Chapter 91

**Hadassah POV**

The lead running point nods me over. I beeline for the one who took my earpiece, slipping it out of his pocket before I fix it back in my ear. I strut toward the door until I’m surrounded by a contingent of Torin’s men. Every step is measured as they advance with tactical precision, men in tuxedos, armed with rifles covering my front and rearguard, and I feel like the most all-important person in the world as we navigate through the labyrinthine corridors. We come to the crossroads where the corridors fork into new sections and I diverge our forces with the flick of my fingers, sending two of them left and right.
“Incoming!”
The air crackles with the sharp retort of silenced pistols and the clatter of the high-caliber rifles. The lead wraps his burly arm around me, hauling me off my feet and hurtling around a corner before he flattens me against the wall. With the air torn from my lungs, I look back at his stormy eyes with his thick, dark brows bunching over them, clenched.
“Whoa, you’re not even going to ask me out first?” I joke.
Though he says nothing, a spark of humor in his eyes tells me everything I need to know before he returns fire. The guards are taken by surprise by the ruthless precision and speed of Torin’s men. When it’s clear, he takes a hold of me protectively and tucks me behind him so I’m safe in the shelter of his presence as we advance together. We all breach through high-security doors and they bypass biometric locks using specialized equipment. The others deal with the resisting guards, the air pounding with the concussive sound of the clangor of high velocity bullets.
The lead guy and I enter the security room. The spacious expanse can accommodate multiple personnel with ergonomic workstations that have dead men with their torsos bent and lying limp on the table. Blood splatter steaks across the tempered glass and the high-grade composite panels.
My stomach churns, but I continue with my nerves steeled. I take the chair and I roll one of the guys away from the primary station before he sags and droops until he drops to the floor. The lead guy merely wrenches the dead security guard away before he plops down on the seat, manspreading whilst he cradles the rifle to his chest comfortably. I shake my head at the cruel indifference before I move closer to observe the state-of-the-art surveillance system with multiple monitors displaying real-time feeds from strategically placed security cameras throughout the palace and its grounds.
With my fingers pressed on the earpiece, I say, “Torin?”
His voice cracks through with resounding panic as I can hear the elite citizens frantic in the background.
“We’re being relocated to the underground bunker for our safety,” he informs with the line sizzling with static. “We’ll lose contact in seconds.”
“Everything’s going according to plan up here. From here, it’s all on you.”
This was the plan. Me getting caught. All of it—except for Calum’s surprise guest appearance. The auction was just a smoke show to give us a legitimate reason for having access to the well-fortified estate. The plan was to trigger a major security breach, enough to shuttle everyone into the panic room in a desperate bid to secure the owner’s life along with his elite visitants. Mr Moretti’s underground chamber where he allegedly keeps his most valued possessions, treasures, artifacts that would never make it on the auction list. They think they’re ensuring the safety of such items, but triggering their red alert protocol was exactly what we wanted.
“You have lethal instincts,” the lead guy says, his voice guttural and rough. His eyes rake over me gradually before they leap to meet my gaze with a glaze over his eyes. “And lethal skills. I don’t believe for a second that a techie could take advantage of you.”
“He couldn’t,” I say with my eyes on the surveillance feed, watching the different teams throughout the interior. “I don’t know if you missed the season of the show that Santos had taken me. That man beat my ass senseless. I still had healing fractures—that pain was what he took advantage of.” I shoot a meaningful glance at him. “I can show you how.”
“The fuck—y–y—ou—wi—ll,” Torin says before his line cuts out.
He must be descending underground now.
The lead guy spurts to his feet, his fingerless glove grip hefting the rifle to rest it on his broad shoulder with the barrel aimed at the ceiling. He leans closer, inspecting the live footage. In the dimness, the glow of multiple monitors cast an eerie light on his face as he scrutinizes the feed and that’s when I see it. I inch closer until I’m aligned with him and I place the gun on the surface of the blood-stained table. A swarm of black clad combatants, faces covered, equipped with black tactical gear. They flood inside like an obsidian tidal wave. I would say these are the CIA operatives Calum warned us about, but the nameless vests hint at something far more sinister. Special forces, perhaps?
Suddenly, amidst the sea of footage, a figure emerges on the display. He moves with an all too powerful, predatory prowess through the opulent corridors, his presence commanding and unmistakable. My stomach plummets at the sight of him like a cold knife twisting in my gut.
A whimper escapes me and I slap my hand over my mouth.
For a moment, he pauses. The frame captures him in a mid-step, his dark, menacing silhouette stark against the grandeur of the gilded surroundings. His eyes, cold and unyielding, slice across the corridor. Then, in a jarring twist, he sharply lifts his gaze directly toward the camera.
My breath catches in my throat. It’s like he can see through the monitor, his eyes piercing through the digital veil and locking onto mine. The feeling is visceral—a paralyzing realization that his gaze is not just on the feed, but on me, personally, darkly, intimately. His eyes are voids of bone-chilling intent, devoid yet filled with calculating menace.
My hand falls from my mouth. “I have to get out of here,” I breathe.
In that petrifying instant, time seems to stretch and warp. The world around me withers, leaving only the oppressive weight of his gaze. A nightmare made flesh, as though he can reach through the screen and pull me into his world. His lips curl into a faint, haunting smirk. As if he knows I’m watching, he inclines his chin, exhibiting his neck with my name tattooed on the canvas of his throat, a bloodcurdling specter of fear passing through me.
The monitors flicker briefly before one by one all the feeds go dark.
“What just happened?”
“They compromised the entire system. I’m sure they’re trying to hijack the feed as we speak—we gotta move.”
Tears burst from my eyes in an uncontrollable deluge with a fear I can’t fake nor hide. I panic and dash for the door, but the lead guy restrains me with one arm. Each effort made useless in his iron grip.
“*I have to get out of here!*” I scream with an ear-splitting shrill. “*I have to get out of here*!”
“Hadassah,” he snaps, and I sag against him dejectedly. “You need to calm down and stay on point. Look, I know, I was there the day Torin extracted you—I know what that fucker did to you, but don’t let that get in your head. He wants to make you rattled, scared so that you make a mistake and then you ensnare yourself. But you’re smarter than that… and stronger.”
I inhale a quelling breath to douse the cold fire inside. I open my eyes, and my vision sharpens into a singular focus. Sensing my forced equanimity, he slowly releases me. I rotate around and I snatch the gun from the table. I check the clip to find a full magazine before I slam it back.
“We need a new plan,” I point out.
“The sea-gate is still tactically apt,” he adds on, “with Orian’s army here swarming the place, I’m sure he has every exit point secured. The subterranean network is our only way out. The only problem now is intercepting Torin and getting him out.”
“Panic rooms are equipped with their own surveillance system,” I say, my eyes bouncing everywhere as I brave an audacious calculus—a perilous ploy. “I’m sure he’s seeing everything that we can. He’ll need to avail himself because panic rooms are designed to be impenetrable from the exterior—we won’t even have the time to break through them. Which is why I’ll spare you some time.”
His eyes snap back to me furies like a flash flood.
“There’s only one thing Orian wants more than his traitor brother. And that’s me. I can lead them away—”
“No fucking way.”
“Just listen, the underground bunker—the panic room is linked to the subterranean network that will lead you to the sea gate. There’s an alternate access point that can be used to reach them—on the other side of the property. We just need to make Orian think that I’m making a break for that egress.”
“Deceptive,” he notes. “But how do you plan on getting away with it?”
My brows quirk at the idea. “It will require a sacrifice,” I admit grimly.