Chapter 43: The Shot

The night split open.

Rain hammered against the cracked windscreen as my scream tore through the dark. The car jerked sideways, tyres skidding on wet asphalt, glass raining over my lap. I shielded my face, heart slamming against my ribs.

“Eve!”

Sebastian’s voice came from somewhere behind the haze of sound and flashing lights. He grabbed the steering wheel, wrenching it straight. The car groaned, spun, then slammed to a stop against the guardrail with a metallic crunch.

For a moment, everything went still — except the rain.

My breath came in shallow gasps. My hands shook, blood streaking across my knuckles where the glass had cut me.

“Eve, talk to me!” Sebastian’s voice broke through the chaos. He reached across the console, cupping my face. “Are you hurt?”

I shook my head, dazed. “I—I think I’m fine.”

Then I froze.

A dark figure moved through the downpour ahead. The headlights caught him for a heartbeat — soaked shirt clinging to his chest, eyes wild with panic.

Gabriel.

He ran toward them, rain slashing across his face. “Eve!”

Sebastian pushed open the door and stepped out, blocking me instinctively. But Gabriel didn’t slow. He yanked open my door, breath coming hard. “Are you okay? Are you—” His voice cracked as he saw the blood on my hand. “Jesus, Eve.”

I blinked at him, disoriented. “Gabriel? What—how did you—”

“I followed you,” he said quickly. “I couldn’t let you go like that. Then I saw—” He stopped, his gaze flicking past me toward the road behind us. “She’s here.”

My pulse spiked. “Emily?”

He nodded once. “She’s following you.”

The words landed like a blow. “What?”

“She had someone with her,” he said, scanning the road. “A man in a black sedan. They’ve been tailing you since Riverside.”

Sebastian swore under his breath and turned toward the shadows. “You sure?”

But before Gabriel could answer, headlights flared in the distance— blinding, cutting through the rain. A dark car slid to a stop across the road, blocking the way out.

My stomach twisted. “That’s her.”

The driver’s door opened.

Emily stepped out — hair plastered to her face, eyes gleaming under the stormlight. She wasn’t the polished assistant anymore. Her expression was something else entirely — desperate, unhinged, dangerous.

“Well,” she said softly, her voice trembling through the rain, “isn’t this touching?”

Gabriel moved instinctively in front of me. “Don’t come any closer.”

Emily laughed — brittle, sharp. “Oh, relax, Gabriel. I didn’t come here to fight.”

“Then what do you want?” Sebastian called. “Because you’ve been chasing us for ten miles.”

Emily’s gaze darted to him, then to me. Her smile thinned. “I want what’s mine.”

I straightened, fury cutting through my fear. “What’s yours? You mean the lies you built? The life you tried to steal?”

“Oh, come on,” Emily said, stepping closer. “Don’t act like the saint, Eve. You had your chance. You had him—and you threw him away.”

My throat tightened. “I never threw him away. You took him.”

“I saved him!” Emily’s voice cracked, echoing across the rain-soaked street. “You weren’t there when he woke up screaming, when he couldn’t remember who he was. I was. Me.”

Gabriel’s jaw clenched. “You were feeding me lies.”

Emily’s expression faltered, then hardened. “I gave you peace.”

“You gave me nothing but confusion,” he said, voice low. “You made me believe I destroyed the woman I loved.”

My breath hitched — the first time he’d said it like that. Loved.

Emily flinched, then straightened her spine, rain dripping from her chin. “You think you love her now because your memory’s playing tricks on you again. That’s what this is, Gabriel. You don’t remember what we had.”

He shook his head slowly. “You’re wrong.”

Her eyes glimmered, desperate. “Then tell me why you came to me every night after the crash. Why you begged me to stay.”

I stiffened.

Gabriel froze.

For a moment, the rain filled the silence — heavy, relentless.

Then Gabriel said quietly, “Because you told me Eve was dead.”

Emily’s face broke — shock, pain, disbelief. “No. No, that’s not—”

“You lied,” he said, his voice cold now, steady. “You lied about the crash. About Marcus. About the pregnancy. And you’re lying now.”

Emily’s lips trembled. “I did it for you—”

“No,” I cut in, stepping forward. My voice was quiet, deadly calm. “You did it for yourself.”

Emily’s eyes darted to me, fury igniting again. “You don’t know what it was like watching him look at you every day like you hung the sun. You had everything. And I—”

“Enough!” Gabriel shouted.

Thunder roared overhead.

Emily went still.

For a long, tense second, no one moved.

Then the man from the black sedan stepped out — tall, broad-shouldered, a gun glinting faintly under his coat.

Sebastian’s hand went to his jacket. “Get behind me.”

But before anyone could move, the man raised the gun — and fired.

The sound split the air like lightning.

—

The sound ripped through the night.

One sharp crack, swallowed by thunder. Then silence—heavy, stunned, unreal.

I flinched, my body jerking backward as if the air itself had punched me.

For a split second, I couldn’t tell where the pain came from, couldn’t tell if I’d been hit.

