Chapter 20: Backdoor Claiming
The late afternoon sun cut across her skin, painting her in stripes of gold and shadow. Levi knelt before her, his hands resting on her bare hips, his breath warm against the newly taut curve of her stomach. His thumbs traced slow circles on the sensitive skin just below her navel. She shivered, the air cool on her dampening flesh, but his touch was like brandy, spreading heat.
“Here,” he murmured, more to himself than to her, and leaned forward. He pressed his lips to the exact spot where she’d placed his hand. Not a kiss of passion, but of sacrament. His mouth was soft, his eyes closed. He lingered, breathing her in—the scent of her skin, the faint, clean smell of the lavender lotion she used, something new underneath, something profoundly and uniquely her. “You’re mapping a country,” he said, his voice muffled against her.
He moved lower, his lips brushing the coarse thatch of hair, then lower still, ignoring her center to kiss the inside of her thigh. A place never kissed before. He was cataloging her, worshiping the altered geography of her body with a patient, devastating reverence. Aria’s fingers threaded into his dark hair, not to guide, but to anchor herself. Her knees felt liquid.
“Levi,” she breathed.
He looked up, his gray eyes molten in the slatted light. “You showed me. Now let me learn.”
He hooked his hands under her knees and lifted, spreading her before him. The exposure was total, vulnerable in a way that had nothing to do with submission and everything to do with trust. He studied her, his gaze analytical and awestruck. Her folds were slick, swollen, the pink flesh glistening. He blew a gentle stream of air across her, and she jolted, a sharp gasp catching in her throat.
Then his tongue touched her. Not a swipe, not a thrust. A single, flat, slow lick from her entrance all the way up to her clit. He took his time, tasting her as if deciphering a complex code. He hummed, the vibration shooting through her core. “Different,” he muttered, and did it again, deeper this time, his tongue parting her, delving inside before retreating to circle her clit with agonizing precision.
This wasn’t the rough, demanding attention he usually gave her. This was exploration. This was study. He was learning what made her twitch, what made her hips jerk, what made her cry out. He noted every reaction with a strategic focus, adjusting his pressure, his rhythm, the point of contact. He drank from her like a man dying of thirst, but with the control of a connoisseur.
“Oh, god,” she whimpered, her head falling back, her spine arching. The pleasure was a coiling, rising heat, building differently—fuller, deeper, rooted in the very core he was so focused on.
When her thighs began to tremble violently, he pulled back. His chin was glistening. “Not yet,” he said, his voice rough. He stood in one fluid motion, stripping off his own clothes with efficient, sharp movements. He was already painfully hard, his cock standing thick and flushed against his stomach.
He didn’t push her onto the couch. Instead, he turned her around, his hands on her shoulders guiding her until she faced the back of it. “Bend over,” he said, the command returning, but layered now with that new, terrifying tenderness. “Hold on.”
She obeyed, gripping the top of the couch cushions, her rounded belly pressed against the soft fabric. He positioned himself behind her, the broad, hot head of his cock nudging at her soaked entrance. One hand gripped her hip, the other slid around to palm her stomach, holding her, claiming her.
“This is what you’re building,” he growled in her ear as he pushed forward, an inch, then two, stretching her exquisitely full. “You feel that? You’re taking me so deep, and inside you, she’s right there. My cock is buried in your cunt, and my child is right on the other side of this wall.” He thrust home, seating himself completely, and they both cried out.
He began to move, a slow, rolling grind that was less about frantic friction and more about profound possession. Each withdrawal was almost complete, each thrust a deliberate, deep reclaiming. The angle was different, perfect, hitting a place that made her see white sparks. His hand on her belly pressed her back onto him, ensuring every stroke reached its absolute limit.
“This is ours,” he chanted, his breath coming in hot gusts against her neck. “This tight, perfect fuckhole, milking my dick. This womb, growing my legacy. Tell me you feel it. Tell me you know what you’re doing to me.”
“I feel it,” she sobbed, the words torn from her. “I know, I know, I know.”
“You’re so fucking beautiful like this. So full. So used. My personal, breeding slut.” The filth from his mouth was a dark counterpoint to the reverence of his touch, and the contradiction shattered her. Her orgasm broke over her not in a sharp climax, but in a rolling, endless wave that seemed to originate from the very place his cock was claiming. She clenched around him, pulsing, her cries muffled by the couch.
