I cross my fingers that we’re all making enough noise, gaining enough time, and I pray that Sauvage isn’t late.
But after a few minutes of bickering, the leader yells at us all to shut up and points his gun toward the building.
Out of time.
I shut my eyes, hoping for a little more luck, hoping we’ve stalled for long enough.
A few seconds pass. Nothing happens. We don’t get blown away.
It’s too quiet.
I crack open my eyes to find several of Sauvage’s men with knives to the cartel guys’ throats. Their guns are silently taken from their hands as we watch.
I feel like I might throw up.
That was close.
‘Almost late, guys,’ Blake remarks lightly, but his hands are trembling just a little.
Letting out a harsh breath, I glance over at Shade. His brother didn’t give a shit that he was about to die. My friend looks shellshocked.
‘Sorry,’ I say.
He gives me the barest nod.
‘Where’s Sauvage?’ I ask Frenchie’s guys.
‘Going back around the front now that we’ve found you and saved your asses,’ one of his guys says. ‘Come on.’
Sauvage’s men use the guns they took off the cartel guards to make them walk ahead of us. We go around to the front of the hangar, where the sliding door is now wideopen. I see Lu Garrett with another of Sauvage’s guys. She’s spattered in blood but gives me a double thumbs up. She looks like she’s okay.
We follow Sauvage’s men straight in through the door like they own it, and we follow their lead. Inside, we find that Sauvage and the cartel queen are in a standoff.
Andy is dead on the floor. I glance at Shade, who’s looking down at his brother’s body. There’s regret in his eyes, but nothing else.
Sauvage appears angry, and Mariana Reyes looks wary. Daisy doesn’t notice us at first. She’s standing just behind Sauvage, staring straight ahead, face blank, looking like her world has ended.
The shots.
‘Daisy?’
She looks over at me, and then blinks, and then blinks again. The relief on her face is palpable as she lurches the few steps toward us and throws herself into my arms, grabbing for Shade and Blake, and pulling them closer so she can hug all three of us at once.
She doesn’t say anything.
‘You shouldn’t be here, Señor Sauvage,’ Mariana Reyes finally snarls. ‘This is cartel land.’
‘You took something that belongs to me,’ Sauvage says, his voice like steel.
He gestures at Daisy, still wrapped around me.
The cartel queen laughs. ‘She is not yours.’
Sauvage’s eyes narrow. ‘She is enough mine that if you do not let her and her friends leave, I will begin a war over this, Madam Reyes. You know enough of me not to doubt me, I think.’
Reyes looks more than a little surprised. She surveysDaisy with a much more assessing eye than she did earlier, and purses her lips, allowing Sauvage to continue.
But now Sauvage smiles, using some of his French charm. ‘But perhaps war is not necessary, madam,’ he says. ‘We all have our own pieces of the pie in Richmond and beyond. Perhaps a deal can be struck between us. Lucrative for all.’
