Page 286 of Iced Up Love: Part Two
It doesn’t.
A shot cracks again, closer this time, and I feel the impact a split second before I fully process it, something hot tearing across my arm as the bullet grazes along the outside, ripping fabric, biting into skin.
It’s enough to register.
Enough to hurt.
But not enough to matter.
I don’t stop.
I adjust my grip, ignore the burn, and keep moving because this is too close now, too close to finished to let anything pull me out of it.
We reach the back of the house.
The air changes again.
Quieter.
Heavier.
Christian moves first, his pace steady, controlled, and we follow, the hallway narrowing as we move toward the final room.
The door is already half open.
And inside Mateo Vargas stands waiting.
He’s not running.
Not scrambling.
Not trying to escape.
He’s standing there like he expected this, like he knew we would come, and for a second that almost unsettles me more than anything else we’ve seen tonight.
The room stills.
Everything narrowing down to this one moment.
Christian steps forward.
And something in him shifts.
I’ve seen him controlled. I’ve seen him ruthless. I’ve seen him calculated in a way that most people never understand.
But this, this is something deeper.
Quieter.
Colder.
Personal.
He doesn’t rush him.
Doesn’t raise his voice.
He just walks up to him, each step measured, deliberate, like he’s already decided exactly how this ends and there’s nothing left to consider.
