Page 18 of Families and Other Enemies

CHAPTER EIGHT

KELLENDROPPEDHERbedroll and the bag of burgers. “Call the cops!”

“I did!” Bridget snapped.

Kellen sprinted out of the food bank, onto the streets and in the direction of the cardboard shacks.

Before Kellen got to the alley, she could hear the fight.

Men. Shouting. The thud of fists on flesh. Cursing. Laughter.

Mean laughter.

A thump that sounded like a skull against brick. A scream that sounded like someone broke a bone.

She passed half a dozen people—and Sophia—fleeing the other direction. Sophia saw Kellen and skidded to a stop.

“Keep running!” she told Sophia.

As soon as she rounded the corner, she saw it—three men, young men, beating the hell out of Ralph.

Ralph was swinging a baseball bat, but he’d gone down on one knee and he was bleeding from everywhere, a lot. With these odds, he didn’t have a chance.

Without a second thought, Kellen waded in. She punched the nearest assailant in the throat, relishing the whoosh of breath leaving his body for a moment.

He slammed against the wall, stunned.

“A girl? You gotta be kidding me.” Assailant number one, the guy with the broken nose that proved that, the night before, he’d tried to assault Sophia, lunged at Kellen, knife extended.

She whirled in a turning kick that blew through his knee from the side and knocked him flat on the pavement.

He screamed, lost his breath, screamed again.

The knife clattered into a slimy pile of...well. Maybe an old brown banana peel.

She hadn’t realized how much she needed to beat the snot out of someone.

The third guy got away from Ralph’s bat and rammed himself into Kellen’s unprotected back.

She stumbled forward, folded in on herself, performed a flip and came up facing him.

He charged.

She crouched into fighting stance and smiled.

He faltered.

Softly she said, “You dumb son of a bitch, don’t pick a fight with me. I really am a veteran, and I didn’t survive Afghanistan by being nice to assholes like you.”

He must have heard her and believed her, for he performed the most amazing one-hundred-and-eighty-degree cartoon-character turn in midair, and landed at the front of the alley. “Let’s get out of here!”

Assailant number one, the guy with the broken nose and now broken knee, dragged himself to his feet and limped after his friend.

Mr. I-Got-Punched-in-the-Throat tried to come at Kellen again, but stopped at the sound of sirens and headed toward the other end of the alley.

“May I?” Gently, Kellen took Ralph’s bat out of his wavering hand, aimed and threw it end over end to knock Mr. Throat right in the back of the head.

He dropped.

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