It tipped him over the edge. With a final, brutal thrust that lifted her onto her toes, he emptied himself into her with a raw, guttural shout, his body convulsing against hers. He collapsed over her, his weight supported on his forearms, his forehead pressed between her shoulder blades. They stayed like that, welded together by sweat and spend, breathing in ragged unison.
Minutes passed. The sun moved. He softened inside her but didn’t withdraw. His hand still lay over her stomach. A tiny, firm kick landed against his palm.
They both froze.
Another kick, stronger, a distinct thump against his hand.
Levi made a sound—a choked, broken thing that was half laugh, half sob. He turned his head, pressing his lips to her spine. “She’s strong,” he repeated, his voice thick.
“She’s saying hello,” Aria whispered, tears slipping silently down her cheeks onto the couch.
He finally pulled out, gently, and turned her around. He didn’t speak. He wiped her tears with his thumbs, then his own mouth with the back of his hand. He gathered her against him, heedless of the mess, and carried her to the bathroom.
He washed her with the same focused care, a warm cloth moving over her stomach with infinite gentleness. He toweled her dry, dressed her in one of his own soft t-shirts, and led her back to the rumpled bed. They lay in the twilight, her back to his front, his hand once more a permanent weight on her.
The front door opened and closed downstairs. Voices, heavy with intent, floated up.
Levi’s body went taut behind her. The moment of private peace cracked, the outside world rushing back in. He exhaled, a slow, resigned sound. “Stay here,” he said, kissing her shoulder before slipping from the bed. He pulled on his pants and left the room, closing the door softly behind him.
Aria lay in the gathering dark, the phantom sensation of his hands and the real memory of that tiny kick warring within her. The sound of raised voices—Armin’s, tense and urgent, Eren’s, sharp with anger—filtered through the floor. She couldn’t make out words, but the tone was clear. Something had happened. The two-week clock for Liora was ticking, and it sounded like the world had just gotten a lot smaller.
She placed her hand over the spot where Levi’s had been. “It’s okay,” she whispered to the fluttering life inside her, to the fear coiling in her own gut. “He’ll figure it out. He always does.”
But for the first time, lying alone in the dark, she wondered if figuring it out was enough. The problem wasn’t a person or a place. It was a future. And futures, she was learning, were fragile, complicated things that couldn’t always be fixed with a blade or a brutal, beautiful fuck.
And futures, she was learning, were fragile, complicated things that couldn’t always be fixed with a blade or a brutal, beautiful fuck. The voices downstairs hardened into distinct shapes. Armin’s was a steady, urgent monotone. Eren’s interruptions were jagged rocks in the stream of it. Levi’s silence was the most terrifying sound of all.
Aria pushed herself up, the oversized t-shirt falling around her thighs. She placed her feet on the floor and waited for the room to steady. Another kick, a firm nudge just beneath her ribs. She pressed her hand there, a silent communication. I know. Me too.
She found them in the kitchen, a tense tableau under the harsh fluorescent light. Armin’s laptop glowed on the table, lines of code and dense paragraphs reflected in his glasses. Eren paced behind him, a caged tiger wearing a grease-stained tank top. Levi stood opposite, arms crossed, his bare torso still marked from her nails and teeth. The air smelled of old coffee and fresh tension.
“You can’t verify the source,” Levi stated, his voice flat.
“I can verify the pattern,” Armin countered, not looking up. His fingers flew across the keys. “It’s not a single source. It’s a consensus emerging from three separate dark web auction logs. The syntax is consistent. The digital footprints, while hidden, have architectural similarities.”
Eren stopped pacing. “So just say it. What are they auctioning?”
Armin’s hands stilled. He looked up, his blue eyes finding Aria in the doorway. They held a grim, apologetic knowledge. “Intact medical histories. Genetic profiles. Pre-natal care documentation, complete with ultrasound imaging and bloodwork. They’re packaged as ‘proven viable vessels.’ The bidding is… active.”
The words landed like a physical blow. Aria felt the floor tilt. Levi was already moving, a chair scraping as he grabbed its back. “Liora,” he breathed, the name a curse.
“And others,” Armin said softly. “But yes. Her profile, or one matching her described condition, appeared in a log fourteen hours ago. It’s what triggered my alert. They’re not just snatching people off the street. They’re building a catalog.”
Eren’s fist hit the wall, making the cabinet doors rattle. “A catalog. For what?”
