Nodding, I put a new magazine in my gun and headed off to the right. If we were lucky our brothers would have taken care of most of Carrick’s crew. But for all we knew he had a whole group of them here with him to try to kill us.
My eyes scanned the darkness, looking for any movement. There was a flickering light off at the end of the wash bay thatkept it from being pitch black in here, but it still wasn’t easy to see. And I could barely hear shit.
I took deliberate, slow steps so that I didn’t announce my position to the enemy. I’d nearly passed Carrick’s location before I realized he was there. He came out of the darkness grinning like the fucking bad guy in any super hero movie. Crazy bastard. Dangerous bastard, too. He was losing and he knew it, but rather than run he was going out scorched earth.
He hit me from the side, but I managed to hang onto my weapon as I stumbled under his weight. I didn’t see anyone else around, but gunfire started up again, which meant Kilo had found his back up.
“I’m going to gut you like a fucking pig,” Carrick snarled.
Catching his wrist with my free hand, I kept him from keeping that promise.
“Then I’m going to kill those two pieces of shit. They fucking ruined everything.”
I didn’t need him to clarify to know he was talking about Rue and Ryan. About my family. Anger raced through my bloodstream. Twisting, I managed to contort my body enough that the hand holding my pistol twisted in his direction. “Over your fucking dead body,” I growled.
There was a half second of realization that dawned in his manic eyes before I pulled the trigger. I kept pressing until my gun gave a metallic click.
“Shit. That’s one way to make sure he’s dead,” Kilo said as he trotted up. His own gun was in both hands, half raised as he waited for more assholes to jump out of the dark at us. It didn’t happen.
I let Carrick’s body fall to the ground. I’d unloaded the full magazine into his chest. He wasn’t getting back up again. “Get them out of here. I need to find the others and make sure they’re okay.”
Rue and Ryan crept out from behind some trash cans when I called their names. She shook her head as she approached. “I’m not leaving,” she said, a stubborn look crossing her face.
“You can’t help us clear this place out,” I insisted.
“I know, but I’m not taking Kilo away from here and leaving you shorthanded.”
Opening my mouth to argue with her, we both stopped when Ruck’s voice came from outside. “We can hear you yelling at each other from across the fucking car wash.”
I snapped my jaw shut because he was right. I’d forgotten to lower my voice and she was yelling just so that I could hear her.
“Don’t worry, there’s none left,” Bolo called out.
“What a fucking disappointment,” Relay added as they walked up to us in a group. “I wanted to kill more of them.”
“You’ll get that chance soon enough,” Ruck told him. His eyes tracked over us, then he asked, “You guys good enough to give us a hand?”
“A hand with what?” Kilo asked.
“Got a bunch of kids inside the building,” Ruck said. “Hype and Merc are with them now. We need to get them to a safe place. A friendly female face might help out, turns out bikers are rather intimidating.”
“...female face. You mean Rue’s face…right?” Kilo narrowed his eyes when Ruck smirked.
Ruck chuckled. “Ryan?”
The kid looked at Ruck, and to his credit he didn’t flinch away from our president. He straightened his spine, not knowing what might be coming, and faced him. “Yes, sir?”
“Just Ruck,” he said with a shake of his head. “You want to give us a hand? Those kids know you. They’ll probably trust you more than us.”
Ryan looked over at his sister. She nodded. “C’mon, let’s go,” she said.
“Fine, guess I’m going too,” I told my prez.
“Sure, after you wash off,” Ruck told me, pointing toward one of the self-wash bays before walking off.
We went over and I quickly soaked Bolo with the spray wand. It wasn’t the best bath in the world, but it would do and then we could change into the extra clothes we carried around in our saddle bags.
“My turn,” Bolo said, pasting an innocent expression on his face.
