IGNITE

CHAPTER EIGHT

CAIN

I startle awake in a tangle of sweaty sheets, convinced I heard the lock on my front door click open.

Leaping from my bed, I reach for the loaded gun in my nightstand drawer and storm through my apartment in nothing but my boxer briefs. My rattled brain tells me there are enemies everywhere. Hidden behind closed doors. Storming the floors of my building.

And the corpses. They always pile up behind closed eyes. I get to watch bullets rip through their flesh in my sleep each night.

Finding nothing amiss in my dark, quiet home, I lean my weight against the wall in my entryway and just... breathe.

It's rare that I dream, but when I do, it's always of my failures. Before I was a businessman and a mercenary, I was a soldier. The first time I killed, yeah... it sat heavy in my brain for a while, but once I was weaned of that horror, I became good at taking lives. Good at compartmentalizing my emotions, too.

Until Aiden.

He unraveled everything inside of me. Lifted the seals on the darkness I'd kept hidden when my service came to an abrupt end.

I'd met him at some local restaurant bar shortly after I'd started up Sinro Enterprises. The stress of my new business, combined with PTSD, led me to drink a bit excessively. He'd called me an Uber to get me home safe that night, his number tucked into my back pocket.

I ignored the temptation for a while, but then we kept meeting up at that same bar. It was easy to believe I'd found my forever wrapped up in his arms. One second in time-a single blast of a gun-changed that. Changed the entire trajectory of my life. Left me with gaping holes where unwanted emotions sometimes bled out.

I knead my fingers along my tense brows. Maybe I need to have a talk with my middle brother, Isaac. Clear my head. He'd have sage advice on what to do with Ezra.

As our client relations specialist and staff therapist, Isaac has always been the most level-headed of us Vincent boys. Though I do question if he does more than take people out to eat.

My phone buzzes from the charger on the granite kitchen counter. I pad over to it, still clutching my gun, and check the time. Just after 6AM. The sky is dark, but it's past the time I normally head into work.

And there's a good fucking reason I'm always the first one in the office. Dozens of missed calls and texts from my staff alert me of something wrong.

Instead of wasting time trying to read all of them, I suit up and exit my apartment, striding for the elevator.

I've converted the seventeenth floor of Sinro's high-rise into four spacious apartments, one of which I've claimed, the other three occupied by my brothers and Rev. The rest of the floor is dedicated to shared common areas-a kitchen and living room with a giant TV and sectionals, a library, a massive gym, and a large outdoor balcony with an infinity pool.

All floors above mine house staff, to make it less suspicious to the public when we come and go at all hours of the day, and all floors below are dedicated to specialized departments, training spaces, storage for vehicles, equipment, and armories.

My blood pressure spikes as soon as the elevator doors open on the thirteenth floor. What could have prompted a freak out this morning? Honestly, it could range anywhere from a broken computer to someone shooting the wrong target, and now, we're under scrutiny from the government again or about to blow up in the media.

"What's going on?" I demand, glare cutting to Gwen behind the front desk. She's a goddess-the front-face of my company, handling calls from all manner of clients. Today, her tawny hair is more frazzled than normal.