Total pages in book: 118
Estimated words: 108709 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 544(@200wpm)___ 435(@250wpm)___ 362(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 108709 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 544(@200wpm)___ 435(@250wpm)___ 362(@300wpm)
She grasps onto me, her arms locked around my neck, and squeezes tight as though terrified I might let go, but that’s never gonna happen. “It’s over, baby,” I soothe her, crouching down as I try to get the heavy chains off her feet. “Tell me you’re okay.”
She just cries, and the moment the chains are gone, I take her face, needing her to focus. There will be time to fall apart, but now is not it. “Come on, Menace. I need you in the game,” I tell her. “Are you with me?”
She swallows hard but finally nods. “Yeah,” she says, swiping the tears off her face. “I’m with you.”
“Good. Now tell me what you know.”
She breathes hard, her gaze shifting to the body of the man I’d gutted beside us, his organs spilled across the dirty ground, but it’s got nothing on the blood that accompanies it. I take her chin and gently bring her gaze back to mine. “It’s okay, Aria. They’re not going to hurt you anymore. But there’s bound to be more of them, and I need to get you out of here before someone comes looking.”
She nods.
“Keep focused on me, and tell me what you know.”
“There, umm . . . There were more of them upstairs,” she starts, her body trembling as she tries to breathe through the pain. “A whole bunch. Maybe twenty.”
Fuck. It was one thing taking on all those prisoners in that conference room. I had the upper hand and could put myself in the corner, forcing them to only come at me one at a time. But I don’t know what’s waiting for me up there, and I can’t afford to leave Aria vulnerable while I try to fight off twenty gang members.
“Did you see the boss? Lux? The guy who had you outside the warehouse. Was he there?” I ask, trying not to show how uneasy this makes me. It would be a shitty situation on a good day, but add four broken ribs, and it doesn’t exactly sound like a good time.
“Yeah. He was sitting at one of the further tables across the room. He was irritated, like he just wanted this shit over and done with,” she tells me, her brows furrowed. “I think we’re in an old Chinese restaurant. There was a sign out front when they brought me inside. Big round tables everywhere, and those things that spin in the middle so you can get the food from the other side of the table.”
“I know the ones,” I tell her, taking her hand and squeezing, remembering just how long I’d been down here before they added her to the mix. “Menace, I don’t want to push you on this if you’re not ready, but I need to know. Did they touch you?”
She shakes her head, a small smile pulling at the corner of her lips as though trying to ease my fears. “No, nobody touched me. At least, not like that,” she says, holding my stare. “They had me stashed in the back corner of the kitchen, and until they brought me down here, nobody even remembered I was there.”
I let out a shaky breath, and something eases within me. “Okay,” I say, getting to my feet and pulling her up with me. “Can you walk?”
She shrugs, and as I settle my hands onto her hips, she clutches them, testing her weight under her broken and bruised body. “Yeah, I think so. It’ll suck, but I can manage,” she tells me. “I don’t think anything is broken. Not like . . .” Aria pauses, her gaze dropping to my chest and taking in the blood stains on my clothes.
“It looks worse than it is.”
“Liar.”
I grin and lean in, pressing a kiss to her temple. “Come on, we’ve gotta get the fuck out of this goddamn city.”
“Thank God.”
Releasing my hold on her, I move around to where Talon’s lifeless body has been discarded on the ground. I crouch beside him and pat him down, checking to see what other weapons he might have on him before taking the gun and counting how many bullets are left.
Two. Not great. But it’ll help.
I nod toward Collaroy as I find a set of car keys in Talon’s pocket. “Can you check him?” I ask Aria, not wanting her to have to play around with dead bodies if she doesn’t want to, but the sooner we can get out of here, the better.
She nods and inches toward the asshole who first hit her, her face twisted with disgust, before kneeling down and pointedly not looking at the odd angle of his neck. She begins patting him down and checking his pockets while I move on to the other guy.
After getting what we need, I glance back toward the shitty cell and find myself slipping back in through the broken bars and staring down at the Polaroid pictures on the ground. Three down, one to go.