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Cole
The fire burned for hours.
Long after the shooting stopped, the flames kept chewing through what was left — metal, rubber, the smell of fuel and death rising in the dark.
Cole stood in the wreckage, rain dripping off his jaw, every muscle strung tight. Around him, the Reapers moved like ghosts, checking the fallen, dragging out whoever was still breathing. The once-silent yard now looked like the end of the world.
Deke came up behind him, face streaked with soot and blood. "Three gone. Two hit bad. Vultures left their dead — at least eight."
Cole nodded once. He didn't speak. His throat was raw from smoke and shouting. His shoulder throbbed where a bullet had grazed him, but the pain barely registered.
His eyes were on the twisted remains of the truck.
Elena had been in there.
He'd seen her crawl out — coughing, shaking — but that moment of not knowing still haunted him. The sound of the explosion, her name tearing out of him… it stuck like barbed wire in his chest.
"Prez?" Deke said quietly. "We gotta move. More'll come."
Cole turned away from the fire, voice low. "Get the wounded on the bikes. We head back to the ridge. Nobody gets left behind."
"Copy that."
Deke peeled off, shouting orders.
Cole started toward the ridge himself, boots crunching through glass and gravel. The adrenaline was wearing thin, leaving behind the ache — of loss, of anger, of everything he couldn't say.
And then he saw her.
Elena sat on the back of a pickup they'd salvaged, blanket wrapped tight around her shoulders. Her face was pale, streaked with soot, her hair clinging damp to her cheeks. When she looked up at him, the chaos around them faded for a second.
He stopped.
She looked fragile — but her eyes held something fierce. Something alive.
"You should be resting," he said, voice rough.
Her lips curved, barely. "Kind of hard to rest when things keep exploding around you."
That got the faintest huff of breath out of him. Not a laugh — but close.
He moved closer, crouching beside her. "You hurt?"
"Just a few burns," she murmured. "I'm okay."
He scanned her anyway — the bruise on her neck, the trembling in her hands. She wasn't okay. But she was breathing.
"That was a setup," she said, eyes on the flames. "They knew you'd come."
Cole's jaw tightened. "Yeah. And next time, we make sure they regret it."
Elena looked at him then — really looked. The firelight caught in his eyes, reflecting something she couldn't name. Pain. Rage. Loyalty. And beneath it all, exhaustion that ran bone-deep.
"You can't save everyone, Cole," she whispered.
He met her gaze. "Doesn't mean I stop trying."
Silence hung between them. The rain hissed on the flames, turning smoke into mist.
She swallowed hard, voice barely there. "When the truck went up… I thought—"
He didn't let her finish. His hand reached out before he could stop himself, brushing a strand of hair from her face. The gesture was rough, but his touch was careful. "You're still here."
She nodded once, eyes glimmering. "Yeah. For now."
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Elena
They rode through the night, headlights cutting through the rain. Cole didn't look back once.
She sat in the pickup's passenger seat beside Deke, the hum of engines a strange comfort now. The Reapers were silent — a line of battered riders heading home from hell.
Every bump in the road jarred her sore ribs. Every flash of lightning made her flinch. But the worst part was the smell — smoke, oil, blood. It clung to her, to all of them.
When they reached the ridge, dawn was bleeding through the clouds — pale pink on a world that didn't deserve it.
Cole was the last off his bike. He walked like a man carrying ghosts, and maybe he was. She watched him from the steps of the safehouse as he peeled off his gloves, flexed bloodstained hands, and stared out at the horizon.
He hadn't said a word since the yard.
Elena hesitated, then crossed to him. "They'll come again, won't they?"
He didn't look at her. "Yeah."
"And you'll fight."
"That's what we do."
She nodded, wrapping her arms tighter around herself. "Then maybe… it's time I stop running."
That got his attention. He turned, eyes narrowing. "What do you mean?"
Her chin lifted. "You said they're after me because I know something. You're right."
Cole went still. "What do you know, Elena?"
For a heartbeat, all she could hear was the rain on the tin roof. Then, quietly:
"They're not just moving girls. They're moving people. Cops. Politicians. Buyers. The Vultures aren't just a gang — they're part of something bigger."
Cole's jaw set. The air between them changed — heavy, dangerous. "You sure about that?"
"I was supposed to be sold to someone important," she said softly. "I heard names. Faces. I remember them."
He stepped closer, voice low, certain. "Then we burn the whole damn nest."
She should've been scared by the look in his eyes — cold, steady, lethal.
But she wasn't.
For the first time, she felt like she wasn't fighting alone.
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