Aiden's POV
I don't remember grabbing the keys. I don't remember leaving the room at all. One moment I was standing there with her voice still echoing through the speakers, thin and breaking in a way that didn't belong to her, and the next I was already moving, already out, already inside the car before the thought could even fully form.
The engine roared to life beneath me as if it understood the urgency before I did, tires screeching against asphalt as I pushed the speed far past anything controlled or reasonable, the city blurring into streaks of light and shadow that meant nothing, because there was only one thing left in my head. Her voice. The way it cracked. The way it begged. And him layered over it, sharp, aggressive, wrong. My grip tightened around the wheel until my knuckles burned white, something colder than rage settling into my chest, something steady, focused, absolute. This wasn't chaos. This wasn't blind anger. This was direction. And it only moved one way—toward her.
By the time I reached her building, I didn't even register the stop. The car barely halted before I was already out, the door slamming behind me with a force that echoed through the quiet night, but I was already moving, already crossing the distance, already knowing exactly where she was without needing to think about it. I didn't go through the entrance. I didn't knock. I didn't wait. There was no hesitation left in me, no space for anything except what came next.
And then I saw her.
Through the window.
On the floor.
For a second, everything stopped. Not slowed—stopped. The world, the sound, the movement, all of it collapsed into a single point, into that image burned into my vision. Blood streaked across her face, too bright, too wrong, her skin marked with something that didn't belong to her, her body trembling in a way that wasn't just fear but something deeper, something breaking under pressure that should have never touched her in the first place. Her hands were unsteady, her breath uneven, and still—still—she was trying to hold herself together.
And then her eyes lifted.
And found mine.
Something shifted in that moment.
Not around us.
Inside us.
I felt it.
The connection snapping into place, sharp and immediate, like something that had always been there but had finally been forced into existence, and I saw it in her too, in the way her body stilled just slightly despite everything else, in the way something inside her reacted before she could stop it, before she could understand it.
And then everything turned red.
Not like anger.
Not like rage.
Like blood.
Like the crimson on her face had spread into my sight, into my mind, into everything I was, until there was nothing left untouched by it. It didn't burn. It didn't flare. It settled. Deep. Heavy. Absolute.
I moved.
The glass didn't slow me. It didn't matter. It shattered the second I hit it, exploding inward in a violent crash that echoed through the room, shards tearing into my skin, slicing across my arms, my shoulders, dragging through flesh, but I didn't feel it, not even for a second, not even enough to register it as pain, because pain didn't exist anymore. Nothing existed except the distance between me and him.
And I erased it.
One step. Two. And I was already there, already in front of him, my hand lifting without hesitation, the gun pressed hard against his temple before he could even fully react, forcing his head slightly to the side. My grip was steady. Unshaking. Controlled in a way that made it worse.
"Move," I said quietly, my voice low, even, but carrying something underneath it that didn't need volume to be understood, "and I end you."
He froze.
Of course he did.
Because he saw it.
Whatever was left in my eyes at that moment, whatever had replaced hesitation, replaced reason, replaced anything that might have held me back, he saw it clearly enough to understand that this wasn't a threat. This was already decided.
My finger tightened slowly on the trigger, deliberate, measured, the safety clicking off with a quiet, final sound that cut through the tension like something irreversible. I wasn't rushing it. I wasn't reacting.
I was choosing it.
I was going to kill him.
And then—
She moved.
Fast. Too fast. Faster than she should have been able to.
Her hand hit mine, knocking the gun just enough—just enough to shift the angle, just enough to break the line—
The shot went off.
Loud. Violent. Deafening in the enclosed space.
The bullet tore past him, slamming into the wall behind, ricocheting off metal with a sharp crack before spinning back through the air in a twisted trajectory, and then—
Her scream.
It cut through everything.
Sharp. Raw. Real.
The red shattered instantly.
My head snapped toward her, the world crashing back into place all at once as I saw it—the blood spreading across her hand, deeper now, brighter, her fingers curling in pain as her body pulled in on itself, her breath breaking into something uneven and uncontrolled.
Everything inside me shifted.
Not gone.
Never gone.
But redirected.
To her.
Always her.
Behind me, he moved.
Too late.
My arm lifted again without hesitation, the gun snapping back into place, this time pressed directly to his forehead, closer than before, my voice dropping lower, colder, something final threading through every word.
"One step," I said quietly, "and I paint the walls with what's left of you."
He stopped instantly.
Because now he understood.
This wasn't anger.
This wasn't emotion.
This was execution waiting for permission.
I stepped slightly forward, placing myself between them without even thinking, my body angled toward him, blocking, shielding, controlling the space in a way that left no question about where he stood now, but my attention—my real attention—was on her. On the way she was shaking. On the way she was trying to breathe through the pain. On the way something in her had already begun to fracture under everything that had just happened.
I lowered slightly, just enough to reach her—
And she flinched.
Hard.
"Don't—!"
Her voice broke through, sharp and desperate, her body pulling back from me like I was the one she needed to escape from, her eyes wide, unfocused, filled with pain and something that hit harder than anything else had.
Fear.
Of me.
"Don't touch me!" she cried, her voice shaking, cracking under the weight of everything, "Just—just leave me the fuck alone!" she shouted.
The words landed.
Different than his.
Heavier.
For a second, I didn't move.
Didn't speak.
The gun still raised.
Still aimed.
Still ready.
But something shifted inside me again, something quieter this time, something that didn't erase what I was about to do, didn't change what he deserved—
But it paused it.
Just enough.
Just long enough for her voice to settle into something deeper than the rage that had brought me here.
And for the first time since I stepped into that room—
I stopped.