“My choice has always been you.”
Despite wanting to strangle him, I can’t help but follow the trail of his tongue as it slips out to moisten his lips.
“That doesn’t entail trying to barter the lives of those I care about.”
“Perhaps you should revise who you allow into your heart then,” he suggests. “I’ve never once claimed to be a good man, but I am an honest one. Can you say that about all of them?”
“Careful, Madden,” Hyland cautions.
“Or what?” He peers over my head at the big grump lingering far too close. “You need me more than I need you right now.”
“I’ve never once needed a thing from you.”
“Then I can call this meeting off. Shall I?”
Moving away from the window, Warner menacingly steps into the melee. The look on his face is downright thunderous. Not a hint of the soft, reassuring soul that I’ve come to associate with safety.
“Ember belongs to us.” Warner delivers the words with stinging disdain. “Choose her and you choose us. Our team. Our rules. It’s high time you learn that lesson.”
“I’m not a part of your world.” Blaine narrows his black eyes.
“Then do what you do best, Madden. Just disappear.”
“Blaine isn’t going anywhere,” I say angrily. “Nor is Axel. For once, put your egos back in their fragile little boxes, and focus on the task at hand.”
When no one responds, my dwindling patience erupts.
“Now! Gracie’s life depends on it!”
Warner ducks his gaze while Blaine has the decency to look chastised. I cast Hyland a penetrating glare then move my eyes to include Axel in the sentiment. Silent or not, he’s still on our team.
The tension is far from defused, but each man backs down without throwing hands or making another empty threat. I wait for Blaine to stalk away and light a cigarette before looking at his people.
“Should we be calling you ‘boss’ now?” Spyder snickers.
“Shut it. You two are stowaways.”
Raye harrumphs, her stare sour. “You’re welcome.”
“For what exactly?”
“Our help. None of us want to be here, so don’t act like this makes us friends or whatever.”
“Raye,” Blaine scolds around a circle of smoke. “Back off.”
“Just calling it like it is, boss. She can’t talk to you like that.”
“I said enough.”
“Why are we even here?” She rolls her eyes. “This isn’t our fight.”
Blaine’s on the verge of giving Raye a public dressing down when an ear-piercing shatter cracks through the entire floor. Cold air rushes in to kiss my back, rippling through shards of fast-flying glass.
The huge, crisscrossed bay windows at our backs implode at the intrusion of a quickly moving shadow swinging into the room. Warner tackles me from the side to crush me as our hideout is infiltrated.
Before I hit the floor, I see the flying figure release what looks like a grappling rope to deftly land on two feet amidst the broken glass. Muscles taut as a highwire stretched to its limit, an attack or round of bullets never comes. Not even once Warner has me protectively tucked under him.
Our intruder doesn’t move. Doesn’t speak. Doesn’t so much as offer an explanation beyond dusting himself off then surveying the entire floor and everyone on it. Those almost-glowing, honey eyes immediately reveal his identity.
