My right hand flattened on the wall. No. Not a wall. A rack of wine bottles. And on the side where Garrett could see what I was doing. I closed my fingers around the neck of one of them and slid it out while I whimpered loudly enough to mask the sound.
Please understand the plan, Garrett. Please.
Chapter 37
Galahad
Richter’s bodywas too close to Grace’s. A gunshot at this range looked easy on paper, but that didn’t account for what a round did when it met bone—it skipped, it tumbled, and it exited where the angles said it shouldn’t. Richter’s face was too close to Grace’s for me to shoot, and I couldn’t risk alerting him to my presence, or he’d pull the knife on her again.
My training warred with my heart and visions of green eyes swirling in my brain. But I had to focus. She needed the operator right now, not the man who’d spilled every secret to her last night. I could be that man the next time I was in her sunshine, not here. Not now.
Despite dancing on her tiptoes and hitting Richter multiple times, she slid the bottle out of its storage space without him noticing.
But I noticed. She’d seen me. I had to believe she’d seen me, and she was doing all of the same math I was. She was going to give me an opening. She wouldn’t have the strength to do serious enough damage to save herself, but it would stun him. I had to close the gap before he could react.
I holstered my pistol silently. My stun gun was a safer option, as was the pepper spray or the baton. But my first goal would be to separate him from her to keep her safe, which required hand-to-hand. I inched forward, taking controlled steps, waiting for her to move. I was no more than twenty feet away, and it would be a straight dash through the wine cellar door to tackle him.
“You’re my ticket out of here,” he hissed into Grace’s face. “We’re going now.”
Grace swung.
And I erupted forward.
The bottle smashed into the side of Richter’s head, and he loosened his grip on her windpipe precisely when I drove my shoulder under his ribs and launched the two of us onto the floor. We hit the stone hard, knocking into chairs as we fell.
He was a fixer, not an operator. But he obviously had grappling training, because he bucked me off him and rolled out of my grip before I could get a lock on his neck. My fist found his sternum, twice, driving the air out of him. But then his knee was up between us and my balance was wrong. I pushed off and got to my feet.
He was up nearly as fast.
The space between the long table and the wall racks on all sides was tight. No room to circle. Close quarters, where technique and aggression mattered more than reach.
“Garrett, be careful!” squealed Grace from somewhere behind me.
“Get upstairs, Grace!”
Richter didn’t back down, didn’t beg for mercy like his boss. No, his next strike came fast—a straight right aimed at my jaw. I dodged it, caught his arm, and drove my fist into his ribs. He absorbed it and countered with a knee to my thigh, deadening the muscle.
I got my forearm across his throat and shoved him into the racks.
Richter broke free with a headbutt that sent blood trickling into my left eye. I blinked through it and threw a combination. Two to his body, then one that connected with his jaw and snapped his head sideways.
He came back fast. An overhand right I blocked but felt through my entire arm. A hook to my ribs under the plates probably broke something. Richter fought like a man who’d learned in places where rules didn’t exist—no posturing, no wasted motion, only damage.
“You’ve got this, Garrett!” shouted Grace, who wasstillin the room instead of going upstairs. Just as stubborn as she’d been since the day I met her.
“Arthur and the team’s upstairs. Go!” I drove forward, forcing Richter back, further from Grace. Took a hit to the jaw that rattled my teeth, but it got me inside his guard. I locked my arms around him and slammed him backward into a section of stone wall that wasn’t covered in wine bottles or shelving.
His head cracked against it, his legs buckled, and he went down hard. His head slammed into the floor with such force he stopped moving.
Fuck.
All around him, red liquid spread across the floor. Shards of broken glass.
I sucked in a deep breath and squeezed my eyes shut, trying to clear the memory. My father. Red blood spread across our kitchen floor. Shards of his tequila bottle.
“Garrett?” came a voice from somewhere far away.
My mother’s eyes found me. Green eyes, dark hair, and blood. Pain. Terror. Screaming.
