Page 103 of The Beast's Broken Angel

“On three, pull your leg back,” I instructed. “One... two...”

Viktor yanked his leg free as I leveraged the beam up just enough to create space. He tried to put weight on it and immediately collapsed with a strangled curse. “Fuck. Bone is broken. Multiple fractures, I think.”

“Don't try to stand,” I said, checking the damage with my torch. The leg was badly mangled but the bleeding was under control. “You're not walking out of here.”

“Can still crawl,” he said grimly, already testing his upper body strength against the debris. “Leg is fucked, but arms work fine. Now we find way out.”

We searched in tense silence, the sounds of combat growing more desperate outside. I could track Adrian's position by his weapon's distinctive sound, and he wasn't moving. Pinned down, probably, too focused on Harrison to realise the tactical situation was completely fucked.

Then I found it. A gap in the debris, barely shoulder-width, but it led toward what might have been a maintenance shaft. The metal was twisted but not completely blocked.

“I might be able to get through,” I said, already calculating. “It's tight, but?—”

“You cannot leave wounded man,” Viktor protested. “Is against medical oath, no?”

“My oath is to preserve life,” I countered, already stripping off unnecessary gear. “Adrian's about to throw his away. That takes priority.”

Viktor studied me for a long moment. “You will drug him if necessary? Force retreat?”

The question caught me off guard. “What?”

“I know Adrian. Know his obsession. Only way to save him from Harrison may be to save him from himself.” Viktor reached into his tactical vest, pulling out an autoinjector. “Sedative. Military grade. Will drop him in seconds.”

I took the injector, weighing it in my hand. The idea of drugging Adrian, of taking away his choice in the most important moment of his life, made my stomach turn. But the alternative was watching him die for revenge.

“He'll never forgive me,” I said quietly.

“Better unforgiven and alive than dead with revenge complete,” Viktor replied. “Go. Save stubborn bastard from himself.”

I clamped the injector between my teeth, not trusting my pockets to keep it secure while crawling through twisted metal and debris. Metal tore at my clothes, concrete scraped skin raw, but I kept moving. The maintenance shaft was a nightmare of twisted pipes and sparking electrical cables, but it led toward the warehouse floor.

I emerged into hell.

The warehouse was a war zone. Bodieslittered the concrete, smoke turned the air toxic, and automatic weapons fire came from multiple directions.

I found Dominic first, crawling toward him through the chaos. Three gunshot wounds, losing blood fast. I worked on autopilot, hands moving through familiar motions while bullets sparked off concrete inches away.

“Boss,” Dominic gasped as I got a line in. “Still with Harrison. Won't leave.”

“I know.” I stabilised him best I could, then moved on. Three more wounded operators got field treatment as I worked my way toward Adrian's position. Each one told the same story: boss won't retreat, boss won't leave Harrison.

Stubborn, stupid, magnificent bastard.

I finally spotted him through the smoke, pinned behind industrial shelving that was being systematically destroyed by automatic weapons fire. Blood soaked his shoulder, but his focus remained locked on Harrison, secured to a chair twenty feet away.

Harrison's extraction team was closing in, their movement patterns screaming military training. Maybe sixty seconds before they reached him. Maybe less.

I dropped beside Adrian, immediately pressing gauze to his shoulder wound. “We need to go. Now.”

“He doesn't leave here alive.” Adrian's voice was calm, terrifyingly calm. “I've waited twenty years for this moment.”

“And you'll be dead in twenty seconds if you don't move!” I shouted over the gunfire. “They've got superior position, superior numbers, and you're bleeding out!”

“Then I die.” Simple. Final. “But Harrison dies first.”

The fatalistic acceptance in his voice made something snap inside me. All the weeks of watching him build walls around his trauma, of seeing glimpses of the man beneath the monster,of feeling things I had no business feeling, crystallised into pure, desperate fury.

“You selfish fucking prick!” The words exploded out of me. “You think this is just about you? What about the people who depend on you? What about your grandmother? What about—” I bit off the words 'what about me?' but they hung in the air anyway.