As soon as Angelo stepped out, a bullet caught him in the leg, and he went down. Shots pinged toward the doorway and came from inside the garage at the same time.
Fuck.
I pulled Sofia low and pushed her behind a hulking car.
“Stay here,” I hissed at her, squeezing her hand hard before turning away.
I listened to the soft shuffling sounds of men trying to be quiet as they moved through the dark. Channeling the kid that I used to be, the one who could see in the darkest night, I decided which direction to go for first and sprang.
I slid across a car bumper, and my fist found the first shooter’s nose. I landed hard on his chest, my hands going to his neck before he even understood what had happened.
The soft crunch of his neck snapping soothed the raging beast of anger and fear inside me. All I could think about was getting Sofia out. She could get hurt like this, with bullets flying recklessly. If that happened, I’d burn every single inch of Casa Nera to the ground, with every single fucker who lived here staked to the earth to die in painful agony before letting the flames consume me as well.
Leaving the dead body of the first man, I moved silently on my bare feet toward the next person. I’d gone through the man’s pockets and now had a knife and a gun. The knife was preferred in these dark, close quarters, however, as I’d rather sneak up and attack in the dark than have a shoot-out.
My knife found the neck of the next man, sinking like butter through his worthless flesh and sinew. Hot blood splashed my chest and arm, and I was relieved that the feeling seemed to be returning to my dislocated shoulder. Angelo had done a good job of popping it back in, though, in a few hours, it’d hurt like a bitch again. At this rate, I’d be lucky to be alive to worry about it.
Angelo. Fuck. The man better not bleed out, not when he was so close to getting everything he wanted, the future he dreamed of with the woman he loved. I felt like his life was my responsibility as well now, along with Sofia’s. Good people who were in this situation because of me.
Another guard fell to my knife, and the garage fell quiet. I headed back toward Sofia.
As I did, my eyes perfectly adjusting to the dim light, a rapid motion ahead pulled my attention. The small door to the garage flung open at the side, the light blinding me for a moment, and then a figure staggered through, dragging another.
Someone had Sofia, and they were taking her outside.
I charged after them.
The one thing that my parents had agreed on in terms of brutal and depressing life lessons was that love was a weakness that could get you killed. It muted your instincts; it dulled your senses and overrode logic. That was never more apparent than today.
As I barreled outside after Sofia, pure terror for her blinding me from everything else, the attack came from the side. Waiting for someone to run blindly through a door was tactics 101, yet I’d fallen for it because I couldn’t tear my eyes from the sight of the woman I loved being painfully dragged, her legs scrambling on the ground, her head thrashing in her attacker’s hard grip.
Two men waited for me outside the door, and they didn’t hold back. One grabbed me around the middle as the other punched me. He was slow and heavy, however, and I was able to get my legs up and push back off his stomach, head-butting the man behind me and taking us both to the ground. Once I was down, I slashed the tendons of the man still standing, leaving him screaming in pain as I twisted toward the one who’d held me. I jerked his hand up just in time to send his shot wide. The gunshot echoed around the compound, then another swiftly followed. I looked up. My attacker staggered to the side, a new hole in his head. Whipping my head to the other side, I looked for the shooter.
Angelo lay on the ground, his injured leg straight before him and his back propped against the side of the garage. He was white and looked grim as hell, but his shooting hand was steady.
He slowly lowered his weapon and looked at me. “Silvio has Sofia,” he panted before groaning and gripping his leg.
Getting to my feet, I grabbed the guns of the fallen men and tucked them into my waistband, looking like a one-man armory. “They never fucking left. They were waiting.”
“Keep alert and shoot anyone who comes at you. We’re still getting out of here, and you have someone waiting for you,” I reminded him.
He nodded, his lips bloodless. “So do you. Get her.”
He didn’t need to tell me twice. I took off, a gun gripped in one hand and a knife tucked into my other. I skirted around the edge of the garage and peered toward the open space in the middle of the compound.
I spied Silvio immediately.
His men were scattered around. More than I’d hoped there’d be, but few enough to take.
They made for the cars at the edge of the green, protecting Silvio as he dragged Sofia after him. He was probably planning on getting the hell off the property and leaving his men to hunt me down and kill me. Silvio didn’t seem the type to take risks.
The men watched out for their boss, and nearly half of them had their backs fully turned.
It was hard to hate the Devil when sometimes I felt like he loaned me his luck.
I stepped out onto the green and took aim. Five shots, five fallen men.
The rest turned and shot in retaliation, but I ducked back against the garage. Chunks of plaster flew off in all directions as they attempted to hit me.
