Page 63 of Vows of Ruin

One guard is posted by the back door. Sloppy. I lift my hand, dagger cool against my palm, and exhale, finding the rhythm of my heartbeat before I throw. The blade spins once, twice, and lands with a wet thunk straight into his throat. He collapses without a sound.

“Go,” I hiss, already moving.

We break from cover, boots pounding against the dirt. Max reaches the door first, yanking it open. Torque and Wrecker slip through ahead of me, weapons drawn, clearing the narrow hallway. I bend at the last second, ripping my dagger from the guard’s neck, blood already pooling beneath his head. No time to process. No time to feel.

Margot’s voice crackles in my ear. “You’re in. I’ve looped the hallway feeds. You’ve got four minutes before the next sweep.”

We flood the back corridors like a storm. Max and I peel left, Reaper to the right, while Toque and Wrecker head straight through to breach the upper floor. Riot and Elias are already inside through the front, Hunter confirmed it. They’re sweeping the ground level, herding any girls they can find toward the extraction vans parked two blocks away.

Reaper’s voice comes through, low and sharp. “Room on your right, two heat signatures. One armed.”

Max nods to me, and I kick the door in.

The man inside barely has time to turn before Max drops him with a single shot to the chest. The girl in the corner screams, clutching a torn bedsheet to her chest. I’m at her side in a second.

“You’re safe,” I tell her, crouching down. “We’re here to get you out.”

Max pulls his jacket off and wraps it around her. “A doctor is waiting for you. You’re going to be okay.”

Another voice over the comm, Cash this time. “Two more secured. Sending them out with Noah.”

There’s shouting now, panicked male voices. A gunshot cracks through the hall.

“Wrecker,” Max says into the comm. “Report.”

“I’m fine,” he responds, breathing heavily. “But these assholes are trying to barricade the girls on the top floor. We’re going through the wall if we have to.”

Reaper again. “I’m on my way. Max, three more moving your direction. Heavy weapons.”

We move faster.

I’m running before I know it, knife still slick in my hand. We reach the hall just as the thugs round the corner. Max drops one with a shot between the eyes. I duck and roll under the swing of a second man’s baton, come up under his arm, and drive my blade into his side. He chokes, and stumbles. Max finishes him.

The third one turns and runs, coward.

From above us, I hear Torque shout, “Girls are secured! But someone set a fire in the north hall!”

Riot again, “I’m grabbing the last two now. Wren—status?”

“Still breathing,” I say, wiping the blade on my thigh. “You?”

A beat of silence, then him again breathless. “Having the time of my fucking life.”

The fire alarm wails as smoke starts to curl beneath the second-floor landing. Chaos bleeds through the building, thick and choking. Screams. Gunshots. Footsteps pounding across broken tiles. And beneath it all, our comms, our pulse, our mission.

Thirty girls. We have to get all of them out.

Max and I reach the base of the stairs just as Wrecker comes barreling down, carrying a girl who can’t be more than sixteen, blood on her cheek, eyes glassy. He doesn’t stop. He just nods to us, breathing hard, and keeps running.

Torque appears at the railing, smoke behind him. “We’ve got eight more. Second-floor landing’s blocked. Reaper’s going to blow it clear.”

“Do it,” I say.

Margot’s voice in our ears now, “Fire crews are on the way. You’ve only got a few minutes before the building’s crawling with uniforms.”

Max grabs my hand. “Time to move, Sparrow.”

I nod, blood-slick fingers wrapping around his. “Let’s finish this.”