Page 39 of Wicked Union

"Are you sure this is the right place? Seems sort of exposed to me…" Tony doubts me, not because I'm new to this game but because I'm a woman. Men don't like when women play their games, but while I may not be the cold-blooded killer they think I am, I know how to play.

"It's the right place," I say firmly, remembering many nights where Peter and I spirited away to this exact location. "Hidden in plain sight… I guess you've never heard the term."

Tito has a weapon, polishing it, making sure the rounds are loaded correctly. He hasn't given me a weapon yet, and I rushedout of his home in a panic, frantic to see my parents and find out whether they're okay. I never thought to grab mine. He can't expect me to go into this situation without protection.

"How do you know it's the right place?" Tony's questioning is annoying, and I don't have to tolerate it.

"Look, Tony, just drive. That's what you're supposed to do, not question my knowledge or orders." My hard glare isn't missed. His eyes shift from meeting my gaze to the road, then back to the mirror where I'm certain he's looking at Tito. But my husband is preoccupied, probably going through each step in his head of how to appropriately respond to our enemy. He says nothing about my comments to Tony.

"Where is my weapon?" I ask Tito, and he pauses for a second to look up at me.

"You don't need one. You're waiting in the car." He's serious. He thinks he's keeping me locked up like a little puppy in a cage while he goes to take care of business.

"The hell I am. I'm going to be right beside you. If I can't avenge my own brother's death by taking out the man who murdered him, then I deserve the right to avenge this attack on my family." The words are a slap in the face, and I mean them to be. He knows the pain I'm in, and while I still blame myself for Jasper's death, the reaction I had at home before learning about the attack on my parents' home spoke volumes.

"Boss, a woman in a gunfight?" Tony chuckles. "That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard."

"I told you to mind your fucking business." Glaring at the driver, I try to calm myself before turning again to Tito. "You said youwant me to be your partner, so give me a fucking gun and let me be your partner."

Tito's eyes flash with anger and stubbornness, but his scowl softens into a resolved defeat. He moves swiftly, leaning over the seats in front of us and reaching for the glovebox. When he returns to his seated position, he's holding a large handgun, my guess is a nine mil or a three-eighty, but I'm not well-versed in weaponry.

"You've handled a weapon before, I assume?" he asks, and I nod.

The guns I've worked with were limited, mostly twenty-two pistols, and once, I fired a forty-five, but it knocked me on my ass. I release the clip and it drops into my hand. It's full. I count fourteen rounds, which I slide back into the gun and clip in place. I feel sort of badass as I pull the slide back and chamber a round, then drop the clip again.

"One more…" I tell him, holding an open palm up so he can give me one more round to fill the clip again.

His eyebrows rise, as if he is surprised that I actually know what I'm doing. If I'm going into a war zone, I need as many rounds as possible. There's no sense in taking only fourteen when the gun will hold fifteen. His lips purse and he reaches into the box of ammunition on the seat beside him.

"Aria, I don’t think this is a good idea. Your father would?—"

"My father isn't here, and he taught me to use a weapon for a reason. If I were Jasper, joining you on a hunt to avenge the family, you wouldn't doubt me for a second, but you take one look at my tits and believe I'm incapable." I slam the clip back in place with the final round loaded and glare at him. "Stay out of my line of fire. I don't take to people who doubt me."

The car rolls to a stop in the middle of my rant, so when I'm finished I climb out and round the front of the vehicle without waiting for him to respond. Several more cars fall in line behind ours and men begin exiting them. The looming furniture store and adjoining warehouse is only a block away. If any of Uhkov's men see us approaching, we're sitting ducks, but the amount of adrenaline coursing through my veins keeps me focused on my task.

Peter won't stop the attacks on my family because they got involved, and while he is a good friend and likely would be a good husband if things had been different between us, he is still an enemy. Even more so now that his family has openly pitted themselves against mine. I will never kill him myself, nor will I ever order it to be done indirectly, but I won't sit back and take this shit. We have to defend the Peralta-Ramiro alliance.

"I know how to get in. There's a door in back and the key is always inside the drainpipe."

Tito, who's just joined me at the front of the car, nods at my instruction. I'm not the leader here. I'm along for the ride, and I won't be told to sit like a good dog. So, I offer my respect to him when he moves out first, taking the lead.

We slip under cover of darkness along the storefronts next to the warehouse and then into the black alley where we almost vanish. If I weren't so close to Tito, I'd lose him. My gun hand shakes as he stands by the door and reaches for the key in the drainpipe. The light over the back door has been busted out for as long as I can remember, evidence of the childish things we did when we were younger. I can't believe they've never fixed it, but then there is a new generation of Uhkov teenagers who probably do the same thing.

Tito slides the key into the lock and turns it, and the door clicks. He whispers a few harsh words as the men collect behind us. I can't see how many there are, but the small herd is noisy. He hushes them and quietly pulls the door open.

"Stay behind us," he growls at me, and suddenly, I'm wishing I’d have stayed in the car. What the hell was I thinking believing I could come in here and do this like I am a grown man? My stomach rolls, nausea reminding me that it isn't just my safety I'm in charge of. My little one has to be protected now too, and my anger over everything pushed me to be the hero.

The men file into the building, Tito holding the door for them, and before thirty seconds pass, gunfire erupts. My pulse is hammering, my hands sweaty, but I lurch through the door behind Tito and step into his world.

It's surreal, the explosive sounds around me, the eerie, dim lighting. I feel like I'm in a bad dream, hoping I'll wake up before things get scary or I die. At least I can see now. I creep forward behind the men, now having lost track of Tito for the moment. My gun is raised, my breathing rapid and thready. I can't hear anything. The gunshots have deafened me. I wince every time they go off. I don't belong here.

"You're gonna die, Ramiro, you and the whole Peralta family." A sinister laugh is cut short by another blast, and I faintly hear gurgling and coughing.

Tears well up, and I don't try to blink them away. I back myself into a corner near a stairwell and slide down the wall with my gun on aim. The men are gone now up the steps, down the corridor, into various rooms, and I sit cowering like a fucking fool, shaking so badly I almost piss myself. I'm hyperventilating.I pull my shirt up over my face and breathe in the stale, recycled oxygen, and it helps.

I don’t even see most of what's happening, but I don’t miss a single one of the gunshots. Each one makes me jolt with fear. Each one feels like a nail in my coffin being hammered in place. And when I see a shadow at the top of the stairs, I turn my gun in that direction. It isn't one of my father's men or Tito's, and the paralyzing shot of adrenaline to my heart stabs me into action.

I squeeze the trigger once, twice, three times, missing a few and striking him in the shoulder with one. The body falls down the stairs at me, tumbling and rolling. His gun bounces on the steps and hits the wall, and he slumps into a pile, groaning.

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