While Theo sounded exasperated, a quick study of his eyes and they were sharp as a jaguar’s.
“Ward got out of it. Because of you. Always the protector, my brother. Never the protected.”
“No, he didn’t. He still had you to contend with.”
Trace shrugged with one shoulder. “Well, a boy needs to practice on something.”
“You were beaten just as badly as me. Worse. Why you still enjoy imputing it to other, smaller, vulnerable people, is well beyond my understanding,” Theo said. “But I’ve stopped trying to understand you.”
“We stopped being brothers decades ago, haven’t we, Theodore?”
For an instant, I watched Trace’s lips fall, his cheeks sink, his eyes droop. Crestfallen. In the same second, his features cleared, but it was the biggest clue I’d ever noted inside this barbwired prison of a man. I was convinced it was a hallucination. There couldn’t be any humanity left in a person like this.
“We went through the same things,” Theo said, “yet turned out so different. For so long, we’ve enjoyed our separate paths. So why don’t we go back to that? You go your way, I’ll go mine. The only reason we’re together again is because of Father. The only reason we’re pitted against each other is because of Father. You said it yourself. He enjoys watching us fight. One day it will be to the death.”
Theo stepped forward, away from me, toward Trace.
“How about we bring a stop to this?” he continued. “I’m tired of being Father’s pawn. Aren’t you?”
I monitored the war beneath Trace’s features, the flashes of these brothers’ pasts uniting with the present, Trace’s conflict of deepening Theo’s hurt versus letting him go.
My stomach sank. At the worst time—or the best, depending on your perspective—a door slammed from above and more footsteps sounded.
Gordon was on his way.
The sound registered with Trace, shutting down any weakening. His stare went to blue ice.
“Nice try, Theodore,” Trace said, the corners of his mouth ticking up higher with each syllable. “But we both know only death will stop this competition.”
Gordon, the same height as his sons, came to a stand beside Trace.
Theo said nothing. A fast study of him revealed how hardened he’d become, as if bracing for the next hit. But he wouldn’t flinch—he’d take the bruise, the break, the further amputation from his family. He’d done it enough times.
“You don’t have to, anymore,” I said to him in a whisper.
With a flicker of surprise, he glanced over long enough to tell me he was listening, but focused his attention back on his father.
“Tracey,” Gordon said, without looking away from Theo.
These two men, one the patriarch, the other the prodigal son who failed him, faced off with an intenseness that would heat this cave into an inferno if left unbanked.
“You brought Tracey back into the family,” Gordon said without any inflection. “For that I thank you, boy. I’ll concede you’re the smartest, hence my request going first to you.”
Trace’s mask faltered for the barest of seconds before falling back into place.
Theo remained silent. I felt an infinitesimal brushing against my knuckles and I resisted the urge to glance down.
Theo was trying to tell me something … warn me? But what? I frantically thought through any potential scenarios.
“I would hope wanting me to return to the Saxon dynasty was more than just your ego, Father,” Trace said.
“My eldest, you must admit, you’re not the brightest.” Gordon turned his attention to me before continuing. “The escapade of years ago notwithstanding. I lost millions in that transaction, dear girl. You’ll have to pay penance. You know that, don’t you?”
“I’ve stayed away from the Saxons,” I began, but Gordon was already back to speaking with Trace.
“And you absconding like that … that is not how I raised my boys. And certainly not how I expect you to act in the future.”
The silk in Gordon’s voice took on a tautness, as if it were tearing, but slowly. Deliberately. Trace showed no outward turmoil—unless you were looking for it. I caught the lightest of flinches, of fingers twitching into a fist and then releasing, before he caught himself.
“There will also be consequences for you. Bring her down.” Gordon didn’t call behind him—he didn’t have to. Whoever was listening had predicted his command, and a scuffle of feet, a garble of muffled fear, cascaded down the staircase.
The sounds of struggle became visible when Butcher stepped into the bare cone of light with his captive.
Drea.