“We don’t know,” Armin admitted. “The end buyer data is encrypted behind a partition I haven’t cracked. But the specificity of the medical data suggests a purpose. It’s not for manual labor.”
Aria walked to the table, her hand automatically finding Levi’s arm. His skin was cold. “My appointments,” she said, her voice too small. “The fake ID you got me, the clinic in Dayton…”
“Were a risk,” Levi finished, his jaw working. “One we mitigated. You were ‘Jane Doe.’ No digital records.”
“But what if they’re not just buying digital records?” The question came out of her calmly, which surprised her. The panic was there, a shrill buzz in her ears, but beneath it was a cold, clear river of thought. “What if the auction is just the menu? Liora’s physical description is out there now. They lost the product. They want it back. They’ll be looking harder.”
Armin nodded, a sharp, jerky movement. “It’s a logical escalation. The broadcast of her profile increases her visibility to other predators, too. Her idea of walking into a police station is exponentially more dangerous now. Her photo could be flagged in a dozen private systems before she finishes her statement.”
“So we move her.” Eren said. “Again. Somewhere else.”
“That’s a holding pattern, not a solution.” Levi’s grip on the chair tightened. “We need to remove the listing. Permanently.”
A beat of silence hung in the humid kitchen air. The refrigerator motor kicked on with a low hum.
Armin adjusted his glasses. “There is one way to remove a listing from an auction.” He spoke slowly, measuring each word. “You fulfill the transaction. You become the winning bidder.”
Eren snorted. “With what money? Our vast fortunes from fixing motorcycles and unloading fish?”
“Not with money.” Armin’s gaze settled on Levi. “With a better offer. A trade. I’ve mapped the network’s communication nodes. They’re fragile, reliant on a few key physical servers. I have the addresses. Their security is digital. It’s good. But it’s not…” He glanced at Eren’s fist, still pressed against the drywall. “It’s not physical.”
Levi understood. His crossed arms unfolded. “You want to smash the window.”
“I want to offer them a choice,” Armin corrected. “A trade: their entire network’s operational security for Liora’s profile. We get her deleted from every log. They get to keep their infrastructure from being dismantled, bolt by bolt, in the real world.” He finally looked at Eren. “It requires a very convincing presentation.”
A slow, vicious smile spread across Eren’s face. It didn’t reach his eyes. “Finally. Something that makes sense.”
Levi was already analyzing, his eyes distant. “They’ll want to meet. To verify the threat. They’ll bring security.”
“We’ll bring more,” Eren said.
“No.” The word was Aria’s. They all looked at her. She kept her hand on Levi’s arm, feeling the coiled tension in his muscles. “You can’t just walk into a meet. They’ll be expecting a militia. They’ll be expecting you.” She looked at Levi, then Eren. “You’re the obvious threat. You need to be the hidden one.”
Armin leaned forward, interest sharpening his features. “What are you thinking?”
“They’re tech brokers. Auctioneers.” She took a shaky breath, the plan forming in pieces. “So you give them a tech problem. A really persistent, annoying, inescapable one. You, Armin. You meet them. You’re the face of the threat. You’re the virus they can’t delete. And you show them… you show them that if they touch you, the real attack begins. The one they can’t firewall.”
Levi turned to her fully. His eyes scanned her face. “You want to use him as bait.”
“I want to use his genius as a shield,” she corrected. Her heart hammered against her ribs. “He walks in with a laptop and a dead-man’s switch. They understand that language. And while they’re talking… you’re already at their servers.”
A grudging respect flickered in Levi’s gaze. It was a strategy. A reckless, dangerous one. But it leveraged their strengths. Armin’s mind, Eren’s ferocity, his own precision. It was also a direct counter to his instinct, which was to put himself between all of them and the threat.
“It could work,” Armin murmured, his mind already racing ahead. “I’d need to code the failsafe. A localized EMP burst wouldn’t be difficult to rig. Contained, but enough to fry every unshielded circuit in the building if my heartbeat stops. It’s a tangible demonstration.”
“I don’t like it,” Levi stated, but his tone was clinical, not dismissive. “Too many variables. Their location, his exit route, our timing.”
Eren shrugged, a roll of powerful shoulders. “So we tighten the variables. We scout. We plan. Like the old days.” He looked at Armin, a fierce, protective challenge in his eyes. “You sure you can stand in a room with them? Looking them in the eye?”