“Eve!”

Gabriel’s voice broke through the ringing in my ears. He lunged forward, grabbing my arms, his hands slick with rain. “Talk to me—are you hit?”

I blinked, trembling. “I—I don’t think so—”

Then a groan cut through the storm.

Sebastian stumbled back, hand pressed to his shoulder. Blood darkened his sleeve instantly, seeping through his jacket.

“Sebastian!” I gasped, catching him before he could fall.

He hissed, teeth clenched. “I’m fine—go—just—”

Another shot tore through the air.

Gabriel pulled me down behind the car, shoving me toward the ground. The sound of bullets striking metal rang around us, each impact sending sparks into the wet night.

“Stay down!” he shouted.

Emily’s voice rose above the chaos—raw, furious. “Stop it!” I said stop!”

The man with the gun—dark coat, gloved hands—hesitated for a fraction of a second, his aim faltering. “He’s going to take you in, Emily. You said, “No witnesses.”

“I said stop!” She screamed again, voice cracking. “That wasn’t the plan!”

My heart pounded as I crouched beside the wrecked car, my mind racing.

He’s not just muscle. He’s cleaning up.

Emily had come ready to end this.

Sebastian gritted his teeth, trying to sit up. “They’re not bluffing, Eve. You need to—”

His breath caught in pain. “You need to move.”

I looked at Gabriel. “We can’t just leave him—”

“I’m not leaving anyone,” Gabriel said. His eyes were ice now—focused, dangerous. “When I say run, you run. Understand?”

Before I could answer, he reached into the car, ripped out a length of twisted metal from the broken frame, and flung it at the road light above the shooter. It shattered on impact.

Darkness swallowed the street.

The gunman swore and fired again—blind.

Gabriel tackled him. They hit the wet pavement hard, grappling, rain and mud splashing around us. The gun clattered away, spinning across the ground toward the gutter.

Emily screamed, her voice breaking into panic. “Gabriel! Stop—stop, you’ll kill him!”

But Gabriel didn’t stop.

Every suppressed memory, every lie, every ghost Emily had fed him boiled to the surface. He slammed the man against the asphalt, fury cutting through him like electricity.

I crawled forward, grabbing the gun just as the man’s hand reached for it.

“Don’t!” she shouted, raising it with shaking hands. “Don’t move!”

The man froze.

For a heartbeat, everything stopped—the rain, the struggle, the noise. Just me, holding the weapon, my breath coming in ragged bursts.

Then Emily stepped forward, rain streaking her face, her voice low and trembling.

“Eve. Put it down.”

My hands shook harder. “You hired him. You did this.”

“You don’t understand—” Emily’s voice cracked. “They’re not mine. I didn’t—he’s not with me anymore.”

“Then who?” Sebastian’s voice came from behind her, weak but furious. “Who the hell sent him?”

Emily didn’t answer.

Her eyes darted behind me—past me—to something moving in the shadows of the trees.

Gabriel noticed too. He twisted, still on the ground, scanning the dark.

“Eve,” he said quietly, “there’s someone else here.”

Thunder rolled again, louder this time. The gun felt like it weighed a hundred pounds in my hand.

Emily took another step forward, pleading now. “You need to listen to me. If you don’t get out of here, they’ll finish what they started.”

My stomach turned. “Who?”

Before Emily could speak, a second car’s headlights flared behind us.

A black SUV—no plates—roared to a stop. The driver’s door opened, and a man in a dark suit stepped out, expression unreadable under the rain.

“Emily Dalton,” he called, his voice cold, clipped, and professional. “You’ve made a mess.”

Emily’s face went pale. “No—no, you weren’t supposed to—”

He raised a silenced pistol.

Gabriel lunged for me.

The shot hissed through the rain.

Emily’s body jerked—then collapsed.

I screamed as Gabriel caught me before I hit the ground. The rain turned crimson around us.

The man holstered his gun, eyes flat as glass. “End of liability,” he said, then turned back toward the SUV.

Sebastian tried to rise, voice raw. “Who the hell are you?!”

The man didn’t answer. The SUV’s lights flicked once, then it began to reverse—melting into the fog.

I knelt in the rain, holding Emily’s body, the warmth already fading from her skin.

Gabriel crouched beside her, blood and rain streaking his face.

Emily’s lips moved, barely a whisper. “It wasn’t me… I didn’t… finish it…”

Her eyes fluttered, then went still.

I looked up, my voice trembling, breaking. “She was scared of him. Whoever he was—he wasn’t working for her.”

Gabriel met my eyes, realisation dawning like lightning behind his expression.

“She was working for someone else.”

Sebastian swayed on his feet, grimacing. “Then that means—”

Gabriel’s jaw tightened. “This isn’t over.”

The rain came harder, washing the blood toward the gutter as sirens wailed in the distance.

And behind us, in the mud, the fallen man’s phone buzzed once — a new message lighting the cracked screen.

Unknown Sender:

"Phase one complete. Proceed to extraction."