and I took a bullet to get her out. Now we’re walking straight back into hell, and it might be even more dangerous than it was that day.

Flames dance in the corners of my vision as we reach the basement door. The handle is hot enough to blister when Killian grabs it, cursing as he yanks his hand back.

“Stand back,” Nico orders, already moving to kick the door. The wood is warped from the heat, making it stick in the frame.

We all take turns ramming it, our desperation growing with each passing second. Finally, the door gives way with a crack that I can barely hear over the inferno around us. The basement stairs disappear into darkness below, with smoke rolling up past us as we start to move.