(Athena's POV)

Pulling the pin on another grenade, I fling the round explosive into the hall swarming with amateur assassins before jerking Arie behind a wall with me. The loud sound of the bomb going off shakes up the entire foundation of the old building itself as I hold my handgun once again.

"When I throw a bomb, it's best if you get aside instead of blindly going in unless you want to die. I'll gladly let you be my bloody guest then." I flash Arie a sarcastic smile and receive a perfect scowl in return right before I walk into the debris of cracked walls and dead men, some squirming on the floor in agony. "Allow me," I smile and put them out of their misery with a bullet in their heads.

          My assassins scatter away as Arie and Jackson stick to my side. We huddle through a large, filthy ballroom-like area where dozens of men swarm in like ants, some holding guns and others carrying baseball bats and knives.

          I immediately aim for the ones with guns, dropping each one like a fly whilst taking cover behind a round broken table. Arie runs around firing off her desired weapon as Jackson tackles a few of them in a hand-to-hand combat. After reloading my own gun, I saunter out, curling my index finger on the trigger and squeezing it to fire off bullets at the ones heading straight for me before my ammo runs out again.

"Great!" Without any time at hand to shove in another magazine, I decide to throw the gun at one of the men heading right for me. He crumbles to the ground, but his colleagues don't falter in their quest to end me, and I brace their arrival with a menacing smile.

The first one swings his dagger at me, but before it can slash my flesh, I clutch his attacking wrist and direct the pointy blade toward the second man who comes for me, jabbing the long knife into his stomach. Holding tightly onto the first man's hand, I drag the weapon up the second one's chest before redirecting it to stab the blade back into the first man's neck.

          "Ugh!" I grimace as the man's blood splatters on my face. "Disgusting."

          Before I can wipe my face, more assassins decide to ambush me. Bending over, I quickly remove the dagger from the man's neck and fling it at another which embeds itself in his eye. Retrieving the tactical knives from my ankles, I lunge forward and stab both in a woman's stomach before moving onto another female who decides to throw a knife at me that I escape by a mere inch.

"Close," I remark as she growls and aims to take me down by landing a punch right on my face. A sudden metallic taste dances on my tongue as I suck on my bleeding lip and glare at the girl's smiling face. "Never go for my face."

Thrusting my body forward, I tackle the girl to the wet floor and begin ramming my fist to her face as she tries to shake me off her body and block my assailing punches with her arms. As I reach for my knives that are stuck in the other dead woman, two men grab my arms and jerk me off the assassin. They snatch the blades from my grip and drop it for the female assassin to pick up. She spits out blood, snarling like a dog and walking toward me.

"This isn't going to work out well in your favor, boys," I warn the men strangling my arms as the girl comes to stab me before I kick her face and knock her out to the ground. With all the strength in me, I manage to slam the two men together, then kneeing one's groin with force. Using his bent body as a boost, I jump off his back and climb on top of the other man's shoulder, shoving my thumbs into his eyeballs as he lets out a painful screech before throwing me off.

He sinks to the floor, permitting me to get behind him and snap his neck with a simple twist, a move that I can never get enough of. But then a bullet to my back crumbles me to the floor with a wince followed by another bullet to my waist which forces a whimper out of me. Two men creep in my direction with their guns aiming right for my head. I feign agony and act like an injured wolf as my hand slowly inches to my waist discreetly when one of them gets shot by someone else.

          Conquering the moment, I whip out another tactical knife from my waist and cut it at the knees of the other man, then slit it at his hand to release the gun from his hold. Before I can shoot him myself, someone else decides to lodge a bullet in his head again.

          "You're welcome," Arie smirks at me with a cocky smile that irks me.

Rising up to my feet and unzipping my jacket, I remove the bullets embedded in my bulletproof bodysuit. "I didn't need your assistance," I sneer, pitching the useless ammunition to the floor.

"Consider me generous." She turns on her foot confidently before a man wags a knife at her which pierces through her flesh an inch below her left breast. Immediately, I shoot her attacker dead and head to her side as she shakily holds onto her wound.

          "Maybe you should've listened to me when I told you to stay back!" I scold her, taking a look at the injury she sustained, but she refuses to let me examine it.

          Turning away from me, she peeks at the stab wound herself. "Thought you said you wouldn't help me if I got hurt."

"Consider me generous," I repeat her own words before jerking her around to face me, but she shoves me away instead.

"The cut is superficial. Nothing you need to worry yourself with," she snaps, crawling back into her thick shell like a turtle.

