He lunges for my hand, but the pain from his injuries pulls him up short. He places a hand over his wounded leg and hisses between his teeth, giving me a brilliant idea.
I stab the knife down hard through his hand and into the meat of his thigh, pinning him together in a fucked up mini-skewer. Eddie roars in pain, and for a fleeting moment I think I hear the rumble of an engine, but the noise the old bastard’s making is unbelievable.
His weathered fingers curl around the blade, and with a guttural growl he pulls it free, flinging it across the bed in a failed attempt to lodge it in me. I stoop down to pick it up from where it landed on the floor, and by the grace of God miss a bullet that whistles over my head.
“Shit!” I duck, as though such a delayed reaction was really going to save me. I turn to face the offender.
The guy from the kitchen stands in the hallway, aligned with the door as he clutches his left arm, which is bleeding in rivulets onto the floor. A gun is gripped tightly in his right hand. Asshole. I honestly thought he was one of the good guys. He doesn’t get another chance to fire, his head whipping to the right as a bullet tears through him from somebody down the hall to his left. His body buckles to the ground as heavy footfalls approach.
“Jesus,” Eddie swears, seeing the guy fall, and wrestles to get off the bed in his sorry state.
He flops to the floor at the exact same time as I dive behind the bed, cursing at his leg and rolling on to his side, the two of us ending up face to face. I growl and jam the knife I have in my hand into his wounded shoulder out of sheer frustration. “You and your fucking junkies!”
“Ryan?”
I pop my head over the bed like a gopher from a hole after hearing Bronx’s voice. “Bronx?”
“Jesus,” he takes two long strides and ends up standing on the bed in an effort to take the shortcut. “What the fuck you do to him?” He looks down at Eddie howling on the floor, his gun trained at the asshole’s head.
“Made a Voodoo doll out of him?” I twitch an awkward smile.
Bronx chuckles, stepping forward to lower himself off the bed. “You okay, darlin’?”
“Surprisingly so.”
“How you feelin’, asshole?” Bronx swings his boot into Eddie’s ribs as the old man writhes on his side, clutching the handle of the knife.
“It’s stuck,” he sobs, tears running from the corner of his eye. The bastard’s actually crying.
“Fuckin’ harden up,” Bronx taunts, pushing him onto his back with the sole of his boot. “How you want to finish this?” he asks me over his shoulder.
“Myself,” I answer.
He backs up two steps, lifting his chin to gesture at the gun tucked in my jeans. “You’ll need that, then.”
I smile sheepishly. “I’m out of bullets. It’s all for show.”
“You’ve got to be kiddin’ . . .” Eddie says.
Bronx chuckles, placing a boot on Eddie’s chest to keep him in place, the toe of his shoe nudging the handle of the knife I placed in the English prick. Eddie cringes, wrapping a hand around Bronx’s ankle to try and shift him off the wound, but Bronx doesn’t budge.
I accept the gun Bronx offers and wrap my fingers around the still warm grip to aim at Eddie. The sorry fuck just stares at me, his eyebrows peaked in the middle as he pathetically pleads for mercy. I want to give him some epic final line, something to stew on, but what’s the point? He’s going to have all of point-two of a second to think it over before his brain ceases to function.
I step back, a little more schooled on the distance of blood splatter than I was at the start of the day, and squeeze the trigger. Eddie wheezes out a final breath, his body going lax as the crimson tide begins to flow. I stand and stare at the last page of my story folding over, the remainder of the book blank.
Everything from here on out is mine. Everything from here on out is what I want to make of it. And as I turn and meet those kind eyes that gave me hope before I even realized what the emotion was brewing inside of me, I know exactly who I want with me as I learn all about who Ryan really is.
The man who cared enough to risk his life and his livelihood for me.
Bronx.
“It’s done,” I whisper. “It’s time to live for me.”
“Sure is,” he says, giving me a sly smile. “I’m just so fuckin’ glad you’re okay.” Bronx stows his gun and turns to face me, running his hands up my arms toward my throat. I wince as he passes over my padded up shoulder, and he frowns, pulling my T-shirt out of the way to check out my crude bandage.
“When did that happen?”
“At the house. Taylor shot me.”
His breathing picks up pace, but he holds his composure pretty darn well. “And you hashed that up yourself?”
I nod.
“Bullet still in there?”
“Of course it fuckin’ is,” I exclaim. “I might be tough, but I’m still a girl when it comes to that level of pain.”
“We’ll get you out of here first, then call in Gloria.”
“Gloria?”
“One of the club’s old ladies. Skilled with a hook and a curved needle.”
I hiss air in between my teeth, frowning. “Not sure I like the sound of that.”
“I’ll hold your hand, darlin’.” With his palms cupping the sides of my neck, he tucks his thumbs under the point of my jaw and coaxes my face up, smiling as his eyes flick between mine. “Hell of a day, huh?”
“The biggest one for a while, yeah.”
He lifts one of his hands to stroke loose hair off my face, stilling with his fingers in the lengths over my ear. “There’s blood in your hair.”
“And probably a few other things.” I laugh a little at his grimace. “I’m fine, really.”
“Well, sometimes it can take a few days for the shock to set in after somethin’ like this, so let me be the judge of that, yeah?”
“Sure.” I wrap my arms about his waist, leaning in and resting the side of my face against his chest as he circles his arms around me. The steady tha-thump of his heart is soothing, my own slowing to match the rhythm the longer I listen.
A cough behind me breaks the moment, and I turn to see Callum in the doorway. “That girl who was out the front is still refusing to come out of the bathroom,” he says. “These two the only other people here?”
“I think so,” I answer. “Not that I really checked the whole place.”
“Leave it to me,” he says. “You two carry on with your”—he circles his hand at Eddie’s dead form beside our feet—“weird ‘moment’ thing.”
Bronx pulls away slightly to bring his phone out of his pocket as Callum leaves to check the property. I stay leaning into his chest as Bronx types out a message to King to let him know they’ve found me and where we are.
“I’m sorry I made you worry. And I’m sorry that I dragged them all into this. I just wanted to bring the bullshit to an end.”
He tightens his hold on me again. “So did King, which is why they’re all here. If they didn’t feel this was worth their time, I’d be here on my own, darlin’. You owe them nothin’.”
“Is Harris with you?” I can’t bring myself to call him ‘Dad’ yet. It still doesn’t feel right.
Bronx shakes his head and then looks down at Eddie. “No. He went the opposite direction.”
“He left?” I pull free, glancing down when I realize Eddie’s blood has almost reached my foot.
“He left to go on a run, not to leave you behind.” Bronx follows my gaze, and steps us sideways. “How about we go check on Callum and then get the hell out of here?”
“What about him?” I ask, nodding to Eddie. “Isn’t there evidence we need to destroy or something?”
Bronx brushes his fingers along my jaw, smiling. “You have any idea how many flammable chemicals there are around a crack house?”
“I’m guessing a few.”
“Enough to help burn it to the ground before the neighbors have time to call the fire service.”
I smirk, stepping away from him to pick up Eddie’s wallet from the nightstand. “Déjà vu.”