Chapter 149 The Truth Unveiled
She wasn’t a damsel. Wasn’t weak. Wasn’t breakable.
She was steel wrapped in softness. Fire hidden under calm.
She was exactly the kind of person who’d walk back into hell for the people she loved.
“I’m tired of this shit,” Melissa added. Her jaw set.
She looked at the compound.
“So we’re going to walk in there. We’re going to get Gavin and Aria. And then we’re going to end this once and for all.”
Kane smiled. It was grim and dark but it was a snails:
“Yes, ma’am.”
He pulled his weapon. Checked the magazine. Chambered a round and then looked at his men.
“Anyone coming with us?”
Three hands went up immediately. The most loyal. The ones who’d follow Kane into hell itself.
“The rest of you,” Kane said, “stay here. Be ready for emergency extraction. And if we’re not out in twenty minutes…”
“We’re coming in after you,” one of the men interrupted.
Kane nodded. “Fair enough.”
He looked at Melissa. “Can you run?” he asked.
“I can do whatever I have to do.”
“Good.” He started walking toward the compound. “Stay behind me. Stay low. And if I tell you to run, you run. Understood?”
“Only if you promise the same thing applies to you.”
Kane glanced back at her. “Deal.”
They walked toward the entrance. Toward the burning empire. Toward certain death or miraculous survival.
Behind them, Ethan watched with something like awe.
“She’s insane,” one of the men muttered.
“No,” Ethan said quietly. “She is a fighter.”
Melissa and Kane disappeared into the compound. Into the smoke and chaos and madness. Into the final battle.
This was it. The end of everything.
Or the beginning of something new. Forged in blood and fire and impossible choices.
Melissa limped through the entrance, Kane at her side, and didn’t look back.
Because looking back meant hesitation.
And hesitation meant death.
Forward was the only direction that mattered now.
Forward to Gavin.
Forward to Aria.
Forward to whatever ending this nightmare would bring.
And she’d walk through hell itself to get there.
One painful step at a time.
Kane pushed the massive doors open.
They swung inward with a groan of protesting hinges. The sound echoed through the cavernous hall like a death knell.
Melissa stepped through first.
The sight that greeted her stole the breath from her lungs.
Gavin.
Lying in a pool of blood so large it looked black in the dim lighting. His body was utterly still. Face pale as death. The crimson mantle gone from his shoulders, he looked like a dying god.
Melissa sucked in a sharp breath. Her broken arm throbbed. Her legs threatened to give out. But her face remained perfectly blank.
She wouldn’t give Sophia the satisfaction of seeing her break.
Not yet. She turned slowly.
Sophia sat on Zeus’s throne at the head of the hall. The crimson mantle draped across her shoulders. Her dress was destroyed…torn, bloodstained, filthy. Her makeup had run in streaks down her face, giving her the appearance of a deranged doll.
And she was smiling. The moment Melissa’s eyes met hers, Sophia began to laugh.
High-pitched. Manic laughter. The sound of someone who’d crossed the line from sanity into something darker.
“Oh!” Sophia clapped her hands together like a delighted child. “Oh, I’m so glad you could come back! This is perfect! This is absolutely PERFECT!”
She stood from the throne. The mantle dragged behind her like a blood-soaked train.
“See, the thing is…” Sophia’s voice was almost conversational “…when the family puts a target on you, there is no escape. None. You can run to the ends of the earth and we’ll still find you.”
She walked closer. Guards lined the walls. All of them watching. All of them armed.
Melissa stood her ground.
“You really think you’re God, don’t you?” Melissa’s voice was steady. Cold.
Sophia’s smile widened. “Yes. We are. We are absolute.”
She threw a sad, almost pitying look at Gavin’s motionless body.
“I just don’t know why he couldn’t see that. Why he thought he could be something other than what Zeus made him.” Her voice turned bitter. “Why he thought loving YOU was worth throwing away divinity.”
Kane took a step forward. His hand on his weapon.
“Where is Aria?” His voice was deadly calm.
Sophia’s eyes snapped to him. She raised one hand.
Immediately, three guards moved. Positioned themselves around Gavin’s body. Guns pointed at his head.
“Don’t step forward before I ask my men to blow Gavin’s brains out and end it,” Sophia said sweetly.
Melissa’s heart stopped.
Then she heard a breath, it was shallow and barely there but she heard it.
Gavin was still alive.
Relief flooded through her so intensely she almost collapsed. He was hanging on. Still fighting. Still refusing to die.
And she knew…knew with absolute certainty…that Gavin Cross wasn’t a quitter. He wouldn’t die easily. Wouldn’t leave her alone in this hell.
He was alive. And as long as he was alive, there was hope.
A door at the side of the hall opened. Jason walked through and he was dragging someone.
No.
Not someone.
Aria.
Melissa’s world stopped.
Aria’s hands were bound behind her back. Her face was swollen, one eye nearly shut from bruising. Blood matted her dark hair. Her clothes were torn.
She could barely walk. Jason was half-carrying, half-dragging her.
“Aria,” Melissa whimpered.
The sound escaped before she could stop it. It sounded raw and broken.
She took a step forward. NKane’s hand shot out and stopped her.
The guards around Gavin tensed with their fingers on triggers.
Melissa froze.
“Jason,” she said. Her voice was shaking now. “How could you?”
Jason didn’t look at her. Just kept his eyes forward. His jaw clenched.
Silent.
He dropped Aria roughly. She hit the floor with a cry of pain. And curler into herself.
Melissa’s hands clenched into fists. “JASON! How could you do this?”
Still nothing. Sophia’s laughter rang out again.
“How could he?” She walked closer to Melissa. Circling her like a predator. “You think everyone is like your stupid Gavin? Stupid enough to throw away power that nations would kill for?”
She gestured at Jason. “Jason got his position by blood and by suffering. He won’t throw it away when he’s the next king.”