“Shit, Cat,” Ryker uses the sleeve to tie a tourniquet above the spot where my shoulder burns. “You’ve been shot.”
“Well, I didn’t think someone gave me the melatonin sex!”
“Caaaaaat!” Drum moans from the floor.
“Oh, yeah,” I nod toward our quarry. “They also shot that asshole. Who knows my name.”
“We need to get out of here,” Ryker pulls a gun out of his waistband. “I’ll get the car and take you someplace safe. Sound good to you?”
I want to argue with him, but everything hurts. Not just my shoulder. Even my hair hurts.
“Hurry,” I whisper.
I’m about to say something else, but he’s gone again.
Like a freaking ghost.
Bullets continue to tear holes into the front of Drum’s house. These aren’t silenced weapons. The gunfire is deafening. It sounds like they have automatic weapons out there. Someone should be calling the police right about now, but that seems unlikely in thisbars on the windowsneighborhood.
I hear the gunning of an engine, and the bullets strafe away from the house and toward what I assume is my Native American Ninja in shining armor. A squeal and two thumps later, the car is right outside the front door. I peek around the door frame. Ryker pulled the car alongside the door, so the driver’s side was in between the shooters and me.
“C’mon stranger,” I nudge Drum. “Come with us if you want to live.”
The man moans but crawls out the front door and into the car’s passenger seat. I slam the door shut and dive into the backseat as Ryker peels out of the yard.
“Get down!” Ryker yells as he maneuvers down the tiny city streets at highway speeds. He looks over his shoulder. “I see three of them. Not the same three from the kill squad, I think.”
“Fucking PREMY!” I wince as Ryker takes a sharp turn. “She had to tip them off.”
“Maybe,” Ryker’s voice trails off. “Forget about that for a second. Let’s get rid of these fuckers and get you some medical attention.”
A bullet hits the back window, spraying safety glass over my hair and arms. “Motherfucker!”
“Are you hit?” Ryker peers over the seat.
“Pay attention to the road!”
“ARE YOU HIT?”
“NO! PAY A-FUCKING-TTENTION!”
His head swivels front, then he yanks the wheel to the left, forcing my body into the right backseat door. “Damn it, Ryker. Let me know what’s coming, for the love of cheeses!”
“Reach under the backseat,” Ryker commands. “Extra weapons.”
Drum moans from the front seat. Ryker throws my jacket at him. “Put this on your stomach. Press hard.”
I pull up the backseat cushion to find a handy little cache of weapons. “Now, that’s what I’m talking about.”
There are automatic rifles and a whole bunch of shit that’s not legal on the streets of America. Or - anywhere for that matter. One of these weapons has a bio-scanner. I know only one place employs these weapons, but I don’t have time to interrogate Ryker about it as more bullets hit the car.
“Kitten,” Ryker growls. “Now would be a great time to take out those fucking assholes.”
I grab the automatic rifle, slap in an ammo cartridge, and wait for a pause in the shooting.
“Keep it between the lines, Ryker,” I warn as I pop up in the back window and start firing at the truck behind us.
All I can see is the silver grill of a supersized pickup truck, and for a moment, I’m transported back to that car in Flamingo Cove. The vehicle that was T-boned by a dump truck. The crash that pinned me inside.