Armin met his gaze. The strategist was gone for a second, replaced by the boy who had stared down a charging titan with a broken arm. “Yes.”
The decision settled over the room, heavy and inevitable. It was a path forward, violent and sharp-edged. Levi finally nodded, once. “We plan. We move in forty-eight hours. Not before.” His eyes found Aria’s. “You and Maya take Liora to the safehouse in Reynoldsburg. You stay off-grid. No phones. No contact until you hear from me.”
The command was absolute. The fear she’d been holding back rose, bitter in her throat. She wasn’t being included in this plan. She was being shelved for her own safety, for the baby’s safety. It was logical. It was also a kind of agony.
She just nodded.
Later, in the dark of their room, he packed a small, nondescript duffel. She watched from the bed, drawing her knees up to her chin. The silence was a thick wool blanket, suffocating.
“You’ll have everything you need,” he said, not looking at her. “Maya has the coordinates. The pantry is stocked. It’s sterile.”
“I know.”
He zipped the bag with a sharp sound. “Armin will have a tracker on me. You can watch the progress on the laptop he leaves you. It will be offline, isolated, but you can watch.”
“Okay.”
He stopped then, finally turning. The dim light carved the lines of his face deep with shadow. “This is the part I don’t know how to do,” he said, his voice raw. “The leaving. The waiting. It feels like a retreat.”
She unfolded herself and stood, walking to him. She took his face in her hands, forcing him to look at her. “It’s not a retreat. It’s a tactical positioning of assets.” She managed a wobbly smile. “I’m your most important asset, remember? You’re just securing the perimeter.”
He pulled her to him, crushing her against his chest. His breath was hot in her hair. “You’re not an asset. You’re Aria.” He said her name like it was a vital, fragile truth. “And you’re carrying my heart in your stomach. Don’t forget that while you’re drinking your fancy water out of that stupid pink cup in some bunker.”
A laugh hiccupped out of her, wet and unexpected. “It’s a Stanley. And it’s quartz pink.”
He kissed her then, deep and desperate, a promise and a plea. When he pulled away, his forehead rested against hers. “Two days. I’ll come back. We’ll finish this.”
She believed him. She had to. She kissed him again, briefly, then stepped back before she could cling. “Go plan your war. I’ll go pack my… nutrients.”
He shouldered the duffel bag, a soldier again. At the door, he paused. “Name her something strong,” he said, without looking back.
Then he was gone. Aria stood in the quiet center of the room, her hands instinctively cradling the curve where his future slept. The house felt vast and hollow around her. Downstairs, the low murmur of planning resumed. She walked to the closet, pulled her own go-bag from the shelf, and unzipped it.
Inside, next to rolled clothes and her medication, sat a small, hot pink vibrator and a matching, discreet silicone butt plug. She stared at them for a long moment, symbols of a simpler, darker form of escape. She zipped the bag shut over them. That wasn’t what she needed now.
What she needed was to be strong. What she needed was to believe that fragile, complicated futures could, sometimes, be held together by the sheer, stubborn force of a love that bit back. She picked up her phone, the screen illuminating her determined face in the dark room, and typed a quick text to Maya.
"Pack your stuff. We’re going camping. Tell Liora to wear comfortable shoes."
The safehouse wasn’t a house at all. It was a repurposed storm bunker buried beneath a detached garage on a scrap of rural land outside Reynoldsburg. The air smelled of damp concrete and old motor oil. Aria stood at the bottom of the steep stairs, her overnight bag at her feet, and tried to quiet the buzzing in her veins. Maya was already fussing with a battery-powered lantern, casting weird, swinging shadows on the cinderblock walls.
“Cozy,” Maya said, her voice echoing slightly. “Very… serial killer chic.”
Liora descended the steps slowly, one hand pressed to the small of her back, the other gripping the railing. Her seven-month bump was a pronounced curve under her sweatshirt. “It’s dry. It’s hidden. It’ll do.” She sounded tired, the defiance from the apartment bleached out by the grim reality of the concrete box.
Aria forced cheer into her voice. “Look, Maya brought the important stuff.” She pointed to a bulky canvas bag Maya had lugged down. “Blankets. Snacks. A battery pack for my Stanley. We’re practically glamping.”
She watched Liora’s face for a smile, but the other woman just nodded, lowering herself onto a folding cot with a soft groan. The reality of their situation pressed in, heavier than the earth above them. Two pregnant women and a best friend, hiding in a hole.