Irritation rubs my insides like sandpaper in the most gruesome way. I can't decide whether I want to strangle her or keep her safe for Leo because I can't imagine what he'll do if anything happens to her. Arie is someone he cares deeply about despite everything that has happened over the past few months, and Leo is someone I highly respect and will do anything for, even if it means putting up this nuisance named Arie Noelle.

"You're so bloody stubborn," I hiss through my teeth and recollect my knives from people's bodies along with my gun. "I wonder how Leo ever put up with a little girl like you."

          "You don't know me, but Leo does," she counters instantly in a quipped tone. "I don't trust you or anyone in this mobster world of yours at this point. I've lost too much to it already, and I'm not ready to lose myself or my brother to it." She strips the bottom of her baggy shirt to wrap it around herself and cover the wound to stop the excessive bleeding. "I have my own damn problems that make me the way I am, and I'm sure you do too. I don't know what made you into the biggest bitch I know, but something clearly did. I'm eagerly looking forward to never seeing any of you ever again."

          "Sweetheart, the past always comes to haunt you no matter what, especially when you're involved with the underworld." Rotating my head a bit, I silently motion Jackson to come hither with two of my other assassins. "You never get out of the mafia even if you want to, unless you die, of course." I chuckle to myself, stepping closer to her. "It won't be long before you see us again, and I promise you that."

"And I will kill every last one of you then." She purses her lips into a forced smile that she struggles to maintain as blood seeps through her poorly bandaged wound, soaking her shirt and her already blood infused pants. "And you know I can do it."

An easy smirk stretches my face muscles flawlessly. "You can maybe beat Jackson and some of the other idiots, but never me. I've been in this game far longer than you have. I can take you down within half a minute or less. But that's a battle for some other time."

Snorting to my statement, she rolls her eyes. "Let's just find the kidnapped people for now, shall we?"

"Glad you reminded me. I thought we were on a picnic in this filthy dump," I retort, starting to walk toward an undiscovered area as they all follow me.

"Oh, I thought it was a picnic too, but then you opened your big mouth and all I heard was a bitch barking while I was trying to stroll around the park," she claps back at me with sass underlining her voice as I spare her a quick glance through my trek.

"Is bitch supposed to be an insult? Because I wear that word proudly as my crown that is clearly too big for your ego to handle," I grin victoriously, urging her to groan in defeat.

          The five of us roll down the hallways like some gangsters ready to burn down the world, shooting and killing anyone that gets in our path as Arie interrogates some on her own.

"Where is my brother?" she screams at the man under her foot, forcing an icy glare down his throat. "Tell me!" When the man doesn't answer, it hits a nerve with the girl. She stabs his chest rather ruthlessly and repeatedly as if he's a piñata, getting carried away by the raging emotions that take her to a dark and daunting place.

"Pretty sure he's dead now," I declare, popping a hand on my hip, waiting for her to finish up her murder fest.

Distancing herself from the body and stumbling over his lifeless leg, her eyes fan over the mess she created in horror for a long second before she wobbles to the side and vomits up her insides immediately which forces my gaze away in disgust. When she gets done, she wipes the sweat and tears from her face alongside blood as her other hand holds onto her belly. Deep breaths escape her mouth in attempts to calm her trembling self down while her eyes get a bit drowsy as the energy visibly drains away from her body.

"Somethin' wrong?" I ask, tilting my head to the side with an arched brow that speaks of my curiosity.

"No," she answers me with a slight panic glimmering in her shaky voice.

          "I can tell you're hiding something," I press her to get answers, but she stands her ground firmly.

          "I was stabbed, that's what's wrong, okay?" She strangulates her gun between her fingers and moves around me, not meeting my gaze.

          My instincts tell me there's more here, but I decide to not ride her stubborn ass and look for my sister and mother instead. "Whatever you say."

          Nodding, she follows me into a large room where we finally find Ashton being held by four men, one pushing a knife to his throat while the other three point their guns at us.

"Arie?" Ashton croaks out his sister's name, the fear glistening brightly in his eyes with tears.

Arie tenses up, pointing a gun back at them. "Let my brother go," she seethes, a sinister edge in her threat.

"Give us Athena Estle alive in exchange for the boy," one of the men lays down the condition which tickles me.

"If you get me alive, you all will be dead soon after, so that's a bad idea."

"The boss wants you alive, whether you're willing or not. Don't worry, though. We have something that will knock you out fo-"

Arie doesn't let the man finish his sentence before she shoots all four of them right between their eyes within a second which surprises me. She does have something in her, after all.

The gun tumbles from her grip at once as she slowly inches closer to her baffled and terrified brother whose mouth is left agape due to everything that just transpired. "Arie?" His widened, red eyes rake over all the blood on the girl's clothes before he trudges forward and embraces her body that goes limp in his arms almost immediately.

