Page 127 of Riot

I start to laugh, call it a hysterical reaction. “You think that’s really true? You really think you covered all bases? All security cameras? You’re sloppy, one of you will have fucked up somewhere, and you know what’ll happen?” I glance up at them through my one good eye. I jolt forward. “BOOM!”

They both jump back in surprise and I fall back into my seat laughing. D2 is on me, punching me in the face as D1 tries to pull him off. I don’t fuckin’ care. I have faith in my club, and the more faith I have in them, the less unlikely it feels that I’ll get out of this. I trust in Rock and Jett to find me. Blood drips down my face and this time I do spit, I narrowly miss D2’s boot.

“Enough!” a female voice rings through the silence. The footsteps were so quiet, I didn’t even hear them. “Didn’t I say I wanted him alive?”

D1 and D2 both stop, their arms by their sides as she approaches. I can barely see shit, and I’m more than a little intrigued to see who wants me alive so she can kill me. I mean, I’ve heard of ex-lovers being crazy, but this takes the cake. Nope, she’s no ex-lover of mine. This all screams Chicago, but who?

“He was cussin’ you out,” D2 mutters.

She snorts a laugh. “He was, was he?” She holds a gun to his head and he rears back. “Don’t fucking lie to me. I knew I shouldn’t have hired an asshole to do a man’s job.”

Just when I think she’s going to lower the gun, she clicks the safety off and fires. Point blank into D2’s skull. He falls to the floor, blood oozing out of his head.

I wince. I guess that’s one less dick I have to kill later.

“Holy fuck!” D1 yelps, rearing back farther with his hands in the air. “I tried to get him to stop, he wouldn’t listen?—”

“Shut the fuck up or you’ll be next. Now get this asshole outta here before I ruin my shoes.” She still hasn’t come into the lightened space, her face covered by the darkness as I try to stay focused.

She rounds the back of my chair as D1 drags D2’s lifeless body away, a trail of blood in his wake. “Well, well,Ghost.So we meet again,” she purrs near my ear.

If my hackles weren’t already up, they sure as hell would be now. “Again? Why don’t you show your face? Better still, tell me who you are so I can jog my memory.”

She laughs. “Now where would the fun be in all of that?”

“Is this about Chicago?”

“My, my, you do watch the news.”

“You make quite the entrance, though. I don’t know why you waited for eight plus years to get your point across.”

She slides the gun across my cheek. It’s warm from the bullet she just shot, and it leaves a trail of heat on my skin. “You always were a cocky son of a bitch.”

She bends to my other ear. “It was because of you that I’m here.”

“Go figure. What did I do to piss you off? Kill your lover, Mancini?”

She balks. “Mancini, is that what you think this is about?”

“Isn’t it?”

“So many questions.”

“So little answers. If you killed all those men in Chicago, I’d say you’re a pretty good shot.”

“And you’d be right.”

“The question is, why now?”

“Who says I haven’t been working behind the scenes for eight long years,Ghost?Or should I say,Myles?”

She knows who I am, which means my family and club are also in danger. It’s to do with Chicago, but not Mancini, which makes no sense. The only other person who knew me back then was my handler; Carter.Wait, is this about him?

There’s nobody else.

“So you think you know me?” I laugh. “Tell me how I know you, sweetheart. This could’ve been a lot less painful for the both of us.”

“Oh, it won’t be painful for me,” she sings. “Nobody knows where you are, remember?”

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