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Aran

I kick the locked door with such force, the hinges rip. It crashes with a loud thud on the floor, causing the entire room to freeze. Everyone stares at me like spooked deer, four of them looming over my screaming Hex as if they are vultures about to peck him to death.

My eyes zero in on the syringe hovering right above his arm. My pulse spikes to the sky, hot and bloodthirsty. Were they trying to drug him? To diminish him into an unwilling plaything?

Unforgivable.

I don’t just see red. I taste its coppery tang and feel it drip down my clenched fists. Agony and utter horror consume me when I see fear and hope reflected in those livid browns. The man I love is in danger. He needs me.

I’m going to murder them.

Every single one of them.

With a roar, I lunge at the couch. The syringe clinks on the floor, rolling somewhere before whatever nasty drug it contains can be injected into Hex’s arm. I stepped outside for only two minutes, just enough time to take care of the guards on this floor so they don’t come rushing in when I start interrogating Claire and her accomplices. The timing was perfect—everyone was chatting nonsense and sipping drinks, and she seemed like she wouldn’t make a move just yet.

Clearly, I miscalculated and put my adorable troublemaker in danger. I grit my teeth, tasting more blood. That will never happen again.

The person I crash into is lying unconscious on the floor a heartbeat later, their nose broken and bleeding. The rest scatter like cockroaches, half racing for the door while the other half rush for the shelves where there’s either a phone or a hidden weapon.

“Did you really need to break the door?” I hear Hex groan, my mind clearing off the bloodlust for a second. “You could’ve, you know, kicked it with less force, and then closed it so everyone is trapped in the room. Now they are trying to run away!”

If he’s pulling the sass on me, it means he’s mostly okay. I exhale in relief, my entire body sagging. He’s fine, they didn’t drug him. I wasn’t late. I arrived before anything could happen to him.

My heart squeezes for him. I need him safe in my arms, smiling up at me.

“Tien…”

His eyes meet mine in the middle of this pandemonium. They blaze with love, beautiful and breathtaking, like a falling star about to collide with the Earth.

“Sorry. I didn’t think they would try to drug me…” he mutters in a small voice, losing all the facade. It pulls on my heartstrings, fueling my rage and the need to protect him until I can barely breathe. For once he appears his age, a young precious being that has no place in this cruel and nasty world.

“It’s OK. I’m here now. Everything will be fine. You are safe.”

He nods, his fingers ghosting over my cheek as his gaze strays to something behind me. “Yeah… Yeah, okay.” He grabs the bottle of whiskey from the table and throws it. “Just… you might want to stop those guys before they ring the alarm?”

The bottle shatters just in front of the door, glass flying everywhere. The two rushing for the exit stop dead in their tracks, faces startled and pale as they look at each other and then at me and Hex. I lose no time, pouncing them while their confusion lasts and aiming for their throats. I need to neutralize them before they have had the chance to recuperate.

God, I could kiss Hex right now. With his flexible moral compass, crazy ideas and quick wit, he has the makings of the perfect combat partner if I spent some time training him. Part of me still balks at that thought, but if he keeps saving us at clutch moments, I don’t think I’ll be able to say no if he asked me to let him tag along next time I’m out on a mission.

Hopefully, there won’t be a next time after we’re done with this drug conspiracy, but you never know what the future might bring.

The clueless VIPs go down without a fight, but that’s when things get a bit hot.

“ARAN, DUCK!” Hex screams at the top of his lungs, diving from the couch to the floor.

I comply without a question just as a barrage of bullets comes flying my way.

A gun was hiding on the shelf then. Or a couple. It matters little, though it solidifies my conviction that we have to wrap this mystery up tonight or we won’t get a second chance. Everything was going fine, albeit a bit slowly, until suddenly it wasn’t. I don’t even know what exactly happened or how we got here, but I have no choice but to make it work.

I crawl across the floor as the bullets keep coming, using the furniture for cover. With the two guards neutralized and the music blasting downstairs, the party should still be unaware of our skirmish.

“Over here!” Hex waves me from between the coffee table and the couch, his body covered in fluff from the destroyed cushions.

It’s like I’m back in the trenches during training, with the only difference being the lack of mud or rain. I keep in shape and I exercise daily, but this is not something that usually makes it into my routine, so I am glad my muscle memory doesn’t let me down.

When I make it over to Hex, I find him hunched over a tablet. He’s biting on his lip and aggressively typing something on the device, completely oblivious to the continuously scary situation unfolding around us. All it takes is for one of the morons firing to stop doing it blindly and actually check where we are hiding.

“What are you doing?” I hiss, trying to fit in the narrow space.

“I snatched Mrs. Lynx’s tablet. Gimme five and I’ll be in,” he says distractedly, not even looking at me.

When did he manage to steal it while being pinned by those hyenas?

