Brooklyn is crouched near her father's ankles, half-sheltering behind an overturned armchair. A small group of men stand behind her, giving and taking most of the damage being slung around the house. Dallas isn't among them, thank God. At least the little rat can't just nail Calamity and Brooklyn in the back of the head while they're unawares.
No one whips toward me when I throw myself inside. There's too much noise and too many others to concentrate on. I'm just another body in the room. A bullet whizzes past, lodging itself into the wall with a small shower of plaster. My heart thunders in my chest and my arm throbs, reminding me just how painful it was to get shot. I'm at risk for a whole lot more than a flesh wound here.
It doesn't matter though. Brooklyn is in the thick of this, and I'm going to get her out of here alive, even if it kills me.
I take aim at the nearest man aiming for her and squeeze the trigger.
My shot doesn't even register in the general din, but the man goes down, blinking one last time before his body catches up with the fact that most of his brain is decorating the far wall.
He knocks into his companion as he falls, who jerks in surprise and whips his head around to face me. He only has time to turn toward me before the bullet hits, tearing out a good chunk of his throat. This man actually has time to realize what's happened before he goes down, clutching his throat as viscous red blood pours through his fingers.
Dallas and his buddies crouch behind an overturned sofa, using it as a barricade against Gardel. A quick head count reveals that Dallas has at least twice as many men as Gardel. If Brooklyn weren't here, I’d turn my back and left right then and there. It was high time someone put a hole in Calamity's skull and the fact this battle was culling the King's numbers was just a benefit. But Brooklynwashere, which meant I had to come down on Calamity's side. What fucking irony.
I lose another shot, aiming to hit Dallas between the shoulder blades while he's half-turned away. The shot goes wide and hits Axel instead. The shot hits him right in the eye and explodes out the back of his head.
This grabs the attention of the entire room, and thirty eyes swivel to the doorway where Ryker and I stand. Gardel's fingers twitch spasmodically around his gun and hate etches deep furrows into his face. For a second that seems to span an eternity, I'm sure he's going to lunge out from the protective barrier of bodies to shoot me, consequences be damned. But something draws his attention downward, his gaze lighting on Brooklyn's petrified face and his expression softens by an infinitesimal degree.
Dallas' face is no less furious, though he regards me with disgust, rather than outright hatred, as if I'm a roach in his otherwise pristine house.
"Deal with him!" he shouts to another of his guards.
The boy doesn't look much older than fifteen. He's pale and shaky beneath a floppy mess of brown hair. He should be at home, finishing his algebra homework, or making his first fumbling attempt to remove a bra. He probably joined the Kings for some extra cash or the status points it won him. I remembered being a punk ass kid at his age, convinced that I knew everything. That arrogance had gotten my father killed.
I wasn't going to let Dallas use this teenager as a meat shield.
The boy steps out from behind the couch and raises a pistol, aiming for my head. His shot goes wide, missing me completely. Another divot is added to the wall behind me. He tries to line up another shot, but he's too slow. I reach him in the next second and the butt of my gun collides with his cheek with a crack that's barely audible over the chatter of gunfire.
The kid goes down hard, face impacting the floor at a bad angle. I've probably caved in his cheekbone and he might have broken his nose, but he'll live.
I jump over the kid's prone body, not breaking stride. My eyes are all for Dallas, who looks distinctly panicked as I barrel toward him. He tries to shove another man into my path. I wrench his hand up and the shot hits the ceiling and fine dust and wood scraps rains down on our heads. I knock the gun out of his hand and get a knee up, bringing his groin into a collision course with it. The man releases an undignified squeal and falls to the floor. He's going to be incapacitated for a little while at least.
I lash out, getting a fistful of Dallas' hair, dragging him toward me, jamming the business end of the 9mm against his temple. Everyone freezes, even Gardel. Most of his fury has drained away, though I still think he'd like to shoot me. Fair enough. I'd do the same if the circumstances were different.
"Drop your fucking weapons." I snarl into the silence that's fallen over the room. "I swear to God I will shoot."
At first, no one moves. None of the men loyal to Dallas look at me, too busy trying to gauge what their boss wants to do. If Dallas is suicidal, I'm a fucking dead man. His guys will pump us full of enough steel that our corpses will set off every metal detector in the state. But I don't see Dallas as the martyr type. He's been a cowardly sneak thus far, and I don't see that changing just because he's been caught.
"Put them down!" His voice isn't the shout he wants, because I've wrapped my bicep around his throat, threatening to choke off his air if he tries to struggle.
Guns clatter to the ruined floor, all of Dallas' men surrendering their weapons at his prompting. They must really be loyal to him. Or perhaps too scared to defy him.
Calamity's men don't surrender their guns, and there is calculation in every face. One shot is all it would take to eliminate two of their greatest enemies. Most of them don't know I'm not Cruz. It's not like most of the newbies even know that we're twins.
"Hand him over," Calamity growls. "He's mine to kill."
"If the time comes we'll flip for it," I shoot back.
There's a flicker of amusement in those icy blue eyes for a second. I swear he's enjoying this.
Happy to entertain you, motherfucker,I think sourly.
The man I kneed in the groin staggers to his feet, wild-eyed and pissed. He doesn't even seem to register that I'm holding a gun on his boss, or that his buddies have surrendered. He brings his gun up and aims it at Calamity.
Life isn't like the movies. Things don't happen in dramatic slow-mo with strobing lights. It's only in hindsight that we can rip the memory apart and examine it frame by agonizing frame.
It took only a second for the man to fire. A half a second for the bullet to go flying toward Calamity's chest.
And a fraction of that for Brooklyn to throw herself in the way.
