Chapter 180

Chapter 180
The gunshot split the world in half.

Siena didn’t feel the impact at first—just the brutal force slamming into the wall behind her as Damien tackled her down, his body covering hers completely. The sound of the bullet embedding into the steel panel ricocheted inside her ears, sharp and metallic.

Smoke stung her eyes. Her heart hammered against Damien’s chest. He pressed harder over her, muscles locked, breath harsh with pure murderous panic.

“Siena—talk to me.”

His voice wasn’t steady. Damien Voss was never unsteady.

“I’m okay,” she croaked. “I—I think I’m okay.”

He lifted himself just enough to run his hands over her torso, her arms, her hips—quick, rough, frantic. His palms trembled. Trembled.

“No blood,” he whispered like a prayer he didn’t believe he had the right to say.

Another gunshot cracked inches from his head. Damien twisted, grabbed the back of the overturned table with one arm, yanked it forward, and slammed it down over them like a shield just as another spray of bullets punched into the wood.

He lowered his body again, covering hers, breath fanning against her ear. “Don’t move.”

“You’re on top of me,” she whispered. “I can’t.”

Even in the middle of an assassination attempt, his body reacted—she felt the unmistakable shift against her thigh, the tension that wasn’t only from danger. His voice was gravel. “Not the time, Siena.”

“That’s your fault,” she whispered, her pulse sparking even now, even under fire.

His chest vibrated with a sound that was not quite a growl, not quite a curse.

The table shuddered above them as another hail of bullets hit. Damien shifted his body to shield her better, muscles coiled tight, holding the bulk of the weight.

“We have to move,” he muttered. “They’re trying to corner us.”

“How many?”

“Five, but trained. Not street mercenaries. These are professionals.”

Another explosion—closer this time—shook the ground. The fire alarm screamed to life, red lights pulsing. Smoke crawled beneath the table, hot and acrid.

Damien’s voice hardened. “They’re setting the room on fire to flush us out.”

Siena swallowed. “Damien—”

“I won’t let anything happen to you.”

It wasn’t a promise. It was a vow. One that carried blood and violence and obsession in every syllable.

He reached beside them, retrieved a knife strapped under the bedframe—one she didn’t even know was there—then slid off her body in one smooth, lethal motion.

When he rose, his entire demeanor changed.

Damien Voss disappeared.

The man who took his place was merciless, stealth incarnate, a predator scenting blood.

He grabbed Siena’s face in one hand, kissed her hard—quick, but deep enough to brand. “Stay behind me. You follow exactly where I tell you. You don’t stop. Ever.”

“Damien—”

“Say you understand.”

“I understand.”

His eyes darkened with something primal. “Good girl.”

Her stomach flipped—wrong time, wrong place, and yet heat curled through her anyway.

Damien flipped the table off them and launched forward. Two bullets flew at him instantly—he dodged one, deflected the other with the knife in a blur of metal. Siena scrambled behind him, staying low.

The nearest masked man advanced, gun raised.

Damien didn’t wait.

He grabbed the man’s arm, twisted hard until a sickening crack echoed, then drove the knife into his throat. Blood sprayed. The man collapsed.

Another soldier aimed from behind.

Damien shoved Siena aside, caught the attacker around the torso, slammed him into the burning wall, and snapped his neck in one brutal motion.

“Two down,” Damien said coldly.

Siena’s breaths trembled. She’d seen Damien dangerous before. She’d never seen him like this.

The fire spread faster, smoke thickening. Alarms wailed overhead.

Damien grabbed her hand, pulling her toward the back exit. “Stay low. There’s one outside that door—”

The door exploded inward.

A third attacker kicked Damien in the chest, sending him skidding back. Siena screamed, but Damien rolled, sprang up, and lunged. They crashed to the floor in a brutal tangle of fists and steel.

The soldier was skilled—blocking, striking, countering. Damien’s jaw split at the hinge from a punch, blood seeping into his mouth. He spat it out, grabbed the man by the throat, slammed him down, and drove his knife deep into his ribs.

The attacker convulsed once, then went still.

Siena’s hands shook violently. Damien saw it.

