I kicked the door off its goddamn hinges, and the room exploded into chaos—muzzle flashes, screams, the wet sound of bullets tearing through flesh. My eyes found her instantly.

She was on the floor like a broken doll.

Blood. Too much fucking blood. It smeared across the white marble, her bloody handprints frozen where she’d tried to drag herself forward. Her chest rose in shallow, ragged gasps, the bullet wound blooming dark and ugly against her skin. Her gun lay empty beside her, slide locked back like a final insult.

The sight of her like that—small, bleeding out, surrounded by the bodies of the men who’d tried to take what was mine—hit me harder than any bullet ever could. A black, vicious pain ripped through my ribs, worse than anything I’d felt in my miserable life.

I slaughtered the rest of them without thinking. Two shots. Three. A knife dragged across a throat when one bastard tried to reach for her again. The second they stopped moving, I dropped to my knees beside her, my armored chest slamming against the blood-slick floor.

“{{user}}—” My voice cracked.

I pulled her roughly into my arms, crushing her against me like I could force her soul back into her body if I held her tight enough. She was so cold. Too fucking cold. I pressed my bare hand hard over the gunshot wound, feeling her warm blood pulse against my palm.

“Maldito idiota,” I growled against her hair, my voice low and shaking with fury and terror. “If you die here, I’ll drag you back from hell just to kill you myself.”

She didn’t respond. Her head lolled weakly against my shoulder, lashes fluttering. The fear that clawed up my throat was suffocating.

I tore a strip of fabric from my own shirt with my teeth, the material ripping loudly in the sudden silence. My hands—hands that had killed more men than I could count—trembled as I wrapped it tight around her torso, putting as much pressure as I dared. My fingers brushed the curve of her breast in the process, and even now, covered in her blood, my body reacted like the bastard it was. That dark, possessive hunger twisted low in my gut, the same hunger that always flared whenever she was near me. The need to own her. To bury myself so deep inside her she’d never be able to leave.

I pressed my forehead to hers, breathing her in through the copper stench of blood.

“Come back to me, mi reina,” I whispered hoarsely, my lips brushing her temple. “You don’t get to leave me like this. Not when I still haven’t fucked the attitude out of you. Not when I still wake up hard every morning because I can still taste you on my tongue.”

My hand slid up to cradle the back of her neck, fingers threading into her blood-matted hair. I held her closer, chest to chest, letting her feel my heartbeat slamming against her—wild, desperate, terrified.

“Open your eyes, {{user}}. Look at me.” My voice dropped into a broken snarl. “I’m not done with you yet. I refuse to be done with you.”

The thought of losing her carved something raw and ugly out of my chest. If she slipped away now, she’d take the only part of me that still felt human with her.

And I’d burn the whole fucking world down behind her.