I wanted to thank him for upping the ante and giving me somewhere to direct my anger. I would have to be careful that I didn’t kill him like Gray had accidentally killed the Russian. Mine wouldn’t be an accident though.
“Blaze, put that knife away. What is wrong with you? You’re such a coward.” Gray didn’t yell as she admonished the other guys and I could have thanked her as well. Calling him a name only spurred on his anger and he lunged forward, swinging the knife with psychotic zeal toward my mid-section.
I reached forward after his swing and grabbed the back of his forearm, pushing his hand toward his knee and breaking his hold on the hilt of the knife. The piece fell to the ground, the sound of metal striking a rock filling the sudden silence of the clearing.
Everyone watched us, their eyes wide. Some pulled out their phones, the flashes acting like spotlights. I could easily see Blaze’s intentions as he searched the group, his gaze landing on Gray and then flicking to his friend. He gripped his hand with the other and growled, “Call the cops and tell them we found her.” He smirked at Gray. “You won’t come with us; you can go to jail. Even they can’t save you there.” He laughed, the bark loud and all-consuming but humorless.
I didn’t wait for him to make another move.
I stepped closer and popped him straight across with a tight jab, shutting off the maniacal laughter in a split second. Stepping back into a fighting stance, I nodded his way. “Come on, princess. Do something. Let’s make it worth your while to call the cops.”
I had a promise in my eyes he wasn’t going to miss.
Brock must have heard what I didn’t say, he grabbed Sara’s arm and turned her toward the black truck as I moved in on Blaze, holding him at bay while Gunner and Brock got the girls out of there. As if sensing a mass exodus was to take place, the rest of the Jameson high students that had shown up started peeling away from the circle.
Blaze shot a glance around at the dispersing crowd and his face grew red and tight. “Stop them!” He moved toward me as if he alone could stop me.
But the guys he’d come with each shot off in different directions, focusing on different targets and spreading out their strength.
The deep rumble of my truck echoed behind me, filling my chest with the deep engine base of the aggressive cam shaft.
“Gunner, now.” I leapt forward, popping jab after jab into Blaze’s face, then ducked, pivoting and slamming my fist into his unsuspecting abdomen. He grunted and fell to his knees.
Using the moment, I turned and motioned for Brock to slide in the back. He climbed from the driver’s seat and jumped into the bed of the truck.
I took his previous spot and waited for Gunner to shut the passenger door after he loaded Sara in after Gray.
Gunner patted the top of the cab when he got in back and I shifted into first, peeling out of the gravel lot before Blaze had even reclaimed his footing.
The lights of cars evacuating the divide flooded the forest across the highway. Everyone tore off toward the north. I turned south. We needed to get into Jameson as fast as possible. Taking a back road would be the best way there.
Gray lifted her head from the seat back and stared out the windshield. “Where are we going? I was dancing.” She reached for my arm as if she was going to turn the wheel herself.
I blocked her grab and claimed both her hands with mine. After a minute, I glanced at her, my eyes searching her face for a sign that she knew what she was doing or if she was still inebriated.
She bit her lower lip, her eyes wide as she met my gaze. “Seriously, Stryker, where are we going?”
Sara beside her was quiet as she stared out the window. “Anything is better than back, isn’t it? We’re not going to Timbercreek, are we?”
I released Gray’s hands to shift into fourth and grip the steering wheel. I was acutely aware of her thigh pressed against mine. She smelled delicious and I couldn’t place the scent exactly, but I wanted to see if it was all over her or just in her hair.
“No, we’re not going back to Timbercreek.” I softened my tone. “Sara, what does everyone keep saying about your uncle? What exactly is the problem?” It probably wasn’t my business and yet I needed to know.
She scoffed and then her laughter fell off into a sniff. “Truth? He keeps trying to rape me. Nothing big, right?”
Anger flooded through me, not that it was ever that far away. Someone she should have been able to trust had destroyed that trust how many times?
I made a mental note to put out some feelers and see what needed to happen to get rid of the uncle on more than a temporary time frame.
“Where’s Gunner and Brock?” Gray sagged against my side; her voice soft yet worried.
“They’re in the back.” It rankled that she wondered about them.
“Won’t they get cold?” She tried sounding like she didn’t care, but the things I was learning about Gray left little doubt that she could rage against anyone but that her heart didn’t let her hate easily.
She cared about my cousins. I couldn’t get in the way of her being happy. Of course, Gunner and Brock were attracted to her as well. Who wouldn’t be? Her thick, dark brown hair and brilliantly blue eyes were hard to ignore. Add to that her curvy yet muscular frame and her sassy attitude, and she was the ideal woman in the making.
An aftermarket slider in the rear window easily opened from the outside since I never locked it and Brock poked his face inside. “Hey, pass me a drink, will you?”
Sara glanced down by her feet and passed back another hard lemonade. “You drink this stuff?”
“It’s not like I can go in the store and pick out what I want. Beggars can’t be choosers, right? I’ll take what I can get. The only real problem with these is I have to drink more for a harder buzz and piss every fifteen minutes, but other than that, they’re not bad.” He laughed at something Gunner muttered, then said back to Sara. “Can you pass me a couple? Gunner might try to steal mine.”