Upstairs, in the empty garage above, a soft thud echoed.
All three of them froze. Aria’s breath hitched in her throat. It was probably the wind. An animal. A settling beam. But the sound had been too specific. Too solid.
Maya’s eyes met Aria’s, wide in the lantern light. She held a finger to her lips. She crept to the bottom of the stairs, peering up into the darkness. Silence now, thick and absolute.
“Probably a raccoon,” Maya whispered, but her voice was thin. “They get into everything.”
Aria’s hand found her stomach. Her heart was a frantic bird against her ribs. Levi’s plan had a forty-eight hour timeline. It hadn’t accounted for an immediate, physical breach. Armin’s digital tripwires were supposed to be silent sentries. She thought of his confident words: Their security is digital. It’s not physical.
Another sound. Not a thud this time. A scrape. Metal on concrete. Directly above the hidden hatch in the garage floor that led to their bunker.
There was no lock on the inside.
Liora rose from the cot, her movements sharp with adrenaline, all her earlier fatigue gone. Her hand went to her belly, protective and fierce. “They’re here,” she breathed, the words chilling the damp air.
Maya scrambled back from the stairs. “The door. We need to barricade the door.” There was nothing to use. The cots were flimsy aluminum. The shelves were empty. The bare, poured-concrete room offered no weapons, no cover.
The heavy metal hatch above groaned. The sound of a lock being forced, not with digital finesse, but with brutal, mechanical leverage. A shriek of torqued metal, then a deafening crack as the external bolt gave way.
Light from the garage flooded down the stairwell, outlining two silhouettes—broad-shouldered, moving with a swift, practiced economy. They weren’t scouts or techs. They were entry specialists. Quiet, efficient, and utterly unhindered by the alarms that never sounded.
The first man descended. He wore dark, nondescript tactical gear, no insignia. A compact submachine gun was slung across his chest, but his hands were empty. He assessed the room in a single glance: three women, one heavily pregnant, one five months along, one unarmed. His eyes, flat and cold behind a black ski mask, showed no surprise. Only calculation.
The second man followed, covering the stairs. He held a device in his hand—a rectangular box with a small antenna. A signal jammer. It explained the silence. It explained why Armin saw nothing.
“Liora Seraphina,” the first man said. His voice was distorted, robotic, filtered through a voice changer. He ignored Aria and Maya entirely. “You’re going to come with us. Quietly. It’ll be easier for everyone.”
Liora stood her ground, chin raised. “Go to hell.”
The man’s shoulders lifted in a slight shrug. He looked past her to Aria. “You’re a bonus. The buyer has a preference for earlier-term specimens. Less… wear.” His gaze dropped to her stomach, and a fresh, primal terror seized her. This wasn’t about retrieving lost property. They were shopping.
Maya stepped forward, putting herself between the man and Aria. “You don’t want to do this.”
He didn’t even look at her. A gloved hand shot out, a quick, brutal motion. The butt of his gun connected with Maya’s temple with a sickening thock. She collapsed soundlessly, a puppet with its strings cut, slumping against a shelving unit before sliding to the floor.
Aria screamed, a raw sound that tore from her throat. She dropped to her knees beside Maya, her fingers scrambling for a pulse at her neck. Warm. Thready. A trickle of blood darkened her blonde hair.
The man stepped over Maya’s legs as if she were debris. He closed the distance to Liora in two strides. She tried to scramble back, but her balance was off, her movements slowed by her pregnancy. He caught her arm, his grip vise-like.
“Don’t struggle,” the mechanized voice droned. “Fetal distress reduces viability.”
Liora froze, the clinical horror of the words stripping her of her fight. Her eyes found Aria’s, wide with a terrified surrender.
The second man, still by the stairs, gestured with his jammer. “The other one. The buyer might still want the first, but two for the price of one is better margin.”
The first man nodded, shifting his grip on Liora to free a hand. He pulled a syringe from a pouch on his vest. A clear liquid sloshed inside. “Sedative. For transport.”
Aria’s mind, fogged with panic, cleared into a single, sharp point. Levi’s voice cut through the haze: You’re my most important asset. Not an asset. A person. A fighter. She was on her knees, her friend was bleeding out, and a man with a needle was coming for the life inside her.
Her hand, still resting on Maya’s neck, brushed against the canvas bag. Her fingers closed around a smooth, cylindrical object. Her pink Stanley tumbler.
