My heart leapt straight into my throat, suffocating me.
Liliana and the soldier dropped the dead man. While she backed away, he went for his weapons.
“Come peacefully and we’ll let you live,” said one Hunter, his face a pale smudge in the dark.
No.
Death before slavery.
I would die before I succumbed to what they calledliving.
The Hunters drew closer, and my switchblade slid easily from its permanent resting place in my bra. My heartbeat expanded to my throat, my stomach, my fingertips, but I was ready, and I wouldn’t hesitate. Killing had long ago become an act of survival, and with the Brotherhood Cross stitched into their combat clothes, I found it difficult to find reasons they should live.
“Ah, a medic,” another said, eyeing my red cross armband. “We could use you. Come with us, and we’ll find a nice House for you.”
The others snickered. Beside me, the soldier who’d dragged me to this alley to die spat at their feet.
“No?” the Hunter said. “Alright, then.”
They advanced, and my soldier threw himself in front of me. The fight exploded in a flurry of arms and legs. He was a good fighter. His knife buried in the throat of a Hunter, and he spun for another. I leapt at a third with my switchblade, but he dodged to the left. In my periphery, Liliana had joined the fight with her own blade.
I swiped my blade and missed. The Hunter grabbed my wrist and whipped a blow to my chin. Stars danced in my eyes as he threw me to the ground.
Pain lanced through my elbow and throbbed in my jaw. My knife clattered away. A foot landed a hard kick in my stomach, knocking the air from my lungs.
My chest spasmed, and I lay helpless, wheezing, as my soldier snapped the neck of another Hunter, then choked when a Bowie knife sliced deep into his abdomen. He clutched the wound and dropped to his knees.
In the dark, his blood was blacker than the night, and by the sheer amount of it, I knew they’d nicked something vital. He fell onto his stomach and didn’t get back up.
I tried to stand, but the Hunter’s boot pressed into my spine, and I was pinned to the ground like an insect. Still, I reached for my blade, lying a yard away.
I needed that weapon.
With it, I had options—continue fighting, bury it in my own stomach, jam it in the eye of this bastard on top of me. Without it, this was over.
I’d be theirs.
Liliana gasped, and I twisted enough to see her fall, a knife jutting from her side.
Despite everything, my heart clenched. “Liliana,” I wheezed through staccato breaths. “Hold on.”
But for what? Why should she hold on? We were both fucked.
Reaching again for my blade, I sensed a stiffening of the soldier above me. He turned toward the mouth of the alley.
“Colonel,” said one of his comrades. “Found some before they could escape.”
Any hope left in me withered at that one word.
Colonel.
If a colonel had arrived, then I had no chance. The best I could hope for was death.
My hand fell to the pavement. The blade was too far. This was over.
Trapped as I was, I could hardly make out the dark figure as he approached with even steps, silent as a panther. He was dressed the same as the rest of the Hunters—in a black combat uniform—but he wore no helmet, and the telltale scarlet insignia of a Blood Colonel shone bright on his shoulder, even in the darkness.
Lucas Scott peered down at me, expressionless, and my body went boneless. It hadn’t occurred to me that he might actually show at a mission he’d purposely sabotaged. A long moment passed in which we stared at each other, him utterly dispassionate, and me speculating whether he’d let them kill or imprison me. It wasn’t like I was important to him, and he’d maintain his cover by leaving my fate in his soldiers’ hands. With a simple missive, he’d have a replacement Defiance contact and would be rid of me for good.