Still so bruised, her legs pale sticks in a simple red romper. Crescents of cuts rained down her arms, and her neck was almost purple from previous pressure of someone’s—Trace’s—hands.
I couldn’t see how her mouth was doing, her bandaged nose, because Butcher’s meaty hand was across them.
“Why is she down here?” Trace asked.
He was terrified. If I could see it, Theo certainly could. And Gordon.
It was amazing to me that a known batterer and killer could have feelings for this girl. But it was right in front of me. Trace did not want his father to hurt her.
Oh, but he would.
Unconscious demand had me stepping back, as if hiding behind Theo could drown out what would happen.
Gordon caught my movements, however subtle they were.
“You’re next.”
Theo’s hand gripped my forearm. “Go ahead and try, Father. I’m not the seventeen-year-old I once was.”
Gordon turned to his eldest. “Trace, you understand what must happen.”
“I do.”
“That’s a good boy. You fled when you shouldn’t have. Stopped communications when the first thing you should’ve done was come to me. Made quite a few messes across the ocean that I’m left to clean up.”
What made a man so cruel and crafty, oh so willing to inflict pain, bow entirely to a higher force was beyond my comprehension. Yet here Trace was, ceding to his father without a fight. It made me wonder—
“Why’d you run?” I asked him. The question was startling, and Trace raised his chin to me.
“If you were just going to let your father do what he wanted, anyway. Take from you, why did you give him a reason? Why meet Drea?”
At the mention of her name, Drea’s Bambi eyes skittered back-and-forth in their sockets, finally resting on me.
“You’ve only given him more ammunition,” I said to Trace.
“You wouldn’t understand,” Trace said. There wasn’t a single crack to his guise as he regarded me, his father’s words having their effect.
I gripped Theo’s arm, praying Gordon’s intimidation tactics would continue bouncing off his scarred exterior.
“Here’s what you’re missing, dear girl,” Gordon said to me, his baritone burying deep into my blood cells. “Every time, my boys will come back to me. They. Are. Me. And as a result, they will never leave. Not fully. Not ever.”
“You’re not going down with them,” I murmured to Theo.
I pulled a bobby pin out of my shorts’ pocket. Because I’d practiced in mirrors—on Theo’s charter plane, at Rada’s, at Kai’s—I was able to stick it in the hole at the back of the necklace without looking down.
Theo registered my movements, his neck moving, then the rest of his profile, until he faced me dead-on.
And his expression registered fear. “Scarlet … no!”
* * *
Too late.
I pushed the button.
Theo lashed out, swiping my necklace and ripping it off my neck so hard and fast it burned, then stung as blood seeped through the rings of cuts the gold chain left behind. When it landed near a wooden barrel, Theo’s eyes stretched wider.
My gasp was cut short when Theo grabbed my elbow, tossed me over his shoulder and sprinted to the staircase.
Confusion was in full swing as the necklace pooled sile
ntly in the far corner, tiny green light flashing in-out-in-out, Gordon’s mouth opening and closing—he must be making sound, but I couldn’t hear it due to the clang of adrenaline rushing my ears.
As Theo sprinted up the steps, I spotted Trace screaming after us and pulling out a gun to shoot—
“Oh, God, Theo!”
That was me, screaming at Theo that Trace was going to fire at us—
My vantage point erased when Theo took the last step, but the sound of a bullet, another fucking bullet from Trace, tore through the crush of blood swelling my ears and I swore it was headed for my back this time.
I couldn’t breathe. There was a sting of impact in my thigh, my carotid artery hit, blood seeping down my legs, losing life the same way a fish loses water. I bucked against Theo, but it was useless, because he wouldn’t stop. I was dying and he was running, unknowing of the hit, completely clueless that I was going to sag on top of him, dead weight since he hadn’t known to save me.
He didn’t know.
“Theo…”
But the name was hitched and swallowed back, Theo’s shoulder digging into my stomach, pressurizing any sound that intended to escape. Including my last gasp of life.
