Page 41 of Ruined By Sin

"Do what?" I stop three meters from him and widen my stance. "What's under the coat?"

"They made me." His chin crumples and he pulls at the collar of his coat with both hands like it's choking him. "They put it on me. I didn't have a choice."

"Open the coat. Slowly. Show me what's under there." Now my heart is pounding, drilling into my ribs like it's trying to escape because I was right. That thing in his hand is a detonator. He's got a fucking bomb strapped to his chest.

His fingers fumble with the zipper. It takes him three tries to get it started and when he pulls it down, I see the vest strapped to his torso. Wires running in bundles along the front, taped to blocks of something C4, connected to a small device mounted at his sternum where a red light blinks.

The corridor behind me has maybe thirty people in it between here and the main floor. Beyond that, three hundred more are packed into the gym watching the fights. This is fucked. There's enough C4 on that man's chest to take out half the building, killing everyone inside. I knew it was bad, I just never imagined this.

"Who sent you?" I ask. My mouth has gone dry and I can hear my own blood in my ears whirring past my eardrums.

My mind goes to Kira, home alone at my house waiting for me. She's probably thinking I'm gonna come home and pour her a glass of vodka and tell her about the fights. But what If I never go home? What if I never see her again?

"I don't know." He's crying now and the tears on his face mingle with his sweat. Whoever put this thing on him scared the shit out of him. I don’t know if I can get him out of it in time. I don’t know that I want to risk my life. "They grabbed me outside my apartment. They put this on me and told me to walk inside and stand by the doors. I don't know who they are. I swear to God I don't know."

"Mirov. Was it Mirov?"

"I don't know any Mirov. I'm a plumber. I fix pipes. Please, I have a daughter." He's crying so hard, snot bubbles bulge on his face. I want to tell him I'm not sure I can save him, but how do you tell a man he's about to die when he's innocent?

Fuck.

I key my comms with my free hand. "Kaz, I need the south corridor cleared now. We have an IED. Get everyone away from the locker rooms and lock down the exits."

"What?"

"Do it now!" I shout and then hear him start barking orders through the earpiece. But I turn my focus back on the man in front of me. If a Mirov really did this, there's no way I'll ever know. It sounds like this man has been kidnapped and forced to do this.

"Listen to me," I say to the man. "We're gonna walk outside. You and me. We're gonna go through that door behind you andinto the alley and we're going to get you away from these people. Can you do that?" I'm walking toward him, ushering him with movements of my hand, flicks of my weapon. With that thing strapped to his chest, he doesn't have to fear my gun, but he moves with me, albeit slowly.

"I can't move. They said if I move, it goes off."

"Who said that?"

"The men—fuck! The men who put it on me."

"It's on a timer. You see that red light? That's a timer, not a trigger. It's gonna go off whether you move or not, so you can stand here and kill three hundred people or you can walk with me and we get clear."

His whole body is shaking so hard, his teeth are chattering. Then he nods and I holster my gun and put my hand on his shoulder.

"Walk with me. Don't run... Steady steps." My dinner might just come up. Never in my life have I stood so close to a ticking time bomb.

We move toward the emergency exit at the end of the hall. My hand stays on his shoulder and I match his pace, which is slow and stiff. When we hit the door, cold air rushes in and I guide him through, past the dumpsters, past the loading dock, toward the far end of the alley where it opens onto the street.

"Keep going," I tell him. "Don't stop." But I stop. I'm not putting my life any closer to that risk than I have to. I don't know how to disarm a bomb, and if I try taking that vest off, who knows what happens to me. This is insane.

"My daughter," he says. "Tell my daughter?—"

"Move," I shout, but my voice cracks and the realization of what’s happening has me just as frightened as that man. I start backing away, but before I get back to the building, the damn thing erupts.

The boom is deafening, rattling my bones and slamming me back against the cinderblock wall of the building. I feel a hard body behind me and hear Kazimir snarl as I bump into him before we both fall over and watch the ball of fire in the distance.

"Fuck!" he hisses, turning over and covering his head as debris rains down on us, blood and innards, garbage from the dumpster, which flies through the air.

And it's all over in a split second. But the ringing in my ears may last for days. It throbs inside my head alongside my pulse, and I cough a few times, feeling dirt and dust in my throat.

When I roll over, pushing off Kazimir, and sit up, my head screams at me, having knocked it against the wall. He sits up too, dusting his chest off as a few more guards dash out the door in our general direction before a flurry of men start filing out. Everyone inside the building has heard the explosion, and they’re coming to investigate. Luckily, the building hasn't been touched.

"What the fuck," Kaz grumbles, pushing himself to his feet before offering me a hand.