Gray didn’t say anything to them as Sara passed back the bottles. The girls fell silent and then Gray spoke up. “You shouldn’t have taken us like that. They wanted to turn us in. Now you’re going to get caught with us and you’re going to get in more trouble because of it.”
“Let me worry about that.” My phone buzzed in my pocket. I pulled it out, glancing at the text preview that still glowed on the screen.
Ivanovs point of contact is looking for you. Don’t go back to the house tonight. Go to the mine offices.
A text from my uncle that barely warned us. If the Ivanovs were looking for us at our house, they would look for us at the mines and at the school, and anywhere else they could tie to us. Dominick had no idea what would keep us safe, if he even wanted to keep us alive.
If we died, he’d get everything and he wouldn’t have to turn anything over when we turned eighteen.
The one thing Dominick had proven time and again was his innate ability to underestimate us and the trainings we’d gotten from our fathers. We didn’t have to go to the mines, the house, or anywhere else that anyone knew about. No, we had our own place off the radar and we’d be safe there.
Gray and Sara would be as well.
If I didn’t want to risk angering Dominick, I’d have to surface after the weekend and let him know we were okay, but we couldn’t admit to where we’d been. I’d have to procure a hotel room or something to throw him off.
As much as he said that our best interests were the most important thing to him, his actions had never fully supported that sentiment.
I wasn’t stupid and I wasn’t taking any chances.
I reached back and rapped my knuckles on the glass. Brock and Gunner appeared in the small rectangle and I glanced at them in the rearview mirror. “We have to go underground. The Russians are looking for us.”
My words sobered my cousins and they nodded, disappearing back outside the window.
“Underground?” Gray didn’t sound as timid as she had. Her own alcoholic haze had to be wearing off.
I took the next left, turning onto a chip sealed road that was part gravel and part tar. Nodding, I continued staring out the windows. “We’ve got the Russians after us and you have the cops after you. We don’t have a lot of places to go at this point. We’re taking you under with us. You’ll be safe.” I glanced at Gray then at Sara, careful to include both of them in my promise. “You both will.” Sara was no one to me on her own, but she mattered to Gray and that meant she had worth.
Gray edged closer to me, her heat moving up over my leg and up my side. I glanced sharply to my right, catching the glimmer of tears on her cheeks.
What more could I do to make things up to her? Not much. Keeping her safe was the most I could do. I wasn’t sure she’d take anything else.
If she didn’t accept that, I couldn’t help worrying that we would all end up dead.
Chapter 26
Gray
The alcohol hadn’t dulled the pain like I’d hoped. Instead, every time I closed my eyes, I saw Sonya’s face. I didn’t even know her and yet she’d be with me the rest of my life. I almost wished I could go to jail. Would that make it go away? The incessant guilt riding inside me like a balloon filled with acid just waiting to pop.
I couldn’t seem to get warm either. Every inch of me felt ice cold. Well, that is except the parts that were pressed against Stryker. I wanted to curl into him, ask him to wrap his arm around my shoulders. I needed to feel something besides the sting of the chill. Anything would do at that point.
He’d said something about going underground. I wasn’t’ sure what that meant. Were we going into the mines? I had a problem with tight spaces and if I went underground, literally, I’d have a problem with the fact that I was underground. I didn’t even do well snorkeling in a pool or in basements. Being under things wasn’t my idea of being safe.
“Are the Ivanovs looking for you because of me or because they know you were at the fight?” I glanced at Stryker. I’d seen the text on his phone. If he tried to act like he didn’t know what I was talking about, I’d be more than willing to call him out on it.
Rain drops spotted the windshield in small sprinkles.
Brock shoved his head through the back window. “It’s starting to rain.”
“Grab the tarp, we need another forty-five minutes to get there. I can’t make it any faster, guys, sorry.” Stryker glanced at me and looked back at the road. “I’m not sure. We’ll all have to hide together at this point. I’m not sure how much they want from us and I don’t know what they want to do to you.”
I laughed softly under my breath. “You don’t have to lie.”
He turned his head sharply my direction, flicking his gaze toward Sara who had slumped against the door and then back at me. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Another lie.” I shook my head and folded my arms. “You know exactly what they’d do to me. Everyone knows the Ivanovs don’t mess around. I’d be dead in a week, if I lasted that long.” The Russian torture had hit infamy in the Timbercreek area as the vengeance spread from Seattle eastward. I didn’t have any hope or any delusion that I would be treated any differently.
He shook his head and reached for my hand, wrapping my fingers in his.
“You’re one of the most confusing people I know, Stryker.” I couldn’t help the honesty. My buzz was wearing off, but the truth serum part of alcohol would hang on, I had no doubt.
“How so, Gray?” He pulled his hand to his lap with my hand still in his fingers. I didn’t pull away, curious where he was going with it.
