“You hear that, motherfuckers?” Roz roared. “You gotta go through me if you want him!”
“So be it,” a calm voice said from behind them.
Gage hadn’t heard the footsteps of someone closing in over the gunfire and Roz’s yelling. That voice scared him more than the bullets.
It was the men in green.
Roz’s shotgun clattered away, skidding across pavement. Forced grunts followed, deep, brutal sounds of fists meeting flesh.
Roz cursed, a gasp whooshing out of him as if someone had driven a fist into his gut.
Gage lunged in his direction. His shoulder hit packed muscle as he wrapped his arms around a waist, and lifted with everything he had.
They both went down hard, the frozen concrete biting his knees through the denim.
The man was up again almost before they landed, rolling smooth and fast, but Gage was already turning toward Roz’s voice.
“Get off me—”
“Roz!” Gage launched himself at the sound of his friend’s struggle.
He dropped low, sweeping his leg and throwing his weight forward. He caught someone at hip height, the impact ricocheting up his spine. They both hit the ground with a hard thud.
Before he could right himself, an arm clamped around his throat from behind. Not a sloppy chokehold. It was exact pressure right under his jaw, not his windpipe, enough to control but not crush.
Gage snarled and thrashed. He drove his elbow back, hit something solid, but the grip didn’t budge. It was as if he were trying to fight a tree trunk.
The forearm across his chest was concrete, surrounded by muscle. Thick and unyielding as a metal beam.
“Stop fighting,” the man growled in his ear, his breath hot against his cheek. “I’m not here to hurt you.”
“Coulda fooled me,” Gage choked. “You’re the ones from the rooftop. You’ve already tried to kill me once.”
“I’m your fuckin’ brother. We were trying to save you,” the man snapped. “You didn’t escape us… We let you go.”
“You were shooting at him!” Roz barked somewhere to Gage’s left, voice strained as though he was in a similar hold as him.
“If my team wanted to shoot you,” the stranger said, his patience sounding razor-thin. “You’d be dead already.”
“Let him go,” Roz snarled, struggling. “You’re choking him.”
“Does he sound like he can’t breathe, dumbass?” the man holding him growled.
Truth was, the hold was firm, however he could still breathe and talk just fine but not escape.
Realizing he was at an impasse, Gage lifted his arms slowly, fingers spread.
“All right,” he rasped. “I’m not fighting.”
After a second, the strong arm loosened from around him and slid away.
Air flooded Gage’s lungs as he staggered forward, coughing.
“Let my friend go,” he said, turning toward Roz. “Right now.”
A different male voice answered, deeper, smooth as river rock and not the slightest bit winded. “Fine, but if he swings on me, I’m putting him down for a nap.”
“He won’t,” Gage said, putting as much conviction into it as he could. “Roz, don’t fight anymore.”
