Chapter 9 · Say Stay

The lamps blew first.

Then the entire counting room jumped, like a boot had kicked the foundation right out from under us.

I hit the floor off the cot. My dad's ledger flew out of my lap. Page 212. The first column of numbers that had finally started making sense. Now it was pitch-black, concrete dust was choking my throat, and my ears shrieked like metal scraping metal.

Upstairs, glass shattered. Men shouted. A rifle went off—three rapid, deafening cracks.

The door banged open against the brick. A flashlight beam whipped across the steel shelves, and Dominic cut through the dark behind it, gun raised.

"Mara."

"Here." My throat was raw. "I'm right here."

"Shoes. Now."

"I don't have—"

He didn't wait. He crossed the room in two strides, locked a scorching hand around my wrist, and yanked me up like I didn't weigh a damn thing. The ledger stayed on the floor. I twisted back for it.

"Leave it."

"It's my dad's!"

"It's paper." He dragged me flush against his chest. "You're not."

His shirt smelled like spent powder and cold grease. His heart was hammering against my cheek—hard, fast, frantic. That scared me more than the blast. Dominic Castellane didn't panic. His pulse didn't race. I'd staked my survival on that since day two.

He hauled me toward the back wall, behind the industrial shelving, deep into the alcove where the dehumidifier usually hummed. It was dead now. The silence in the basement felt thick and poisonous.

"Stay behind me," he breathed against my ear. "No matter what you hear. No matter what you see."

"Dominic, who is—"

"Sable." He spat the name like crushed glass. "He wants the ledger. And he wants you dragging it out for him."

Heavy soles hit the library hardwood upstairs. Then the stairwell door groaned. Slow steps. Methodical. Men who had a blueprint.

Someone had sold them a floor plan of my house.

*My* house. Nine days in his grip, and the word had already slipped out.

The basement latch clicked. A narrow beam of LED light skimmed the concrete, checking corners.

Dominic shoved me hard against the shelves, shielding me with his body.

One gunshot. The flashlight dropped, spinning wildly on the floor. A man choked on his own blood and crumpled in the doorway.

A second shadow lunged from the blind side on the left. I never saw his face. Just the rush of cold air.

Dominic saw him. He pivoted, but the blade was already flashing—low, jagged, driving straight for the gap under Dominic's arm. Driving straight for my ribs.

Dominic didn't dodge. He drove his own body forward, right into the steel.

The sound was sickening. Dull. Wet. Like meat giving under a punch.

He fired twice at point-blank range. The muzzle flash lit the room blinding white. The second man folded in half, tearing down half a shelf of ledgers as he went, and the floor shook when he landed.

Dominic stood motionless for a beat. Then he looked down at his side like he'd just noticed a stain on his coat.

"Huh," he muttered.

"No." My knees slammed into the concrete beside him. "No, no, no. Sit down. Sit *down*, damn it!"

He didn't sit so much as drop. His back scraped down the metal uprights until he hit the floor, his right hand slipping limp into his lap, the gun clattering loose. In the spilled flashlight beam, his gray shirt was soaked black from his ribs all the way to his belt. Spreading fast.

I slammed both hands over the tear. The heat hit my palms instantly. Boiling hot. Blood pushed between my fingers, thick and slick, running in hot streams down my wrists. Copper and salt flooded my nose. It coated my skin, soaking into my sleeves, and I couldn't stop it.

"You stepped right into it," I choked out. My jaw rattled. "Why the hell would you do that?"

"Told you." His voice scraped like gravel in a blender. "Nobody touches what's mine."

"I am not your property—"

"Mara."

His bloody hand snapped onto my wrist. His grip left smear marks over my pulse. His skin had gone ash-gray, sweat beading across his forehead, but his dark eyes locked onto mine without flinching.

"Listen to me. I've been lying to you for nine days."

My gut dropped through the floor. "About what?"

"The debt." His breath hitched, ragged and shallow. "Danny's four million. I could've wiped that off the books in ten minutes. I never needed you locked in my house to get paid."

Boots thudded overhead again. Closer. A muffled voice barked down the corridor: *Clear here. Sweep the cellar.*

"Then why am I here?" I whispered.

His thumb smeared across my knuckles, slick with his own blood. He looked up at me like a man about to hand over his last weapon.

"Say it," he rasped. "Say stay."

I stared at him, my breath catching in my throat.

"What?"

"Say stay." He forced my trembling hand up, peeling it off his wound for half a second. More blood surged out, soaking my knees, and a ragged sob ripped out of me. He didn't let go. "Not because of the paperwork. Not because of the gate. Tell me you want to be here. And I stop pretending this was ever about a debt."

"You are *bleeding to death*!"

"Then say it fast."

My eyes stung. Nine days I'd spent stacking up spite like armor. I'd timed the guard rotations. I'd mapped out two different escapes down the cliffside. And here he was, lips turning blue, demanding the one piece of surrender I swore I'd take to my grave.

Everything in my chest tore wide open.

He raised his other hand, slow and shaking. I didn't pull back. His bloody thumb traced a burning line along the curve of my jaw, ear to chin, leaving his mark right on my skin. Possessive. Ruthless. Desperate.

"Mara."

"Stay," I choked out, tears spilling hot down my cheeks. "Stay. I want to stay. God, Dominic, just *stay*. I'm not running, okay? Just don't—"

His lips twitched. Maybe a smile. Maybe a shudder of agony.

Then his hand slipped from my jaw. His head snapped back against the steel shelf, and his entire frame went dead slack under my hands.

"Dominic?"

Nothing.

"Dominic!" I threw my full weight against his side, pushing hard against the gaping hole, blood pumping hot and thick against my palms. "Don't you dare do this! You don't get to pull this shit and then just—"

The flashlight beam on the floor flickered.

The stairwell door creaked wide open on its hinges.

A pair of handmade Italian leather shoes stepped cleanly over the corpse in the doorway. Smooth. Measured. In no hurry at all.

Then a voice I had listened to across my father's dinner table for fifteen years echoed into the dark, smooth as expensive scotch:

"There you are, Mara. We've been looking everywhere for you."