Page 36 of Brutal Unionn
Even as her body thrashes like it’s trying to escape her own skin. Even as her breath breaks apart in my palm. Even as tears, real and uncontrollable, slip from the corners of her eyes and cut clean lines through the ash smeared across her cheeks.
The flashing lights start to break through the smoke—sickly strobes of blue and red painting the walls, stuttering across herskin in bursts. The alley flickers like a war zone, like reality can’t decide if we’ve survived or not.
The crimson glow of the cauterizing metal has dimmed now, dulled by blood and soot. I toss it away without looking—somewhere into the shadows. It clatters against the brick with a finality that makes my chest seize.
Her nostrils stop their panicked flare. Her breath evens—just barely. Shallow. Shaky. But no longer desperate. Her body still trembles, the aftershocks of agony rolling through her in waves, but she’s no longer fighting me. She’s just breathing. Barely.
Alive.
I slowly lift my hand from her mouth.
Her lips are parted, red and swollen from the force of the scream she tried to swallow. Blood has smeared across her bottom lip from where she bit down. Her mouth is slack, gasping in short bursts of air like she’s learning how to breathe again.
Her chest rises and falls—uneven, frantic, but steady.
I cup her face with both hands, my palms shaking. One slick with blood. The other burned raw from holding the metal.
“I am so proud of you, Hime.” My voice cracked open, barely more than a whisper. I press my forehead to hers again, trembling against the heat still radiating off her skin.
Her lashes flutter. Slow. Her eyes roll upward, dazed and unfocused, but they find mine again—stormy blue flickering in the chaos.
“They were right,” a lazy, mocking drawl echoes down thealley, smooth as oil and just as slick. “You are a tough girl to kill.”
I whip around instantly, my hand already reaching for the grip of the gun buried in the waistband of my jeans. But my hand freezes on my waist the second I see him.
Because he’s already aiming a pistol at my head.
He leans one shoulder against the alley wall like he’s been watching us for longer than I want to imagine. The barrel of the pistol in his hand gleams beneath the stuttering flashes of emergency lights. His finger rests light and loose against the trigger, but his eyes—dark, sharp, predator-calm—never leave me.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you, sweetie,” he says with a lazy smirk, voice lined with that smooth, unbothered malice reserved for people who’ve killed too often to remember how it felt the first time. “Hands up.”
My teeth grind together as I raise my hands above my head. Every muscle in my body coils like wire, every instinct screaming to snap his neck clean in two.
I study him through narrowed eyes.
His face looks vaguely familiar like we frequent the same dark alleys. The man is tall, lean, his movements fluid with a kind of grace that speaks of decades of training. Not a single wasted breath. His black hair is cropped close to his skull, a sharp undercut running into a mess of longer strands swept back. His clothes are all matte black—form-fitting tactical gear, no excess, no nonsense.
His gaze flicks over me once before landing on Nadia. A flash of amusement crosses hisface.
“You are one lucky ???,” he drawls to her, cocking his head as if inspecting a rare specimen through a glass case. “This is my third time trying to kill you, and just when I know you’re dead this asshole shows up.”
“Watch your fucking mouth.” My voice snaps out like a gunshot. ???means crazy bitch in Korean, one of the few I’ve picked up over the years, along with my fan favorite ???,which means do you want to die.“If you like your life, speak to her with respect.”
Bhon raises an eyebrow slowly, his lips twitching with a smirk that doesn’t reach his eyes.
“Protective, and he speaks Korean.” He keeps the gun trained on me, utterly unshaken. “If you were both not about to die, I would say he’s a keeper.”
“I thought you just said she’s hard to kill. I promise you with me around it’ll be fucking impossible.” I snarl.
“You always this territorial? Or is it just her that makes you stupid?” The man snorts.
“Try me,” I growl, stepping slightly in front of Nadia’s body. “And you’ll find out exactly how stupid I am.”
The smile fades just a little from his face. His eyes sharpen, as he cocks the gun to the side like he is seconds from blowing my head off, but he’d have to chop me up into pieces and spread me across all seven continents for me not to hurt him if he hurts my Nadia.
Behind me, I feel Nadia shift—just the smallest movement, her fingers tightening faintly in the fabric of my jeans. Her presence, even now, is gravity.
“Sho…” she croaks, voice shredded.
