Page 20 of Vows of Ruin

Max is at her side in seconds, reading it over her shoulder. “They wants you to go alone? That’s not happening.”

“I know,” she says. “But we can’t storm in either. This is all a little too planned. We have to be smart about this.”

“We’re not sending you in unguarded.” I look at her like she’s already halfway in a sniper scope.

“We won’t” she assures me. “We run it like every other operation. We don’t react. We dictate.”

Her voice is steady, but I can feel the tremor underneath.

“Walk me through it,” I say.

She does. Calm. Tactical. A fucking general. Max will drive her in. Hugo goes with her, no argument there. That dog would throw himself in front of a bullet if it meant keeping her alive. Elias and Margot will be set up in a black van, tapped into the greenhouse’s camera systems, hacking into every available angle. Margot’s got the brains and Elias has the reflexes.

Torque and Wrecker will be staged nearby in street clothes, hidden in the surrounding buildings, watching the perimeter. On comms, weapons hot. I’ll be up high. On a nearby rooftop with Riot posted beside me. My rifle will be trained on that greenhouse door, before Wrenley ever walks through it. Riot will be my second set of eyes, calling out anything I miss. Which won’t be much.

We’ll give this fucker his meeting. But if he even thinks about touching her? He dies.

Wrenley opens the velvet box that Elias hands her. Inside is a delicate brooch that doubles as a hidden pin camera, tech courtesy of Elias. “This’ll link to our feed,” he says.

“And the comm?” I ask.

Max pulls a slim piece from his pocket. “Right here. Looks like jewelry. One tap to transmit, double tap for silent alarm.”

Wrenley takes them both with steady hands, then looks at all of us like we’re her army.

Because she’s our queen, and we are. She nods once. “Let’s go see who thinks they're brave enough to call out the Serpents.”

Max slows to a stop outside the greenhouse, the SUV idling at the curb like it’s holding its breath.

From my perch across the street, high in the shadows of an old stone building, I watch through the scope as Wrenley climbs out of the backseat. She’s all black leather and calm fury, her hair braided tight, her walk purposeful. Hugo follows at her heel, tail straight, eyes sharp. He knows. That dog always knows.

Before she closes the door, she leans in. Her voice is low but comes through the comms crystal clear.

“I love you, Maximilian. Whatever happens in there, remember that.”

Max’s jaw flexes. “I love you too, Sparrow. I’ll be waiting right here.”

She nods once and shuts the door.

She walks forward, slow, steady, then pauses at the threshold of the greenhouse. The light filters through the warped glass panes, casting her in fractured sunlight like stained glass. She turns her head just slightly, looking up.

Right where I am. Her voice comes through my ear piece, quieter than before but stronger too.

“Liam,” she says. “Don’t be twitchy. But if he so much as looks at me sideways… you drop him.”

Then, after a breath, soft as smoke but burning through me like wildfire.

“I love you.”

It sucker-punches me.

She’s never said it to me before. Not like that. Not outside of heat and chaos. Not with all this weight wrapped around it.

My fingers tighten on the grip of my rifle. What I want to do is tear down this fire escape, grab her, and take her somewhere no one else can touch her, kiss that vow off her lips, and do things to her that aren’t legal in public or private. I breathe through it. Focus.

“I love you too, little warrior,” I say, steady and sharp as a blade drawn in the dark.

She smiles. Then she walks through the door and into the lion's den. I swear to God, if this motherfucker even blinks wrong, I’m sending a bullet through their eye socket and into whatever rotted brain they've got left.