He cupped her jaw, forcing her eyes to his. “Focus. Breathe. I need you with me.”

She tried to steady herself. His thumb stroked her cheek, grounding her in a way she didn’t have words for.

“Good,” he said softly. Then harsher: “We’re not done.”

They ran.

Through smoke. Through the flickering lights. Through the corridor where blood smeared the walls from earlier battles Damien had fought just to reach her.

But as they reached the stairwell—

A laser sight landed on Siena’s chest.

She froze.

Damien’s entire body went rigid. His voice dropped to an icy whisper.

“Don’t… move.”

Above them, a masked sniper balanced on the rail of the third-floor landing, gun aimed directly at Siena’s heart.

The man’s voice crackled through a modulated speaker. “Move again and I shoot.”

Damien stepped in front of Siena. The sniper adjusted instantly, maintaining aim on her.

“Move again,” he repeated, “and she dies.”

Siena felt her knees want to buckle. Damien’s arm shot behind him, gripping her hip, keeping her upright.

The sniper tilted his head. “The girl isn’t the target. Not primarily.”

Damien’s voice was pure death. “Then who sent you?”

The sniper smiled behind the mask. “Someone you know intimately.”

Damien’s grip tightened bruise-hard.

The sniper shrugged. “But… killing her would certainly hurt you just as much as killing you.”

“Let her go,” Damien growled.

“I don’t think so,” the sniper said lightly. “Orders were clear. Bring the girl alive. Kill the king if needed.”

Damien stepped forward.

The sniper fired.

Not at Siena.

At Damien.

Damien staggered backwards, a sharp grunt torn from him as the bullet tore through his left shoulder, blood spraying across the stairwell wall.

“No!” Siena screamed.

He didn’t fall.

Didn’t flinch beyond the single grunt.

He reached up, pulled the bullet out with his bare fingers, and let it drop to the ground with a metallic clink.

The sniper’s voice faltered. “What—”

Damien moved.

Fast. Inhumanly fast.

Before Siena could blink, he had launched himself up the stairs, leaping rail to rail like gravity didn’t apply. The sniper fired again—Damien twisted midair and the bullet whizzed past his ribs.

He tackled the sniper so hard the man’s back hit the wall with a bone-splintering crack.

They crashed onto the landing in a flurry of fists and steel. The sniper was good, but Damien fought like a man whose entire universe was standing below him. Every strike was fueled by something feral. Something personal.

Siena heard something rip—flesh? Fabric? She couldn’t tell.

The sniper reversed his knife, aiming for Damien’s throat.

“No!” she choked.

Damien grabbed the man’s wrist, twisted until bone snapped, grabbed his head, and slammed it into the steel railing.

Once.

Twice.

A third time.

The sniper went limp.

Damien didn’t stop.

“Damien!” Siena screamed. “He’s dead—stop!”

Damien froze. His chest heaved, blood dripping from his shoulder, his knuckles, his jaw. Slowly—like waking from a trance—he looked down at the lifeless body beneath him.

Then down at his own blood-covered hands.

Something inside him cracked. She saw it—saw the moment the brutality and the fear and the obsession collided inside him like a fault line giving way.

He looked at Siena. Really looked.

Her face smeared with soot. Her hair tangled. Her eyes wide with terror—not of the killers.

Of losing him.

Damien descended the stairs toward her, every step slow, like he wasn’t sure if she’d run.

She didn’t move.

When he reached her, his hand lifted toward her cheek—

But before he could touch her, a voice cut through the smoke, cold and female and dripping with venom.

“Well,” the woman drawled from the hallway behind them. “This is messier than I intended.”

Siena’s blood turned to ice.

Damien’s entire body snapped toward the sound.

Standing in the blown-open doorway—hair sleek, mouth curved, a gun dangling casually from her hand—was Leona.

And she wasn’t alone.

Two of Damien’s own men—men who should’ve been loyal—stood flanking her, guns trained on both Siena and Damien.

Damien’s voice was lethal. “Leona.”

She smiled like a woman greeting a lover she’d grown tired of.

“I told you,” Leona purred, “Siena was a liability.”

Her gaze slid to Siena.

“Time to remove her.”