The heat at the Naples docks was different from the city. It was heavy, smelling of rotting fish and old oil. Kyle walked three steps ahead of me, his stride long and impatient. I had to practically run to keep up, my heels clicking uselessly against the rusted metal of the pier.
"Slow down, you arrogant prick!" I shouted at his back. "Or are you in a rush to get back to Sera?"
Kyle didn't even turn around. "I'm in a rush to finish this meeting so I can put you back in your cage, Val. You're a distraction I can't afford today."
He led me toward a secluded warehouse at the very end of the pier, where the Vanguard shipping containers were stacked like giant, colorful coffins. Two of his guards stood outside, their hands resting visibly on their holsters.
"Wait here," Kyle commanded, stopping at the heavy sliding door.
"No way," my loud mouth snapped back before I could stop it. "You just spent an hour rubbing your mistress in my face. I'm not standing out here like a stray dog while you do whatever shady business you've got going on inside."
Kyle turned, his shadow swallowing me. He grabbed my arm, his fingers digging into the silk of my sleeve. "This isn't a game, Valentina. The man who made that collar? He has eyes in this port. If you stay out here, you're a target. If you go in there, you're a witness. Choose which one you want to be before I choose for you."
I glared at him, my heart hammering. "I'll take my chances with the ghost from Rome over another minute of your 'protection'."
I tried to pull away, but Kyle's grip tightened. He opened his mouth to bark another order, but the words never came out.
Crack.
The sound of a sniper's bullet hitting the metal container inches from Kyle's head was unmistakable.
"Down!" Kyle roared.
He didn't wait for me to react. He tackled me to the concrete, his heavy, muscular frame crushing the air out of my lungs. Another shot rang out, sparks flying off the crane behind us.
"Vanguard! North-east crane!" one of the guards screamed, drawing his weapon.
The docks erupted into chaos. Kyle hauled me up by the waist, tucked me under his arm like I weighed nothing, and sprinted into the dark maw of the warehouse. He kicked the door shut and bolted the iron bar just as a third bullet thudded into the wood.
The silence inside the warehouse was deafening, broken only by our ragged breathing. Kyle didn't let me go. He pinned me against a stack of wooden crates, his body acting as a human shield.
"Are you hit?" he rasped, his eyes scanning my face with a frantic, dark intensity that was a million miles away from the bored look he had given me earlier.
"I-I don't think so," I stammered, my hands shaking as I gripped his forearms. "Kyle, what was that? Was that him?"
Kyle didn't answer. He reached out, his hand trembling slightly as he touched the diamond collar. For a second, the arrogance was gone. There was only raw, unfiltered terror in his eyes—not for himself, but for me.
"He's here," Kyle whispered.
Then, the shutter of the warehouse's upper window shattered. A small, black cylinder thudded onto the floor between us.
Gas.
"Hold your breath," Kyle commanded, tearing his expensive silk tie off and wrapping it around my nose and mouth.
"What about you?" I muffled through the fabric.
He didn't answer. He pulled a compact handgun from his waistband—something I hadn't even known he was carrying. He looked at me, his gaze cold and hard again, the mask sliding back into place.
"If they get through that door, I want you to run to the back. There's a sea-door. Jump. Don't look back for me."
"Kyle—"
"I told you this morning, Val," he hissed, his voice a low, jagged blade. "You're an asset. And I don't let anyone steal what belongs to me."
The warehouse doors began to groan under the weight of a ram. Kyle stood in the center of the room, shirtless under his suit jacket, his gun leveled at the door, looking every bit the monster he claimed to be.
But as the first tear gas canister hissed, I saw the photo from Marcus's folder flutter out of Kyle's pocket. He hadn't left it at the office. He had been carrying the memory of me from five years ago next to his heart all day.