Waltzing over to the Noelle twins, I check for Arie's pulse that is dangerously low. Her brother pats her face and tries to wake her up, however, his attempts are to no avail. "Arie, p-please wake up," he chokes up on his own words, tears streaming down his cheeks before he peers up at me. "I need to get her to the hospital. She's... sick," he informs me hesitantly.

"What kind of sick?" I ask whilst motioning one of my assassins to lift up her body.

Ashton breathes heavily, still reluctant to tell me everything as we get up to our feet. "If she doesn't get medical attention immediately, she can lose everything," he answers vaguely.

With narrowed and suspicious eyes, I divert my gaze from Ashton and lay it on my two assassins. "You both get them out of here and to the hospital safely." Although I don't buy his bullshit, I decide to let it go this once considering I have much pressing matters to worry about.

As they all leave, I face Jackson with concerned eyes as trepidation starts to take over my frenzied nerves. "We've almost gotten through this entire place and there's no sign of Addy or my mother."

He squeezes my upper arm gently. "Maybe the other party found them."

"I'm going to call Vincent and see." Delving into my pocket for a phone, I call the man and speak when he picks up a second later. "Did you find them?"

"No," he yells over the loud gunshots as I walk around, kicking down doors to empty and filthy smelling rooms covered in muddy water, some with broken ceilings. "Roman found D'Angelo's daughter though and he took her home."

"And Eros?"

"I don't know where he is."

Frowning, I halt my footsteps and give the man my complete attention. "What do you mean you don't know? Wasn't he supposed to be with you?"

"He and his brother split up from me." He pauses for a few seconds, presumably dodging bullets and killing others. "I saw Roman as he was heading out with the girl. I don't know about Eros."

"Fine!" I hang up, breathing heavy in anger and with a little sense of fear in my chest. My conscience fails miserably to get the unsettling feeling of extreme loss out of my mind. What if something did happen to him? I'm sure he can fight off multiple people at a time, but my gut tells me otherwise at this moment.

I turn around frustratedly on the heel of my foot only to feel a needle pierce into the side of my neck, followed by a chilling sensation of cold liquid being forced into my system as I stare at the man injecting me. "Jackson?"

"I had to do it, Athena." He furrows his brows, shaking his head a bit as I begin to lose control of my body. "Please, forgive me."

With the remaining energy in me, I grab his throat and squeeze it as hard as I can which doesn't seem to affect him. "You better k-kill me right now, Ja-" My voice and body both give up on me, my knees collapsing, but he prevents my body from hitting the ground as my eyes start to close up and embrace the darkness of the unconscious world.

***

      My lids patter open slowly as I feel a massive burden on my head. Everything is upside down; the doors, the nice tables, the lights, including my sister who is staring right at me. Even being hung by my feet like a pig at a slaughterhouse, I can make out the prominent scowl on her face, her hands tied behind the chair she's sitting on and her feet roped up to the legs of it.

"Really, Athena?" Addy snaps at me in annoyance. "You had one job."

"Oh, shut the hell up!" I wiggle my wrists that are zip-tied behind my back which causes my body to sway a bit in the air. "Could you not fight them off when they came for you?"

"I put up a good fight, but I was too damn drunk." I notice her rolling her big eyes with a groan. "What's your excuse?"

          "Jackson caught me off guard and injected me with something." My teeth grit together in a painful manner as I remember his traitorous act that led to this state of mine. Never would've pictured him betraying me like this, but a person can never trust anyone in this business of lies and deaths. "I'm gonna kill that bastard."

          "You're fucking kidding me!" she exclaims incredulously as I watch her mouth fall to the floor in sheer disbelief.

          "Unfortunately, he did betray her." Maddox makes himself known as he enters the decent-sized room that we are held in with his hands casually resting in his pockets. A yap of laughter snakes out of my throat as he gets closer. Of course, he's the mastermind behind it all. Now I can only wonder how he got my most trusted man to turn on me. "Hello, little sister." A genuine smile appears on his face as he crouches to get a better look at me.

          Biting the insides of my cheeks in agitation, I release a breath through my flared nostrils. "It's good to know that you didn't really lose your memory, big brother."

———————————————————

I delivered as promised this time. Yay or nay?

Poor Arie got stabbed. 👀 Shit happens.

Addy is alive! Who's relieved?

Who expected Jackson to turn on our dear Athena like that?

Why would Jackson do it?

And thoughts on Maddox and what happened at the end there? Now I'd like to know what you think his motive was to do all this.

Much love ❤️
~Reet