Page 51 of Beautiful Forever
A door slams shut. “I’m out of earshot. Why the fuck are you asking me about?—”
“I’m sending you a pin to my location. I’m about a half mile from the house. Do not say one fucking word to Syn.”
I would never forgive myself if anything happened to her or the baby.
“Aleksander, what the fuck?—”
Stopping the car in the middle of the road, I quickly get out and take off into the woods, using the dimming light of dusk to help guide my footfalls. The shadows are where I’m most at home, anger my best friend. I channel that dark emotion and let it seep into every pore, needing it to become the killer Nikolai and Drako raised me to be.
The headlights of the black SUV I caught a glimpse of in my rearview mirror shut off as it slowly edges along the dirt road toward the house. The windows are blacked out, and I can’t see who is driving or how many people are inside. Doesn’t matter. They’re all going to die.
I find a good vantage point behind a thick bramble, take aim, and shoot the front and back tires out before firing four shots in rapid succession through the driver’s side window. The SUV swerves off the road and tips hood-first down the low embankment into the ditch before coming to a stop when it slams into a copse of trees.
Like a circus car filled with clowns, four men haul ass out of the Escalade and fire in multiple directions as one of them tries to get the driver out, his body nothing but dead weight in the man’s arms. Blood pours out of the half of his face that is missing where my bullets hit their target. One down. Four to go.
Shouts in French rise up as the men scatter. I can only make out snippets of what they’re saying because they’re yelling over one another, but the “Arriver à la maison. Tuer la fille,” flash-freezes my blood.
Not waiting, I burst out of my hiding place, my finger depressing the trigger until my magazine empties. Bodies plummet to the ground, one after another as I stalk forward, my only thought is to stop the men from getting to Syn.
Instead of killing the last man, I shoot his legs, his scream of pain as he topples backward into the ditch echoing through the frigid evening air.
My harsh, panted breaths come out as plumes of icy vapor, but I’m immune to the cold as I stare down at the bastard who came here to hurt my angel.
“Who sent you?”
I already know the answer. I just want to hear him say it.
His hands draw up. “S’il vous plaît, s’il vous plaît.”
Blood and brain matter eject sideways, and the man’s body goes still, his brown eyes wide open but unseeing.
“Why the fuck did you do that?”
Hendrix comes up beside me. “I got bored listening to him beg.”
“He only said two words.”
He scans the road and the other bodies lying there. “He said six words. Four too many.”
“S’il vous plaitmeans please, which he repeated twice.” And he should know because he’s fluent in French.
“Potato, po-tah-to,” Hendrix replies in his snooty British accent.
God, I want to throat punch him so badly. Hendrix’s habit is to do whatever the hell he wants without thinking about the consequences or repercussions. The old idiom about looking before you leap is completely lost on him.
“He would’ve talked.”
“My bad.” Squatting down, Hendrix picks the man’s pockets, finding nothing. No wallet or phone or anything useful. “Any more lurking about in the woods?”
“No. Just them…I think.”
Glancing over his shoulder, his voice raises to a shout. “Youthink?”
“I only saw the Escalade following me.”
Spotting a gun in the grass, I pick it up, check to see how many bullets are left in the magazine, and slip it under the back waistband of my trousers. “Who’s with Syn and Dierdre?”
Hendrix rises from his crouch. “Con and T.” He takes out his phone and texts Tristan. “Who the fuck are they?”