I blinked heavily, exhausted emotionally, physically, and I’m sure spiritually. “You want everyone to hate me at school. You don’t want me on the team. You won’t let me get hurt even though you’re the one trying to hurt me. You make my insides melt. And now it seems that underneath it all, you don’t even want that. Wait… I don’t know about that last part.” I blinked as a car turned onto the road ahead facing us.
Their brights were on and still at over five-hundred yards away, the lights were almost too bright to see around.
Stryker tugged me closer to him, just under his arm and let his forearm fall around my upper back. More heat and this time it spread outward, dissipating the tightness from the fight and that I was being hunted by the cops and the Ivanovs family.
“I do want you on the team. You’re impossible to look away from.” He didn’t negate that he wanted me hurt or anything else, just that he wanted me on the team.
I wasn’t sure how to take that. I wasn’t sure how to take any of it.
The lights got brighter. We were both going fairly fast since the speed limit was bout fifty, if I remembered right.
Stryker called out, “Brock, you see this?” Brock stuck his head back in, joined by Gunner. “This prick won’t turn his brights off.” Stryker flashed him with his own brights, a universally accepted reminder to the other driver that their brights were on and blinding.
The other car ignored Stryker’s reminder. He flashed again, this time only three-hundred yards away. Again, at two-hundred yards.
I shielded my eyes, the lights insanely bright. “Oh, my word, that is bright.”
Stryker met Brock’s gaze with his in the rearview mirror. “Yeah, this prick needs a lesson.”
Brock nodded and disappeared into the back again. The sound of clinking glass carried through the open window with the sound of rushing air. I turned to my left, watching out the side and rear windows to see what he was going to do. There wasn’t much that could be done when you were passing a car on a straight thoroughfare going fifty miles an hour.
Hooking his fingers into the mouths of two lemonade bottles, Brock leaned to the side. He watched as the other car approached, its lights so bright we were momentarily blinded.
Brock swung his left arm back and then whipped the bottles into the direction of the windshield of the car as it passed by.
An odd crunch filled the air along with the sound of screeching brakes.
I turned to face forward, glancing up at Stryker whose face had taken on a tightly grim expression. He glanced back in the mirror again, keeping the speed up.
His eyes widened and I snapped around again. Red and blue lights flooded the length of the empty long road.
“Holy shit, man, go! I can’t believe that was a cop.” Brock pounded a fist on the top of the truck’s cab.
“Get down, you fools. Hide under that tarp. We don’t need him knowing more than he does. Hang on.” Stryker shifted into fifth, reaching speeds that were twenty and thirty miles per hour over the limit.
Sara straightened where she sat, staring straight ahead. “What just happened?”
“Were you sleeping?” I looked at her like she might be crazy. How was she able to sleep through any of that?
“No, I was just lost in thought.” She glanced behind us and then back at me. “The cops.”
I nodded at her, anxiety tightening my throat and making it hard to speak. The cops. I wasn’t sure if we’d gone into Idaho yet, but if we were in Washington and the cops caught up to us, I’d be delivered right into police custody. At that point, the Ivanovs would know exactly where I was and there’d be no way out for me.
Pushing me aside, though, what Brock had just done would probably be a number of felonies, not to mention they were minors under the influence.
Stryker didn’t speak as he took the next curve without slowing down, running the risk of flinging his cousins from the back of the truck.
The flashing red and blue lights didn’t waver as Stryker pushed the older truck to its limits.
“What are you going to do?” I couldn’t help asking. My own life was wrapped up in whatever he did. If he continued to run, we could add the felony of evasion to the ever-mounting list. What else could go wrong?
“I just need to get ahead of him enough that I can get away. We just need a break. Hold on!” He raised his voice on the last phrase so the boys in the back could hear.
Sara reached up
and grabbed the oh-shit bar, gripping it with both hands. I had nothing to grab onto, opting for the seat belt buckled at my waist.
The road stretched before us, black, dark, no hope to offer.
I glanced over my shoulder. The only thing behind us held tight to our speed and wouldn’t let us go. The red and blue didn’t offer comfort. Not right then. My fears and doubts followed behind us and I didn’t know what would happen, if we were caught. There would be a lot of confusion.
Part of me wanted to jump from the truck. Another part of me wanted to get caught. But that was about me. I didn’t want anything to happen the Jamesons. If they were caught, there was no way they wouldn’t get thrown in prison and treated like adults.
You didn’t assault an officer and get away with it. No matter who you were or who you knew.
I dug my fingers into the hard muscle of Stryker’s upper thigh.
No matter what happened, we were going down together.
***
Grab the next Bad Boys of Jameson High series, Her Brawlers. Stryker, Gunner, and Brock are even more addicting as they try to right some wrongs from their past and help Gray fix her own mistakes. Can they stick together once more than murder charges come calling for Gray?
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Thank you so much for joining me with the Jameson cousins. I love them so much! Stryker… sigh.
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The End
Her Challengers
Chapter 1
Gray
Chapter 2
Stryker
Gray
Chapter 3
Gray
Her Challengers: A high school bully romance (Bad Boys of Jameson High Book 1) Page 22
