My finger is up jabbing angrily in his face before either of us can fathom it. “There’s no way in the entire cosmos, Lincoln, that our time is done. We haven’t even begun our story, but these people keep trying to take me from you. They killed my dog; they’re trying to kill you. Please don’t tell me I can’t do this, it would ruin us, more than these people trying to kill us. We do this for Ares, and we do it his way - straight for the throat.”
Barely a second later, I hear them all dedicating what we’re about to do to my boy. My gaze sweeps over all of them before they settle on Lincoln. His emerald-green eyes hold mine. They blaze bright in his anger, determination, and pride.
Lincoln jabs his finger in my face, his eyes glaring right past all my defences, deep into my heart, and soul. “Not one fucking wound or cut on you.”
“Babe, you know I’m going to be covered in blood, just make sure you’re around to patch me up. And then you can chain me to your bed,” I answer, spinning around so I can look through the car to the other side of the road where our would-be attackers are regrouping.
I’m not sure what they’re waiting for, but my trigger finger itches. It’s go time. I set one foot off the sidestep before I start squatting down.
“Lennon, you have one minute under the car before I drag you out. Got it?” Valak snaps as a fresh volley of gunshots hit the driver’s side door, smashing the window and also the one on our side.
“How?” I ask, thrown by the fact he already knows what I’m going to do.
He finally looks at me and gives his trademark small smile. And much like when Lincoln threw his support at me, something in me releases, and a strange peace descends over us. We got this weird ass pack synchronisation thing locked in place. And we all look at each other for a final time.
Gabe climbs into the space I vacate, holding his hand out for another gun. I guess we’re going together—one up, one down.
“Len, you go left, I’ll start right. Meet you in the middle, and then your crazy ass is out of here. Deal?”
“Yeah, well let’s see how we go here first,” I scoff back, winking at him.
Gabe pops his head up and shoots out one of the spotlights aimed at us. You can hear the returning fire, but I can also hear Gabe’s dark chuckles as he has his side scurrying for safety. And once I am lying on my belly I get a clearer picture of what we’re facing. I realise they would have already sent reinforcements, but where I initially thought we had no hope of escaping, you can see plain as day, we’ve got a very real chance. Doing a quick count, I pick out a few people slightly further back from the action. Clearly, they’re higher up the feed chain, not gunning at us like the first line of disposable officers.
Lining up who I’m aiming for, I mix up each shot. The first people I hit drop backwards, rolling to save themselves. One of my shots misses completely, but the person I was going for is quick and they drop to their stomach. We lock gazes, it’s like time slows as he lines me up, except I was already lining him up. I fire off a few rounds in quick succession before he even has the chance to steady his shot. Even in the dark and over the distance, I can see the lethal accuracy. And when a person near them rushes over to check, I take the chance given and fire off another round before I scurry backwards out from under the truck.
“Feet up,” I growl, and everyone jumps up to balance on the truck’s side rail as the other side gets more aggressive in their attacks trying to shoot our feet out. It’s impossible to keep up firing that many rounds without reloading, and it’s also impossible for none of us to not get hit.
The sharp sting of a bullet grazing my arm hurts like a motherfucker, but I lock my jaw and swallow my scream funnelling the pain into cold determination.
At the first pause, the five of us leg it. Gabe, and Valak covering us from behind, doing some freaky twin shit, half running backwards. We find shelter behind the concrete wall of someone’s front garden, and once again I get squashed and buried under the bodies of my alphas.
“I seriously enjoy this when we are naked and fucking, but move over, Lincoln,” I hiss at him, pushing against his body.
“Hmm, see you got me so fucking turned on as we take our revenge for Ares. Surely you’d want to know how much I love seeing your strength.”
I look at him, his eyebrows pulled up all cocky-like, and in a brief pause of our gun battle, I kind of realise I do like hearing that from him. “You had to tell me now?”
“What about if I die and you don’t know it?”
“Are you channelling Gabe at the moment? Honestly, Lincoln…” I wink at him, smiling like I’m dopey drunk. With all the alpha pheromones in the air, that might well be the case. But on the other hand, he’s right, what happens if we do die?
Noah growls, being the voice of reason since we’ve all gone nuts, apparently. Although when I look at him he’s staring at my wound, I try to silence him with a glare.
“No,” he bites back. “Lennon’s bleeding.”
And then I half sit up looking at him incredulously and throwing my hand out frustrated. “Honestly, Noah, why do you think I didn’t say anything?”
It’s too late, though, the twins leap back over the fence, all guns blazing, screaming their heads off.
“Sorry, not sorry. They needed the shove to fucking crazy,” he grins, unapologetically as he follows after them. Climbing up the fence, pinging shots off left, right and centre.
I watch, bemused as Lincoln takes the opposite corner and does the same. It’s like the gates of hell have opened up, and the night gets filled by the sound of so many fucking guns being fired, people screaming orders, or out in pain, it makes my head spin.
Clearly the gods of karma are smiling down on me today. In all the chaos and rage, I catch a glimpse of Wendy-dodgy-ass-corrupt-as-fuck detective sitting in her patrol car, lost watching all the shit happen around her. The spineless piece of shit has even made some poor uniformed cop sit next to her, for protection.
Cracking my neck from side to side to ease the building tension, I shut out everything happening behind me, and calmly reload my guns. A beautiful silence fills my head, feeding the excited resolution and assuring me that what I’m doing needs doing. I take my time to make sure I am properly prepared, double checking more than a few times to make sure my eyes are not deceiving me, and I’m not walking into a trap.
But I’m not.
