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That sound is all it takes for every fucker standing to draw their weapons, including me and my brothers.
“Get the fuck behind me,” I bite out, jerking my chin at Riley.
She still looks like she wants to lay into McKenna, but she obeys, which lets me focus. With Shae and his backup surrounding McKenna’s men, we’re evenly matched in manpower, but since one Reaper is worth a half dozen weasels any day, we’ve still got the advantage as far as I’m concerned.
But Madd is right that we’ll get exactly the kind of attention The Six warned us off from if this shit escalates.
There’s no fucking way we’ll be the ones to back down first, though.
“You want to see your crew’s blood oneverystreet in Halston?” McKenna asks with a manic gleam in his eye, making a pointed reference to Payton’s death. “Because I’m happy to oblige. This shit hole would look a hell of a lot better painted in Reaper red.”
Madd takes the safety off the Glock he’s holding, raising it to aim between McKenna’s eyes. “If you want to see blood, that can be arranged. Not that the view will be great with nine millimeters of metal buried in your skull.”
McKenna licks his lips. “You’ve been doing a lot of burying lately, isn’t that right?”
“What the fuck did you say?” Madd asks in a low, furious voice.
McKenna smiles, his own weapon never wavering. “You’re welcome. But the way you’ve made my men work so hard, putting the job of thinning your herd on our shoulders? They deserve a reward for that. I think I’ll give it to them in the form of some quality time with that hot little number we’re here to collect. The young ones are always so… sweet.”
Riley makes an inarticulate sound of rage.
“Riley,” Maddoc snaps as half a dozen weapons swing around to point at her.
My brothers realize the same thing I do. Hearing that fuckhead threatening her sister like that could set her off.
Maddoc and I both move, but Logan moves faster. His arm lashes out, wrapping around Riley’s waist and hauling her back against him as he swings them both around, his body providing her cover as the tension that was already at the snapping point comes to a head between one breath and the next.
McKenna cackles, a sound of unholy glee, and the sound of even more weapons being drawn and cocked echoes loud in the empty waste of a street. It’s a sound that triggers the craving for blood to be spilled. It boils hot in my veins as Shae and his crew spit curses and scramble from their defensive stances, becoming an active threat.
West Point’s players mirror it, and all my senses sharpen, my focus narrowing as I instinctively prepare to fight.
If anyone so much as twitches, it’s gonna turn into a goddamn blood bath, and part of me wants that with a ferocity that I’d give anything to unleash. But we’ve got no fucking cover and I can’t risk my brothers getting killed.
I can’t risk a bullet findingRiley… or what they’d do to her if we went down.
36
RILEY
I see red.Blood rushes in my ears as rage floods my body like a molten force, and if Logan doesn’t get the fuck off me and let me give Austin McKenna what he deserves for the disgusting things he said about my sister—for what he’s already done to her and the plans he has for her future—I’m going to castrate him.
Dante steps forward, a dozen weapons swinging toward him as he deliberately re-holsters his own and spreads his hands. “Not the time or place,” he says, every muscle in his body still vibrating with readiness even as he lays on the charm and starts to de-escalate the tension.
Maddoc steps back, coordinating his movements with Logan’s as they both block me from being able to see any of those West Point fuckers.
“Logan,” Maddoc says with a pointed look that carries the weight of a full conversation.
Logan nods and loosens his grip on me, and Maddoc takes over. Pulling me back as he murmurs in my ear. “He’s never going to touch her. You know I won’t let it happen. Come on now, you need to stay calm so we can get to her.”
I’m breathing so hard my chest is heaving, but Maddoc keeps up a low, steady murmur that lowers my heart rate and pulls the world back into focus for me. I don’t want to stand down, but he’s right. I’ve got the shakes, worry and anger and rage all warring for space inside me, but none of that shit is going to help my sister.
Logan said she was here. I’m not sure what he saw, but I trust him to get that right.
Chloe was here. Now she’s gone. Now isn’t the time for retribution on West Point, it’s time to wrap this up so we can follow whatever clues Logan found in there. Because hehadto have found some. If I don’t believe that, I’ll go fucking crazy.
“None of us can afford to spill blood in the Breakers’ territory,” Dante is saying, his voice reasonable and calm in the midst of a sea of potential violence. It’s working, though. No one but Dante has put their weapon away, but most of them are lowered now.
Then Austin McKenna catches my eye, and smirks.