My blood boils as the scene that was happening when I busted in replays in front of my eyes. But it’s pointless to get agitated over that now. I need to remain calm and collected, focused on the objective of neutralizing anything or anyone threatening my troublemaker’s wellbeing. It’s also meaningless to try to talk to Hex when he’s slipped into his hacker mode, so even though I’ve only visually confirmed he’s okay, it will have to do.

I must leave him to do his thing and focus on doing mine.

A pause in the volley of bullets gives me my opening. The guns have either run out or jammed. I hope for the latter, but ultimately care little as I kiss Hex’s head and leap over the couch.

My remaining three enemies don’t expect that. Their eyes go wide, and one of them even yelps in shock, staggering back into the wall as fear seems to paralyze them. They won’t be an issue from now on—I can concentrate on Claire and her husband.

The two keep pressing the triggers of their guns, but nothing comes out. I approach them, the bloodlust in me rising. They wanted to touch what is mine, they tried to drug Hex. They wanted him as their pet , even had a collar at the ready.

Disgusting. Unforgivable. I will delete them off the face of the earth along with everything they’ve ever cared for. Slowly, torturously, so they know what agony feels like.

I clench my jaw, tasting copper again. My hands twitch with the urge to claw their eyes out and snap their necks. No one threatens what’s mine and lives.

“Stop!” Claire orders in a shaky voice. “How much do you want?”

I roll my sleeves up, panting as harshly as her. Her eyes widen, scanning the room frantically for an escape. But there’s nowhere to run, I have them cornered like a panther about to strike its prey.

“Is it the boy?” her husband asks, his hands shaking so much he couldn’t shoot me even if the gun still worked. “Did you like him? He’s very cute! You can join us—”

I suck in a sharp breath, my entire body going tense like a spring about to release.

“You can have him, dear,” Claire jumps in, lowering her useless gun. “And all the money you can imagine.”

In no world would I ever let these predators live. If not Hex, they’ll go after someone else. Hell, who knows how many young people they’ve already ruined. Maybe it’s what happened to Eleanor and Katy, maybe that’s why they disappeared and no one batted an eye. To Claire Streiss and the other VIPs, everyone is expendable, a toy you can toss away when you get bored of it.

Claire nods and her husband propels himself at me with a howl.

I stop him with one hand, jabbing him dead-center in the neck. Something cracks and his eyes roll back while wheezing sounds rip out of him as he collapses to the floor. He won’t be getting back up ever again.

I zero in on my last target, shock and fear contorting her face. “Where are the labs?” I demand in a threatening voice.

She swallows hard, her eyes bouncing between me and her dead man. “How do you know about that?”

I kick his lifeless body toward her. “It doesn’t matter. Where are they?”

“I can take you there if you promise not to kill me.” She smiles then, some of the composure returning to her face. It’s like a switch has flipped and she’s already over the death of her partner. Like she doesn’t care. It’s very uncanny. “You are very good, Mong. Work for me? I could… really use a man like you on my team. This, what we are doing here, you can be part of it… It’s like nothing the world has ever seen before.”

“And what is it that you are doing here, exactly?” I humor her, inching in closer without her seeming to notice it.

“We’re writing history.” Her eyes glass over, like she’s only half here. “Everyone who’s here… We are part of it and we’re this close… We just need that last push, and we’ll change the entire world.”

That’s why I don’t like people in power. They think they are special, that they have the right to decide the fate of humankind just because they have money, resources and influence. They think they know best and that it is their right to sit at the top and command us, the less fortunate.

Those are delusions.

But the thing is, this drug formula that Matthew brought over from the US could make those delusions a reality. If brainwashing really is possible, and if governments have been fueling money into fixing the issues and low efficacy of the prototype that they developed based on that same formula, we must intercept them at all costs. This must end here, today, or we might not get another chance.

“Who is this ‘we’?”

She considers that for a moment. “Dear, don’t pretend to be clueless just because you are a mere employee. You know full well, just like everyone else who works for us in some capacity, that we run the world.”

But I need more than that. I need to know exactly who I am dealing with so the plan in my head can adjust accordingly.

I stop a few feet away from her and cross my arms. “Which government do you work for?” We know that America is involved, as well as most of Europe, but we have little information on the rest of the participants. If we want to fight this, we need the full picture.

Claire laughs like I’ve told her the best joke in the world. “Oh. No, no, no. You’ve got it all wrong, sweetie. Neither I, nor any of the people on this very special cruise work for anyone, much less the government. It’s the other way around.”

This is… a little unexpected.

“Surprised? Don’t be. It’s always been this way—governments answer to us because we prefer to pull the strings from the shadows.” She takes a step toward me, slightly leaning forward as if she is about to tell me a secret. “And you can be part of that now. You can have power like us and anything you ever dreamed of. So, what do you say?”