Draven's Point Of View
The air in the elevator shaft tasted like old oil and wet concrete as we descended deeper beneath the hotel. The ride was anything but smooth; steel cables produced a tiny, rhythmic shudder every four seconds that rattled through the soles of my shoes and up into my spine, a metronome counting down to violence.
Azriel stood beside me, hands shoved deep into his suit pockets, shoulders held perfectly straight despite the unsteady descent. Neither of us spoke. We didn't need to. The silence between us had become an old habit over the years, heavy and familiar, broken only by the mechanical hum of the car dropping steadily into the sub-basement.
I could feel the weight of what awaited us below settling into my chest like a stone, cold and immovable. My jaw ached from clenching it too hard, a physical manifestation of the fury I'd been nursing since yesterday.
