Page 106 of Beautiful Ruins
He wasn’t pacing or shouting orders.He wasn’t even looking toward the door.
His head was lowered slightly, chin angled down, posture almost… contemplative.Like he was bowing his head, praying.
Tone leaned closer to the monitor, her eyes narrowing.
“How,” she uttered under her breath, “can the bastard be so calm?”
Another burst of gunfire sounded outside, sharper this time, closer.
We stayed fixed on the monitors, watching every movement with rigid focus.
Archie didn’t flinch.
Didn’t turn his head.
Didn’t so much as change his stance.
There was no visible reaction at all, as though the sound of bullets tearing through the grounds was nothing more than background noise he had already accounted for.
He just stood there in the dim foyer lighting, one hand resting loosely on the head of his cane, shoulders relaxed, waiting.
“What the fuck is he doing?”Tone hissed.
I didn’t have an answer.And I couldn’t look away.
On another screen, the front approach camera showed the men closing in on the house.They were fast, coordinated and armed.
One of them signaled to the others.Then—the front door exploded inward.Wood splintered violently as it crashed open, the sound echoing even through the insulated walls of the panic room.
Three men stormed into the foyer with guns raised.And for the first time, Archie moved.He lifted his head.And the man on the screen was no longer the same person who had been standing there seconds ago.
The stillness vanished.What replaced it was cold focus.His posture straightened.His shoulders squared.His gaze sharpened into something flat and lethal.
The three men slowed.They hadn’t expected him.There was a visible moment of hesitation as their eyes registered the cane.The posture.The lack of immediate aggression.
Confusion.
That split second cost them.Archie’s hand moved.Fast.Faster than anything I had seen from him before.The cane lifted and angled forward.And then—gunfire erupted from the cane itself.
A barrage of bullets tore through the foyer.The sound was sharp, rapid, precise.
The three men dropped almost instantly, their bodies hitting the marble floor in staggered succession like their strings had been cut.
My breath caught.
“What—” I choked.
Tone’s mouth fell open.
“Fuck,” she whispered in disbelief.I’d never heard her curse as much as she had in the space of the past few minutes.
Archie lowered himself to one knee with ease, his composure unchanged.He reached down near his feet and retrieved something with efficient precision.
The camera angle tilted slightly as another wave of attackers entered the foyer.
There were more footsteps and more movement.Before they could fully advance, Archie’s arm flicked forward.
Knives.Actual knives.
