I only had one second to let that name wash over me.
I only had one second to realize what William had been saying earlier—how he’d been taunting my devil with his real name.
I only had one second, and then the hall erupted into chaos.
Chapter 47
Day 182 with Briar
Lucas
William thought she didn’t know. He thought Briar would look at me with the betrayal he had felt when he’d found out about my true identity. And I knew he was counting on that look—counting on the hurt to register on Briar’s face once I confirmed my name—before the man standing behind her stabbed her with that needle and injected her with whatever poison was waiting inside.
I’d wanted to keep my name from her until this was all over, until this world had been brought down and I could finally give her me. But William wasn’t going to wait forever, and I was running out of time before he snapped and did something rash.
I looked from her flat stomach to the tears building in my blackbird’s eyes, then said on a breath, “Forever.”
She nodded quickly. The resignation and devastation on her face threatened to destroy me. But I wouldn’t go down without a fight—I never had before, and I wouldn’t now. Not when her life was being held in the hands of another. Not when I was so sure she was keeping something from me—had planned on keeping it from me until we were through with this night so I wouldn’t hide her away like I’d wanted to.
I swallowed past the thickness in my throat and chanced one last glimpse down at the gun aimed at me before I was looking at her again.
Finger off the trigger. Loose hold.
In the space of one second, I already knew exactly what I would do, and I was ready.
I took in a deep, ragged breath, and held it as I studied those green eyes for what I hoped wasn’t the last time.
I love you, Briar. I’m going to get us out of this, I vowed, then released the breath I’d been holding, and let the name I’d kept secret for the last four years fall from my lips. “Trent Cruz.”
I vaguely registered the sound of screaming coming from behind me—from the front of the hall where the celebration was being held—but didn’t turn to look as I grabbed for the gun aimed at my stomach.
The man holding it had glanced up at the screams but jerked and fought against me when I tried to wrench the gun from him.
I forced his arms up so the gun was aimed above Briar’s head and struggled to reach the trigger.
Briar cried out a split second before I fired at the man holding her, but my arms suddenly felt like dead weights, and my heart dropped when his head snapped back and he sagged to the ground. Because instead of falling with him, the needle was still there, sticking out of Briar’s arm. Her face was pale and emotionless, and she swayed as she stared blankly ahead.
“Bri—”
The man I’d been wrestling for the gun slammed me into the ground, sending the gun sliding away from us toward the girl I’d failed, just as Briar fell to the floor.
I’d promised to protect her. To keep her safe. To get her out of there alive . . .
I’d fucking failed.
I pushed up from the floor and lunged for her, her name ripping from my chest and ending in a roar as something pierced my shoulder and was roughly ripped back out. I turned toward the man who’d just tackled me and caught his wrist as he brought his hand back down in a sweeping arc, the knife in his hand covered in my blood.
Keeping his wrist tight in my grasp, I yanked his arm toward me—straightening it—then slammed the open palm of my free hand into his locked elbow, forcing it to blow out in the opposite direction, and savoring the sound of his scream as the knife clattered to the floor between us.
Throwing him down onto his back, I gripped his tie in my hand and brought his head a couple inches off the floor so it would snap back against the hard surface as I drove my fist into his face again and again.
I could only feel rage and my suffocating agony as I hit him. He needed to feel a fraction of the pain I was in. I hadn’t been able to make the other man suffer for taking my blackbird from me, and I needed someone to.
My fist halted mid-air when a gun pressed to the top of my head. I exhaled a strained, “Fuck.”
“I will admit that even with what I knew of you, I did not see this one coming,” William said through clenched teeth, and it was then that I focused on the screams that were being drowned out by deep, commanding yells for everyone to get on the floor.
The raid had begun.