“Th…”
Unhearing, he burst through the main entrance, broke the iron gate, and flew to the other side of the street.
“Sax … help…”
Then came the boom.
28 Wayward Bullets
The necklace was a bomb?
The asphalt shook beneath my body, Theo’s weight on top of me driving the vibrations deeper into my stomach. I couldn’t see the cause of such violent noise and feeling, Theo’s arm over my downturned face blocking the view.
Wasn’t sure if I wanted to see it.
“Did I just blow up a house?” I screamed through the fabric of Theo’s sleeve.
Wait. I screamed.
I was alive.
Needed Theo to get off me so I could check my extremities, make sure I wasn’t shot, bleeding out underneath him while he pointlessly tried to protect me when I was already dying.
Except … he wasn’t moving.
“Theo,” I gritted out, testing his girth by heaving up on one forearm. I quickly collapsed. “Are you awake?”
Because that was what you asked an unconscious person seconds after something blows up in his face.
“God…” I puffed out air with the word.
Theo was barely standing before this. His stance in front of his family was all show.
Then I came into the picture with an unknown IUD and forced him into a sprint, carrying me on his shoulders up a flight of stairs and out of the house in order to escape the blowback.
“Theo, I need to get up,” I said to him, needing to say, do, something, so I didn’t think about the consequences.
Where were Trace and Gordon? Was their younger brother in there as well? Staff? What was the state of the mansion? Was Theo hurt? Mortally wounded? Was I?
The worry bubbled through my arteries, hissing as it hit veins. It gave me the strength I needed to roll to the side, my left hip grinding into the pavement and twanging as nerves scrambled underneath. My lungs compressed, one rib cage having to do the work of two in order to protect from cracking.
One breath, puff out. Two, heave ho. Heave. Ho.
I yelled out when I finally maneuvered Theo enough to slide out from under. Coughing, I made it to a sit. There was ash in the air. Squinting through the grit, I spotted the house, smoking at the edges, but otherwise standing.
Next, I looked down at myself, feeling for the wound I was sure was there, but what I registered on the back of my thigh was a large splinter, which I pulled out before thinking how much it would hurt.
Wood from the staircase? A jagged piece that broke off when a bullet tore by?
There wasn’t time to ponder. Theo was next. I’d rolled him to an awkward side sleeping position, so pushed him the rest of the way, splayed open his blazer, and felt him down.
“Stay with me, baby,” I whispered like a mantra, frantically checking for wounds, broken bones, wet, red blooming stains.
Nothing. Oh, thank God, nothing.
In the background, I registered the wail of sirens, coming closer. I looked up through my strands of hair in an attempt to spy Trace or Gordon crawling through the iron gate, but couldn’t spot a single hair belonging to them.
Wait—sirens. Sirens. Police. The FBI.
The necklace.
Kai.
Oh, Kai.
“What have you done, Kai?” I asked the empty space in front of me.
Theo and I couldn’t be here to figure that out. I had to get him up and out of here before the emergency crusade found and cuffed us.
I glanced down at his face, perfect despite the mar of a difficult life criss-crossing in fresh cuts and cold scars. My fallen angel.
My fallen, sleeping angel.
Hopefully, he collapsed from fatigue and not a flying piece of debris that hit the back of his skull as he fled with me.
The wails ricocheted closer, firing up my synapses again, giving that spurt of adrenaline that was oh so familiar these past weeks.
The world spun in front of me from the effect. If I wasn’t careful, I’d end up like Theo, too.
“I’m sorry,” I said to his slack expression.
Then slapped him.
“I’m sorry,” I said, cringing, when his brows pushed together in pain.
I clutched his shoulders, my legs on either side of his torso. “Wake up. Sax, I mean it this time! I can’t carry you. I can’t … well, I can try to drag you, but I won’t be able to hide in time for the—”
“…Scarlet?”
“Yes. Yes, it’s me. Open your eyes all the way. We gotta move.”
