Page 93 of Barinov

“Don’t even think about it,” she snaps. “I’ll kill him.”

“Sixty-one thousand.”

I shake my head and raise my paddle back up.

He releases his grip on his gun and turns his attention back to the stage.

“Good lads.”

“Who’s the girl?” Kenji asks, nodding to the girl in pink as the bidding increases.

She ignores him.

“Seventy-three thousand.”

“Talk to me, Wei,” Khoza barks through the comms. “Do we move?”

“Nah,” I reply, raising my paddle. “All good here, man.”

“Who are you talking to?” Callie asks. Her focus drifts away from me and toward the crowd.

“Eighty-four thousand.”

The moment she turns her head, I move. I flip around, disarm her, and have her own gun pointed back at her ribs before she can even blink.

“No!” she cries, her hands raised in a panic. “Please! I’m… I’m sorry. Please don’t shoot.”

“Put your hands down,” I say, ejecting the mag. “You look ridiculous.”

I shove the gun into my jacket. “Everyone stand down,” I snap through the comms.

“Ninety thousand,” the announcer calls out over the noise. “Going once.”

Callie’s tear-filled eyes find the stage. “No,” she gasps, the word trembling through her fingers.

“Hey,” I grab her by the wrist and yank her focus back to me. “Who the hell is she?”

“Going twice.”

“She’s our… she’s m-my,” she sobs, her arm shaking under my grip. “My little sister.”

“Damn it,” Nate mutters in my ear.

“Fuck,” I grit, whipping around toward the stage. “One hundred thousand dollars!” I yell over the crowd, my paddle raised high above my head.

“SOLD!” The announcer shouts, pointing a finger toward me.

The room erupts in cheers and the clinking of champagne flutes.

I turn back around to face her. “Start talking. Who are you?”

“I’m no one,” she says, swiping away her tears.

“How many of you are there?”

“What?” she breathes.

“Your team,” I growl. “Other than those tall guys that were over at the end of the bar, who else is with you?”