As the masked man leaned down toward Liora’s exposed neck, Aria launched herself upward. She didn’t aim for the man with the needle. She drove forward, shoulder low, and smashed into the second man at the base of the stairs.
The move was awkward, fueled by pure adrenaline and her off-balance weight. It wasn’t graceful. It was a mess of limbs and a choked cry. But it caught him by surprise. He stumbled back, his foot catching on the bottom step. The jammer flew from his hand, clattering across the concrete floor.
The first man spun, Liora forgotten for a split second. “Subdue her!” he barked at his partner.
The second man regained his footing, anger flashing in his eyes above the mask. He lunged for Aria. She swung the Stanley tumbler with all her might. It connected with the side of his head with a dense, metallic clang. Not enough to knock him out. Enough to daze him.
He reeled back, shaking his head. Aria scrambled away, putting the cot between them. Her breath came in ragged, painful gasps. The man with the syringe was moving again, abandoning Liora to deal with the interruption.
He backhanded Aria across the face.
The world exploded into white light and ringing silence. She tasted blood, copper-sharp on her tongue. Her head snapped to the side, and she collapsed against the cold wall, stars dancing in her vision. Through the haze, she saw him raise the syringe again, this time aiming for her neck.
From the floor, a hand shot out and grabbed his ankle.
Maya’s eyes were unfocused, her face a mask of blood, but her grip was iron. She yanked with a grunt of pure effort. The man staggered, the syringe plunging downward, embedding itself in the thin mattress of the cot instead of Aria’s skin.
He snarled, kicking out viciously. His boot connected with Maya’s ribs. A sharp crack echoed in the small space. Maya wheezed, her grip loosening.
Liora screamed. Not in fear this time. In rage. She launched herself at the first man’s back, her fingers clawing at his mask, her nails digging for eyes. He cursed, shaking her off like a bothersome insect. She fell hard onto the concrete, a cry of pain wrenching from her lips. She curled onto her side, clutching her stomach, her face etched with sudden, sharp agony.
The second man was on Aria now, his hands closing around her throat, cutting off her air. Black spots swam at the edges of her sight. She clawed at his arms, her struggles growing weaker.
The first man stood over Liora, pulling a second syringe from his vest. “Enough,” the robotic voice spat.
A new sound cut through the ragged breathing and pained cries.
A low, rolling growl of an engine, revving once, twice, right outside the garage door. Headlights flashed, bleaching the garage through the high windows.
Tires squealed. Metal shrieked.
The entire garage wall imploded in a catastrophic roar of splintering wood and twisted aluminum siding. The black grille of a Dodge Challenger erupted through the dust and debris, coming to a sudden, screeching halt inside the garage, its headlights glaring directly down the open hatch into the bunker.
Framed in the blinding light, a silhouette emerged from the driver’s side. Then another from the passenger side. Tall, lean, moving with a predatory stillness that was entirely different from the tactical efficiency of the masked men.
The man holding Aria’s throat loosened his grip, turning his head toward the shocking invasion. Aria sucked in a burning gasp of air.
Eren Yeager stepped into the cone of light at the top of the stairs, dust motes swirling around him like a halo. His green eyes burned with a familiar, apocalyptic fire. He wasn’t holding a gun. He was holding a long, heavy tire iron.
He didn’t speak. He just started walking down the stairs.
Behind him, Armin Arlert appeared, a laptop tucked under one arm. His face was pale, his glasses smudged, but his gaze was fixed and coldly analytical on the scene below. He took in the men, the women, the syringes. His free hand tapped once on the laptop’s trackpad.
A piercing, undulating siren suddenly blared from the device in his hand, deafening in the confined space. The jammer’s counterpart—an alarm broadcasting on every frequency, a digital scream for help that would now, inevitably, be heard.
The two masked men looked at each other. Their clean, quiet extraction had just become a very loud, very messy problem.
Eren reached the bottom of the stairs. The tire iron hung loosely at his side. He glanced at Aria, saw the raw marks on her throat, the blood on her lip. He looked at Maya, crumpled and holding her ribs. He looked at Liora, whimpering on the floor.
His eyes closed for a single, slow blink.
When they opened again, all the restraint was gone, replaced by a flat, promise of violence. He looked at the first man, then at the second.
“Hey,” Eren said, his voice deceptively calm, almost casual. “Which one of you wants to go first?”