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I guess playing games will buy me some time before I seize my chance to take off.
“Sure.” I reach for the controller he holds out on offer to me.
Minutes later I’m in a blonde character in a pink car soaring through the courses. When I best Patrick twice, he sits on the edge of the sofa and rages at the screen.
Which gets me giggling and him laughing too.
Pretty soon it’s like old times.
We scoot together until we’re seated side by side, sharing a cushion on the enormous sofa we always dreamed about sprawling out on.
“I notice you’re not in the corner spot you always wanted, Patrick.” I rock the controller with my thumb, surging ahead of his car on the course. He flies over a sand dune and wipes out.
I jab him in the side with my elbow. He jabs me right back. Suddenly, we’re laughing and carrying on like that difficult conversation about forgiveness and betrayal never took place.
We get back on the course, totally engrossed in the game.
A loud crack coming from the front of the house has us dropping our controllers and jumping to our feet. Patrick’s weapon is in his hand faster than I can process that there’s danger.
He throws out an arm to usher me behind him, but it’s too late. Stepanov’s men flood into the room.
Along with my brother.
Patrick trains his weapon between Nathan’s eyes. “Goddamn you, Hunt. Get the fuck out of my house!” he growls.
I step out from around Patrick and face down my brother. “He will kill you, Nathan. And not think twice about it. Leave!”
A sneer hits his face just as a bullet blasts from his crony’s weapon. I shriek and drop to a crouch, hands flung over my head. Gunfire explodes around me. The side table shatters just like my insides did when Patrick told me the truth about where I rank with the Connollys.
I crawl on my hands and knees around the side of the couch, hoping to dodge the bullets.
After all, I need to stay alive if I’m going to take down my brother and every last man standing with him.
Fear and fury battle in my chest. I can hardly draw breath, but what oxygen I do get is scented with gunpowder.
Then it hits me—I’m never going to see Heath again. I’ll die here knowing he’s better off without me.
Chapter X
Heath
Linc’s waiting in the car for me when I walk out of the building on Green Street. I lengthen my strides, crossing the snow-covered pavement of the parking lot. Tire tracks crisscross it, and there are a few circles in the middle like local kids came here to do doughnuts.
The cold air blasting at my face has me thinking about Serenity and how she’d escaped her apartment with nothing but the clothes on her back. Since I know she has little, I have to wonder if the woman even owns a winter coat, an essential in Detroit winters.
I reach the car, and Linc’s already got his hand on the gearshift to leave. I slide into the front seat, bringing the snowflakes in with me.
“You got the car fucking hot enough?” I ask my brother.
“I haven’t been working in a cold building for an hour. You get it done?” He puts the car into drive and starts across the parking lot.
“Yeah, it’s done.”
After we delivered the last case of pharmaceuticals, I went back inside the building. Any evidence of what was in that basement is now cleaned up. I never leave a stash there for long, and it’s been sitting there a little longer since my brothers handled the deal.
So I made sure to scour the concrete with a bleach solution that will wipe away the scent of drugs any K-9 would sniff out. Just in case. We always cover our asses.
I raise my jaw toward the intersection ahead. “Drop me at Patrick’s.”
