Page 47 of Sinister Red
It feels like the Seeds are just multiplying, their numbers growing while ours depletes. They’re coming in through every entrance, almost like they’re coming up through floorboards and down from the rafters. Everywhere I look I see some DSMC asshole, three to one for every King, but I don’t stop clearing a path and pushing them outside. It’s working for the most part, and once the fight is out in the open, it evens the playing field a bit because they won’t be able to get out unless they try to scale the electrified fence, and the backyard isn’t easily accessible from the front without going around. Getting the Seeds in the front is the only way to try to salvage our members and protect who we can. More space means less places to hide, but it also makes the targets less like sitting ducks.
I keep pushing forward, even as I see my friends—my fucking brothers—nursing injuries and helping the fallen. I keep going as I hear Jackal sob, as Spider screams in anguish. I keep going even when my ammo runs out and I resort to picking guns from dead bodies and using my fists when they run out too. I move forward through the bloodshed, power through my pain and rage, and I do not stop until I have to.
I don’t stop until I feel a bullet rip through the middle of my back and my knees buckle before they give out.
I only stop when I lose all the feeling in the lower half of my body and am forced to, and even then, I keep going in my mind.
Protect my brothers.
Keep my family safe.
I chant this over and over, even as Beau the Butcher appears in my line of sight, leaning over me with a grin. “I heard you were the man to see about the two million dollars that was taken from me.” He crouches next to me and looks around, then meets my eyes. “Impressive for such a young little ginger fucker. Managed to take out a good chunk of my crew all by yourself.” Beau unsheathes a combat dagger and twirls it between his fingers. “Almost feels like a waste to kill you now, but Mac owes me, and what better way to pay than take out the next in line to his throne.”
He stabs me in the shoulder, the pain barely registering as I watch him lift the blade and let my blood drip from the razor edge. “After I kill you, I’ll wipe out anyone else who’s left.” Beau’s smile turns malicious as he leans down and puts his mouth by my ear so he can whisper, “Just like my boy Joker did to that fucker that pissed on my bike.”
My eyes slide shut as Beau drives his dagger into my side, but I feel nothing.
I just count the number of times this bastard stabs me while I start sending up my prayers to whatever entity is listening.
Protect my brothers.
Keep my family safe.
By the time I get to five, I can hardly focus on anything anymore, but an image flashes in my mind, and I decide that if it’s the last thing I see before I die, it’s a twisted sense of mercy.
My Cookie, almost seven years ago, looking gorgeous and so fucking happy in that summer dress when I picked her up for her birthday date. That’s what I see, and that’s what I try to hang onto even as it starts to fade to black.
My Cookie.
Protect my brothers.
Keep my family safe.
I hope she’s happy.
Protect my brothers.
Keep my family safe.
Tell Sofie I’m sorry…
CHAPTERTEN
SOFIE
With a sigh,I look up from my book and check the clock yet again.
9:15 p.m.
Still no sign of Lewis.
I grab my phone from the end table and when I only see two missed calls—neither of which are from my fiancé—I toss it on the couch next to me.
In another surprising stray from his routine, Lewis texted me earlier to say he’d be home at the normal time tonight, but seven-thirty came and went without any word from him. No followup text, nooops, sorry I got caught up with a clientcall. And what’s really starting to get to me is the fact that I know he read my text at 7:45 asking if he was ok, but he didn’t respond, and he didn’t even read the next one I sent at quarter to nine.
I keep telling myself that everything is fine, that Lewis just got caught up with something at work and forgot to tell me his day turned into another late night at the office, but it doesn’t feel like that’s all it is.
Do I think something horrible happened to him and my fiancé is now lying in a ditch somewhere, bleeding out from a head wound? No, I absolutely do not.
