Page 5 of Dreadful

I exhale through my teeth, willing my arm to stop screaming at me. “It’s just a graze.”

Gunshots echo around us, and somebody yells. Rafe doesn't react. His grip shifts from my arm to the back of my neck, fingers sliding into my hair hard enough to make my breath catch as he drags me closer to him.

“Don’t ever do that again,” he says, voice low and vicious against the chaos surrounding us. “Do you understand me?”

I stare up at him, pulse hammering violently against my ribs. His pupils are blown wide enough to nearly swallow the color of his eyes entirely. For one disorienting second, he looks less like a man and more like something cornered and dangerous trying very hard not to rip the entire warehouse apart with his bare hands.

“No.”

“No?” His jaw tightens sharply as he spins us further, his body shielding mine entirely.

I tilt my chin up and ignore the fact that I can feel my heartbeat in my arm now. “He was aiming for your chest, and last time I checked, you're not wearing Kevlar,” I hiss out, anger and fear tightening my voice. “I'm fine, Rafe.”

“You don’t get to put yourself between me and a bullet,” he snarls, his nose brushing mine. “That's my fucking job.”

Behind us, Beckett fires a few times before he ducks back down behind the stack of pallets. “I don't understand what the fuck is going on, but we need to go. Like now.”

My gaze slides to my younger brother. "Where did you get that gun?"

He grins but it's all teeth. “Took it from a guy, but seriously, Bells, if you’re fine—let's fucking go.”

Rafe’s hand slides from the back of my neck down to my jaw briefly, rough and grounding and entirely too intimate for the middle of a firefight. “This conversation isn't over.”

Another burst of gunfire ricochets through the warehouse from above before I can answer him.

Something metallic explodes somewhere to our right, sparks showering across the concrete. I peek around the tower of pallets and see the outline of Abel behind an overturned forklift. It seems like the Widowmakers and Devil's Hand are regrouping, taking cover behind whatever they can instead of rushing us head-on.

Our window for escaping unscathed is decreasing by the second.

Something punches through the wood directly above my head, close enough that I feel the displaced air before I hear the crack. Rafe doesn’t say anything. His palm just finds the center of my back, and I’m wrenched hard against him. “Stay down, baby.”

“You stay down,” I shoot back, fear slowly winding its way around my body.

Despite the blood running down my arm and the absolute disaster unfolding around us, something dangerously close to a smile threatens to pull at his mouth. He leans forward and brushes a soft kiss against my forehead.

The gunfire stops abruptly, and the air on my arms raises.

Malcolm's voice rings out. “Come on out, Calloway. I'll even let the girl and the kid walk outta here alive.”

Rafe stills in front of me. Like a snake coiling its muscles, readying to strike.

My bloody hand fists his shirt, like I can keep him here by force alone. I shake my head, my gaze on his. “Don’t you dare.”

“No, huh?” Malcolm yells, sinister amusement dancing over his words. “Guess you're still a fucking coward. I'm not surprised, though your ma might be.”

“You know,” Rafe says, pitching his voice louder while keeping me close. “I liked your brother better.”

A beat of silence hangs thick with unspoken history.

“I'm going to fucking kill you, Calloway. Today—tomorrow—next fucking week. Your days are numbered, motherfucker,” Malcolm snarls, rage wrapping around every syllable like a dark promise.

I don’t understand the subtext here, but now’s not exactly the time to unravel it.

Another burst of gunfire erupts from the catwalk overhead. Something metallic detonates near the far wall—a hard, percussive crack that sends a shower of sparks cascading down over the door. Then a sound like a whip snapping travels fast along the perimeter, wall to wall, as if the warehouse itself is conducting something. One by one, small panels along the walls blow outward in bursts of orange light. The sharp chemical bite of burning wiring floods the air. Thin threads of smoke begin seeping through the gaps in the walls like the building is exhaling.

It's the perfect distraction we needed.

“Fire!” someone shouts. Others chime in, and panic swells inside the warehouse.