"Conal?"
Nothing. Just the sound of something drip, drip, dripping and the stench of fuel. Footsteps approached the ruined SUV, slow and steady. Rain poured in through the smashed windows, helping to wash away the awful smell of gasoline.
I looked up to see a man in a hooded coat peering in. He smiled at me before raising a gun and pointing it at my face.
Was this how my pathetic and entirely pointless life ended?
19
Conal
What the fuck just happened? The last thing I remembered was a black car hitting us, then… nothing. My head hurt as bad as the time some asshole took me out with a baseball bat, and from the blood dripping down my cheek, I was not in the best shape.
It took way too long to get my brain working, but the moment my thoughts cleared, I heard footsteps.
Since no sirens rang in the background, I quickly concluded whoever this was, we were in deep shit.
The SUV had an emergency beacon if an accident occurred, which would have alerted the security team back home. But home was several miles away, and we didn't have time to wait for the calvary. Not with Verity in the passenger seat.
Fuck, was she OK?
I twisted my head while reaching for my gun. White-hot pain shot through my shoulder, but I ignored it. If the collision was a deliberate hit, this person - or persons - wasn't here to check on us.
A face peered in the passenger window, partly obscured by a hood, but I recognized the bastard. Bren O'Rourke, Liam's cousin, twice removed. The last word I'd had on that fucker said he was in Mexico. Pity he hadn't stayed there. It would have been safer for him.
Bren's eyes flicked over to me and widened when he saw the gun in my left hand. Before he could react, I shot the bastard in the face.
A car door slammed. The assholes who'd tried to take us out weren't hanging around now that Bren O'Rourke lay dead on the grass verge. With great effort, I unclipped my seatbelt and slid out of the busted window.
Verity hung upside down from her seatbelt, eyes wide in shock.
"Sweetheart, are you alright? Does anything hurt?" I crawled around to her. My right arm hurt like a bitch, but didn’t appear to be broken. Thank fuck for being ambidextrous. Otherwise, I might have missed Bren's ugly mug.
A car screeched to a halt nearby and a few seconds later, my brother shoved me aside, not giving a fuck about my injuries.
"Jesus fuck." Perhaps I had a couple of bust ribs as well? It was entirely possible given the force of the impact. Although, the sad demise of Brendan O'Rourke sweetened my pain.
RIP Bren, said nobody ever.
"Pixie, speak to me! Let me know you're not hurt?" Ronan kept his voice soft, but I caught the edge of panic.
Verity uttered a pained noise. Fuck, if those assholes had hurt a hair on her head, I'd hunt down the rest of the O'Rourke clan and gut them myself. How fucking dare they target our girl!
Ronan attempted to release Verity's seatbelt, a string of vicious curses falling from his lips when he failed. Unwilling to wait for help to arrive, he pulled a knife and sliced through it, catching her as she tumbled down.
"I got you, Pixie," he reassured her, still ignoring me, the twin he'd shared a womb with. If I wasn't so fucking terrified that Verity might have serious injuries, I'd have told him exactly what I thought of him.
"We need to get her to hospital," Ronan barked at Ash, who had appeared behind him.
"You OK, Con?" Ash asked me, seeing how I nursed my injured arm.
"I will be," I replied.
Verity lay in Ronan's arms, her eyes closed. Fuck, why had I taken her away from the estate? Declan had warned us it wasn't over with the O'Rourkes. The bastards had bred like rabbits over the last 50 years, which meant there were dozens of them scattered all over Ireland and beyond.
It seemed they hadn't quite got the message after our little killing spree.
"Those fuckers will pay." The violence in my twin's eyes would have scared a normal person, but I knew that if Ronan had bothered to look at me, he'd have seen the same manic fervor.
