“Motherfucker!”
Ryland speeds up, and the car fishtails wildly as he careens down the road. I turn to look behind us a split second before we’re rammed again. My body jerks from the force of it, and before I can even recover, another car slams into us from the side, its passenger door scraping against ours.
“Shit. It’s Carson and fucking Dominic!” Theo shoves me down onto the seat as he speaks, drawing his gun with his other hand. “Ry! Get us the fuck out of here!”
“Working on it!”
Ryland punches the gas, and the car lurches forward as the engine roars. I’m bent nearly double, my head between my knees and Theo’s heavy hand on the back of my neck, but when I crane my neck to peer up toward the front, I see Ryland hunched over the wheel, peering through the small sections of undamaged glass in the windshield.
Air rushes into the car as the front window is rolled down, and Marcus fires out the window before letting out an angry curse.
We’re speeding down the road so fast that even though I can’t see the scenery whizzing by, I can feel it.
Then more gunshots pepper the car—from the back this time, not the front. I hear a loud noise as the back window cracks, and then suddenly, the car tilts to one side, as if the ground has suddenly dropped out from under us.
Ryland grunts, gripping the wheel, but the vehicle spins out, tires and metal screeching as it rotates wildly.
The tires. They shot out the tires.
It’s the last clear thought I have before the passenger side slams into something hard, whipping me across the seat like a rag doll.
The sudden stillness is jarring in the aftermath of the crash.
My ears are ringing and my body feels bruised all over. I don’t want to move, don’t want to think, but Theo’s hands are on me, hauling me up and unclipping my seatbelt. He and the other men are yelling, and my body switches into some kind of autopilot mode as shock narrows my focus.
The door. We have to get out of the car.
Theo is pushing me toward the door on the driver’s side, and I reach for it, yanking the handle and shoving it open. As soon as I’m out of the car, I crouch low, taking cover behind the ruined vehicle.
Ryland and Marcus spill out of the front, leaving the driver’s door open as extra cover and pressing their backs to the side of the car, crouched down just like we are. Marcus has a bruise near his temple, and Ryland has a split lip, but neither of them look like they’ve been hurt worse than that.
“It’s Dom and Carson,” Marcus mutters, pulling his gun from the waistband of his pants and craning his head a little to peer through the windows of Ryland’s car. “I don’t know how the fuck they found us.”
“We need to split up.” Ryland’s voice is hard, and his gaze flicks to me. “I’ll try to draw their fire. Get her out of here.”
Something in his expression makes my heart clench as remembered words rush through my head.
None of us expect to live long.
“I’ll go with you. You’re not fucking going alone.” Theo nods at Ryland.
All four of us duck when a bullet pings off the car, and adrenaline floods my veins. I think we managed to put some distance between us and our pursuers when Ryland floored it, basically driving blind. But they’ve caught up to us now. They’re here.
Marcus casts his two friends a look. The glance only lasts for a second at most, but in that one second, I see every single emotion he’s feeling.
Anger. Desperation. Frustration.
Love.
Such a deep, abiding love that it breaks my heart.
There’s no time to argue. There’s no time to say much of anything. I can tell Marcus hates this, but he doesn’t push back against his friends. He just nods once. “Stay the fuck alive.”
“You too.” Ryland’s hazel eyes are serious.
Two more bullets hit the car with a metallic ringing sound, and Theo braces himself against the side door and fires back. Then he reaches out and palms the back of my head, dragging me toward him to press a hard, fast kiss to my lips, not seeming to give a fuck that Marcus and Ryland are watching.
He’s never done this before. Never been the one to initiate a kiss between us.
And I hate it.
Because it feels like he’s saying goodbye.
My heart gallops in my chest as Theo releases me, his eyes burning with words he has no time to say and I have no time to hear. Then he braces himself against the car again and raises his arm over the trunk, firing at our pursuers once more. Ryland’s gaze catches mine before he joins his friend, and then Marcus is grabbing my hand, pulling me to my feet.
“Keep your head down. And run like hell,” he mutters.
More shots split the air as Ryland and Theo fire at Carson and Dom, forcing them to take cover as Marcus yanks me out from behind the car.
And then we’re running.
Heads low, bodies slightly bent, we sprint away from the car and the sound of gunshots. I barely got a chance to take in our surroundings after we crashed into the streetlamp on the side of the road, but Marcus is obviously better at this shit than I am. He seems to know where we’re going, dragging me along the side of a broad building before ducking around the corner of it.
We’re in the middle of the warehouse district now, and large, squat structures are lined up side by side, interspersed with large stacks of shipping containers. Gunshots and shouts fill the air behind us as we run at a flat-out sprint, and my heart feels like it’s falling to pieces with every heavy thud of my feet.
Theo and Ryland.
Fuck, what’s happening to them? Will they get boxed in by Dominic and Carson, just like Carson originally planned?
I can barely think. It takes all my focus just to run, to keep my balance as we skid around the sides of buildings and down narrow passageways between them. And every time a thought does manage to take hold in my brain, it sends a fresh wave of panic through me.
