Page 74 of Claimed By the Damned
"And... if gettingherout 'unharmed' proves difficult? If she refuses to cooperate once the obstacles are neutralized?"
I smile, a cold, fierce thing. I lick a stray drop of vodka — or maybe blood — from my lip, savoring the sting. "Shewillcomehome. If she fights, contain her. Use necessary force to restrain herwithout injury. No tasers, no damaging holds. Use speed, disorientation, numbers. Box her in, secure her limbs gently but firmly, get her into the transport. She can scream, she can struggle—it changes nothing. Bringing her back intact is all that matters. Understand?"
"...Understood. Containment without injury."
"Excellent." I end the call, the silence absolute.
The game is over.
Time to collect what's mine.
The night is thick with silence, the kind that comes before the storm. My men move like phantoms, slipping through the darkness, every footstep calculated, every breath controlled. I watch from a safe distance, perched atop an abandoned rooftop, the small town spread out beneath me like a chessboard.
Tonight, I make my move.
Their compound is well-secured, but security means nothing when cracks already exist within its walls. My inside man has done his job. He has disabled the initial perimeter sensors along the west fence and confirmed the delay of the interior motion detectors in the ground floor hallway for precisely seven minutes, our window. Just enough to give my men a window—just enough to let them in without raising immediate suspicion.
They are in position.
A flicker of movement in the shadows, the telltale shift of weight—a predator preparing to strike.
The moment my men breach the perimeter through the confirmed unsecured service door, multiple shadows move frominside the house—fast, precise,trained. Some hold back, likely protectingher, but the ones that meet my men head-on are no ordinary security detail. And leading the defense...them. The three men from the footage. More dangerousin person. They aren’t just fighting to defend; they fight like men who have been through war andwon. They don’t hesitate.
The first shot rings out, cutting through the night – closer than expected, fromwithinthe house. Followed by the flash of muzzle fire. My eyes narrow. The bullet strikes metal near my men, sending sparks into the darkness. Somewhere in the chaos, a strangled yell echoes, one of mine.
Before I can process the level of coordination, the fight explodes. Fast. Brutal. Efficient. My men, trained and ruthless and following the routes I laid out based on the mole's intel, are suddenly forced onto the defensive. Their aggression meets something harder. They are losing ground.
They are no longer the predators—they are the prey. My knuckles whiten where I grip the edge of the rooftop parapet.Impossible.
Ethan Mercer—lean, calculated—moves like a ghost through the chaos, his ice-gray eyes, reading the fight like some damned equation. He takes down one of my men with brutal efficiency, a precise shot to the kneecap that has the man screaming, followed by a swift, disabling blow to another's temple using the butt of his rifle. My eyes narrow. Fast and precise, just like the tech expert he supposedly is.
Then Bastian Cross—the strategist, radiating controlled power. He fights coldly, methodically. Every move deliberate. He breaks one man's arm with terrifying ease, dislocating the shoulder before using another attacker's momentum to slam him face-first into a wall, dropping him instantly. No wasted motion.
And Ryker Cage... the biggest one. Pure, unpredictable force. A fuckingBerserker. He doesn't fight with grace or calculation,just raw, unhinged violence that borders on suicidal. He catches a pipe swung at his head, wrenches it free, and uses it to shatter the attacker's bones. He meets a knife attack not with evasion, but with alaugh—a raw, wild sound that carries faintly even to my rooftop perch—before brutally headbutting the man into unconsciousness. Blood smears across his knuckles, unnoticed or ignored.
My jaw tightens so hard a pain shoots through my temple. This is not how it's supposed to go. My perfect plan, built on precise intel and designed for surgical insertion and extraction, unraveling under their disciplined assault. My grip tightens on the radio communicator, the cool plastic threatening to crack under the pressure.
I watch my highly trained men falter, struggle,fall. Did I underestimate them? Grossly. These are not mere bodyguards or hired guns. The way they move coordinated, lethal, no hesitation, screams elite military training. Perhaps the intel from my mole, while accurate on the physical layout, failed to capture the true caliber of my opponents. Or perhaps they adapted faster than anticipated.
The same men who had cost me millions years ago. Rage, cold and sharp, coils tight in my gut, fighting the need for damage control. A hissed curse escapes my lips. This isn't defeat; it is tactical necessity. Preserve assets and reassess.
“Otstupat'!” I snap into the radio, the Russian command severe and cutting. “Retreat. Fall back to pre-designated rally point Bravo!”
The retreat is chaotic, costly... This stings, a rare, infuriating miscalculation. One I willnotmake again. Fury settles into something cold.
A lesson. Next time, I will not make the same mistake.
But it isn’t over.
I turn away, inhaling deeply, forcing my pulse to steady. My men regroup, licking their wounds, waiting for orders.
I will regroup, re-strategize.Theywon tonight. But wars aren’t won in a single battle.
Then I disappear into the night.
Chapter 23: The Girl Who Wouldn’t Break
Lila
