Page 82 of Filthy Promises

That’s when I see it—the gun from his desk drawer, now gripped expertly in his hand.

“Vince, what?—”

“Not now.” His eyes are scanning our surroundings with lethal focus. “When I move, you follow me. Stay low. Stay close. Understand?”

I nod, terror crystallizing in my chest.

The rear door of the car is wrenched open suddenly. A masked figure looms in the opening, also holding a gun.

What happens next unfolds so quickly I can barely process it.

Vince moves like water—fluid, unstoppable. His foot connects with the attacker’s wrist, sending the gun flying. In the same motion, he launches himself through the doorway.

I hear grunts. Screams. The sickening sound of fist meeting flesh.

“Stay in the car!” Vince shouts back to me.

But the car is sideways, the door above me now hanging open. I can see everything, framed like art made of blood and bullets and badly broken bone.

I see Vince as he faces three masked men, all in black, all armed.

I see how he doesn’t hesitate, doesn’t show an ounce of fear.

He fights like he was born for violence. Every movement is efficient, brutal, purposeful. He disarms one attacker, using the man’s momentum to send him crashing into another.

The third pulls a knife.

“Vince!” I scream, but he’s already seen it.

He sidesteps the thrust, grabs the attacker’s wrist, and the sound of breaking bone cracks through the night. The knife clatters to the pavement as the man howls in pain.

One of the others recovers, lunging for a gun on the ground.

Vince is faster.

The gunshot is deafening. Once, twice, three times.

The attacker drops, blood blooming across his chest. His body crumples to the street.

Lights out. Forever.

I clap my hand over my mouth to stifle a scream.

Vince just killed someone. Right in front of me.

The remaining attackers scramble back, shouting to each other. One of them drags the wounded one away while the other provides cover, firing wildly in Vince’s direction.

Vince ducks behind the overturned car, bullets pinging off metal inches from where he crouches.

“Rowan!” he calls. “Are you okay?”

I can’t speak or move. I can only stare at the body lying in a spreading pool of blood on the asphalt.

He shot him. Three times. Without hesitation.

The world narrows to that single point. The dead man. The blood. The gun still in Vince’s hand.

“Rowan!” His voice is sharper now. “Look at me. Not at him. At me.”

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