Gripping Marcus’s hand tightly, I throw a quick glance over my shoulder. I don’t see anyone behind us. And the sound of gunshots are faint in the distance now, so quiet I could almost convince myself I don’t hear them.
Has the shooting stopped?
Are the other two men running just like we are?
Are they still alive?
My chest aches and my lungs burn from the burst of intense exertion coupled with fear. But still, we keep running. My footsteps begin to flag, my feet stumbling over each other, but I force myself to keep moving. To keep going. Marcus pulls me along, unrelenting in his determination to keep me safe.
Finally, he drags me around another corner and comes to a stop, pressing me against the wall of the large building as we both gasp for breath. He peers back around the corner, his gun gripped tightly in his hand.
“Is there… anyone there?” I gasp.
“No.” His voice is controlled, although I can hear the strain beneath it, and I know it’s not from the physical exertion. “But that doesn’t mean they’re not following us. Carson’s a slippery motherfucker. It depends on who he wanted more. Me, or Theo and Ryland.”
My heart skips with a strange mix of hope and fear. Maybe Carson and Dominic split up, each of them pursuing one part of our group. But if they didn’t… if they had to choose? Which choice did they make?
“Can you run again?”
Marcus turns back to me, sliding his gun into the waistband of his pants and gripping me by the shoulders. Concern darkens his eyes as his gaze sweeps over me, and I wonder if I bear the marks of our car crash just like he does. The bruise on the side of his head seems to have darkened and expanded as it’s settled in, and I can’t imagine how badly his temples must be throbbing right now.
My body feels jarred and rattled all over, but I can’t pinpoint any specific area of pain—except my lungs, which still burn like fire with every gasping breath. Bile burns my throat, and I feel like I might vomit.
But I nod anyway.
If Marcus says we need to keep running, we keep running.
How many more hours are left now? Four and a half? Can we really run for that long?
I don’t let myself answer that question, instead letting Marcus pull me away from the wall.
“Come on, angel.”
He grabs my hand and tugs me out of the narrow alleyway between buildings, already moving at a jog.
But then his feet suddenly skid against the asphalt, stopping so abruptly I almost slam into him.
A half-second later, I realize why.
Carson stands fifteen feet away from us, near another small passageway between buildings. His gun is aimed at Marcus’s chest.
Marcus’s whole body goes rigid, his hand tightening on mine until it feels like my bones might break.
The man with the ash-brown hair and the smug face is breathing almost as hard as we are. He must’ve been following us for a long time, I realize, probably on the other side of the buildings we ran along, keeping one building between us at all times. Tracking us. Isolating us.
And although he’s winded, it doesn’t make his hand any less steady.
“Fucking finally,” he spits out. Then his lips curve in a leering smile. “Don’t worry. I’ll tell everyone you ran like a coward.”
Marcus’s jaw clenches. “You’re a fucking asshole, Purcell.”
There’s something in his voice that turns my blood to ice. A heavy knowledge, a recognition that we’re trapped.
My gaze shifts from the man before us to the one beside me, terror rising in my chest. Marcus’s gun is tucked into his waistband, but even if he were still holding it, would it make a difference? Even if he managed to get in a shot at Carson, he wouldn’t be able to do it before Carson shot him first.
And Carson’s not going to negotiate. He’s not going to bargain. He doesn’t want anything from Marcus but his death.
This is a ruthless fucking game, and he’s playing to win.
Carson’s finger tightens on the trigger of his gun. His eyes are hard and focused as he stares at Marcus’s face.
My body moves before I’m even consciously aware of it, my feet stepping forward as if I’ve been inhabited by the ghost of my past self—the girl who should’ve died outside a nightclub two and a half years ago.
None of us expect to live long.
I shift to stand in front of Marcus, and he realizes what I’m doing at almost the same moment I do.
“No, you fucking don’t.”
Fast as lightning, his grip on my hand tightens, and he yanks me back, wrapping his arms around me and spinning us around just as three shots ring out.
Pop pop pop.
I feel the impact of the bullets, just like I did outside that alley years ago. Only this time, they’re not piercing my body.
They’re hitting Marcus.
The force of the gunshots sends us falling forward, our bodies going down together. The asphalt rushes up to meet us, and my temple cracks painfully against it, making dark stars flash before my eyes. Making the world go blurry.
Marcus lands on top of me, his weight somehow heavier than it’s ever felt before. This isn’t like when he rested on top of me after sex, his cock buried inside me and our breaths falling into the same pattern. When I felt like we were one. When I felt somehow whole.
This is terrifying.
Suffocating.
He doesn’t move. And I can’t get up. He’s too heavy, and I’m too small, and the darkness at the edges of my vision is creeping closer and closer, dragging me under.
It feels like an ocean is swallowing me up.
I’m sinking. Deeper, deeper into swirling black water. I don’t know where Carson is. I don’t know where anything is. The only thing I’m still aware of is the solid weight of Marcus against my back, his addictive scent of leather and soap tainted by a coppery tang that makes my stomach revolt.
I feel liquid dripping down my back, pooling around my body.
But it’s not water. It’s not the ocean, not the blackness that’s slowly dragging me under.
It’s Marcus’s blood.
***
To Be Continued…