“Are you … hurt?”
“No. No, I’m not.”
It could have been the effects of the adrenaline, the sheer nature of avoiding death for a third time, or, the limited chance of feeling true happiness. But I laughed, grabbed his cheeks, and kissed him.
“I’m alive. We’re both breathing,” I said as I came up for air, then spun left at the approaching blue-and-red lights. “And we need to keep it that way. Can you sit up? Quickly. We have to go.”
He complied, his lopsided expression not registering much. He was my puppet to conduct as I forced him to an unbalanced stand, gasping and grunting at the full force of his weight on my spindly legs.
We didn’t have a chance at outrunning the police, but possibly we could hide until Theo gathered enough energy to escape this neighborhood. There were plenty of hiding spots … that the police would search as soon as it was deduced that a man-made explosion caused this fire.
“Okay, we can…” I mumbled as I thought, but a gentle clang of metal-against-metal cut through my thoughts. “Are those keys in your pocket?”
“What? Yes?” Theo shook his head sharply, dislodging as much dizziness as he could. “I’m back. I’m coming back. Just gimme a sec.”
“I can’t.” I dug into the inside of his blazer with my free hand. “Which car?”
“The…”
I pressed down on the unlock button and an answering beep-beep sounded. My eyes flashed over to the abrupt blinking of red brake lights.
“Porsche. Shoulda known,” I said, then dragged both Theo and I over to the midnight blue vehicle.
“This should be your lesson,” I grunted as I pulled the passenger door open, then bent Theo down. “Low-riding vehicles are stupid for women in high heels and dresses, and wounded mafia men.”
After one last growl of effort on both our parts, Theo was in.
“Something tells me this isn’t your first rodeo with this bullshit escape car,” I said, then slammed the door shot.
I ran around to the other side, glancing over the hood to see the flashing lights coming. Manhattan tended to create sound tunnels, making horns and sirens sound much closer than they appeared, but spotting actual spinning lights wasn’t a good si
gn.
“Shit,” I said, and slid in with only a few minor winces.
I curled my fingers over the wheel after starting the engine, allowing a few precious seconds to say, “Oh, shit fucker.”
Put me at a round felt table and I could run the other players like a professional gamer destroying their enemies one-by-one, but put me in a getaway vehicle and I’d tangle us up in a garden hose before getting us free and clear of any police chase.
“Gotta try.” I nodded to myself. “Only choice.”
“Drive back to the house, around back. There’s a side road.”
Theo’s head was tipped back, his eyes at half-mast, but his voice sounded stronger.
“Okay,” I said.
I tore out of the parking spot on the side of the road and speared through the gates, knocking one iron half to an awkward angle.
“Sorry,” I said over the motor. “That’s gonna scratch.”
“I care so little right now.”
Jaw clenched, I wrenched the car to the left, tossing Theo against me. He cursed, I apologized again, then pressed harder on the gas.
There. Side road entrance.
I gunned toward it, tires skidding, praying I didn’t hit an animal or—dear Lord—a human, because I wasn’t in any position to slow down.
We hit gravel, stones spitting up and spattering against the chrome, spewing dust in our wake. If ever there was a person to leave an evidence trail, it was me.
“Trace? Dad?”
“I don’t know,” I said to Theo.
He sighed, despite being jostled around.
“We’ll hit level road soon,” I said. Hoped. Or a bridge. That would be nice.
“We should go to Kai’s,” he said. “They won’t suspect…”
“Who? The police or your family?” Then I added, “We can’t go there anyway.”
“Why not?”
“Let me get us out of this, then we can talk, okay?” My butt bounced up and down in the bucket seat. Another fucking treat to low-riding cars, feeling every single goddamned pebble.
“You’re avoiding the question.”
“What if I am?” I said, then made a sharp right onto actual road. The gravel side-street had only been about a block and a half long. “I don’t drive that much. I have to concentrate.”
WIN THE GAME Page 22