As soon as they came up empty, a lull I’d been expecting, having been keeping a rough count of shots, I re-emerged. I had no problem with ammo. I had three guns to burn through.
I got one immediately, leaving four more. These four weren’t as dumb as the rest. Clearly, these were the real deal.
Dodging behind cars and other objects, they avoided my shots. I didn’t have time to play with them all day because Silvio had made it to a car. I had to move. I ran toward them, knowing I was about to be attacked by his remaining men. They might be out of ammo, but I knew they could fight.
The car that Silvio had dragged Sofia into started. He’d had a driver waiting. The tires spun on the gravel of the forecourt, and it was moving. I raised my weapon and shot steadily at the tires. I managed to blow one before the first man reached me.
His punch in my exposed right side made my head ring. I staggered to the side, dizzy but rallying. His next punch went wide as I danced away, but his second hit my shoulder, and I nearly vomited on the spot. He ripped the gun from my hand and tossed it away.
“It’s just us, Chernov. Let’s see what you’re made of. Are you really a legend or just a fucked-up psycho?” the man goaded me.
I suddenly recognized his voice. It was Idiot One, from my first day in captivity.
I couldn’t help it. I laughed as he squared up to me.
His eyebrows drew together over his short forehead. “What’s the joke?”
“You are. I’m just so happy to see you again.” I smirked at him, even as the remaining men surrounded me.
Four to one. It wasn’t anything I hadn’t faced before, but I wasn’t in the best shape. I went to draw one of my fully loaded guns, and someone tackled me from behind. I fell face-first into the gravel with the motherfucker behind me, the gun flying far across the ground.
He clearly hadn’t realized that I had another one, though. As he attempted to get his arm around my neck, I heaved him off long enough to rip the other stolen gun from my waistband and tucked it under my arm.
The shot was so close to me that the heat of it warmed my side. His dead weight fell on me, pinning me down, and I shrugged to buck him off as another man ran in. This one I shot in the leg, before his wild kick took my last gun from me.
Swearing wildly, he tried to reach for the gun at the same time as I did, his hand coming close to my face. I bit it, his blood filling my mouth. He cursed savagely and rolled away, gripping his hand, two fingers exposed to the bone.
I’d learned at a young age that when fighting for your life, there was no such thing as a fair fight. They were all dogfights, no matter what anyone liked to imagine. If you couldn’t get your hands dirty, you didn’t live to see another day.
I crawled for the gun as Idiot One reached me. His kick to my side whited out my vision for a few seconds. I rolled to my side, trying to shake the dizziness behind my eyes as I blinked at him.
He stepped over me and picked up the gun. “So, you are as mad as they say you are. You’re just not as good. Disappointing, Chernov. I’d been expecting more.” He pointed the gun at me.
“Yeah, well, never buy hype. You’ll always be disappointed. When you only get excellent reviews, people doubt the veracity of your claims,” I muttered, sinking my hand into the tiny gravel and sand topping on the ground of the fancy driveway.
I peered up at the man who thought he was about to kill me. “And I never get any bad ones, so it’s a tough one.”
“Why’s that?” Idiot One asked, seeming to enjoy being in a powerful position for once, and milking it for all it was worth. He was truly worthy of his name.
“Because they’re dead,” I said, looking him in the eye as I threw my handful of sand and grit at his face.
He cursed, jerking the gun away to cover his eyes as I twisted and pulled the knife from the pocket I’d tucked it in. With the first stab, I pinned his foot to the ground. He screamed and fell, his weight pulling the knife free. I clawed my way up his body, using my knife like an ice pick sinking into a mountain. He shot wildly downwards, but I was too close to him, and he couldn’t see well. By the time I reached his face, red, with streaming eyes, I’d pinned his hand to the ground with the knife and taken the gun back.
“I’m sorry,” I muttered as I put it to his temple. “I promised to skin you before killing you. I’m afraid I don’t have time for it. I suppose you’ll be another faceless, feeble stat in my kill count.” With a vicious grin, I pulled the trigger.
When his brains splattered to the ground, relief and a profoundly deep sense of peace filled me.
Sofia was right, after all. I wasn’t normal. There was a darkness inside me that only violence could quench and a beast that demanded sacrifice. Today, for her, I let him free.
Rolling up, I noted the injuries to my body in a detached way. I looked around, making sure everyone was down where I needed them. Idiot One’s wild shots had wasted the rest of the ammo, and I couldn’t afford to spend time looking for another gun.
Silvio was getting away and taking Sofia with him.
I couldn’t waste one more second. Pulling the knife from Idiot One’s hand, I ran down the driveway.
