Page 29 of Cold Ignition

Too open. Too exposed. Alexios didn’t like it.

Neither did Rangi.

But stopping wasn’t an option.

They crossed the space fast, boots pounding now, no longer able to hide their movement.

Halfway across the room, the floor shifted.

A sharp crack split through the concrete beneath them.

Alexios felt it a fraction of a second before it gave way.

“Rangi—”

The ground dropped.

Rangi vanished.

Alexios moved without thinking.

He lunged forward, dropping to his knees and catching Rangi’s wrist just as he went over the edge. The impact slammed through his shoulder, pain ripping down his arm as he braced himself against the crumbling ledge.

Below them, debris cascaded into darkness two floors down. Rangi swung once, boots scraping against fractured concrete, searching for purchase.

Alexios tightened his grip. “Don’t you dare let go,” he growled.

Rangi looked up at him, steady even now. “Wasn’t planning on it.”

Gunfire erupted behind them. Closer. Alexios’s mind raced.

Angles. Time. Weight.

The edge beneath him crumbled further, concrete giving way in small, deadly shifts.

“Alexios,” Rangi warned.

He knew. This wouldn’t hold.

Alexios met his gaze. “I’m not leaving you.”

Rangi’s expression softened—just for a second. “I know.”

Another crack split through the floor. Boots pounded closer. Voices shouted. They were almost on top of them.

“Then we do this fast,” Rangi said.

Alexios nodded once. No hesitation. No doubt. Only trust.

He shifted his grip, pulling hard—

As the floor beneath them began to give way completely.

Chapter Six

Rangi felt the moment the world gave way. It wasn’t the sound—the crack of failing concrete or the shouted voices closing in behind them.

It was the shift. The subtle, sickening drop beneath his weight. The instant his body knew before his mind caught up. Then he was falling.