Page 111 of The Bad Brother

Shaking my head, I cut her off. “She’s okay.”

“Ethan.” She tries to lift her hand again. “He?—”

“Fuck Ethan,” I push the words through clenched teeth. “How badly are you hurt? What do I do? Do I move you?” With the bus accident, it was easier. By the time I got to thecrash site, people were already climbing out of the wreckage on their own. All I did was help them. Guide them to safety. This is different. This is Sloane. “Sloane, baby, tell me what to do. I don’t?—”

“Trunk...” she whispers, hands twitching in her lap, limp finger aimed at a lever under her dash. “My kit... C-collar...”

“Okay. Yeah.” I flick another hard look at Ethan. Still out cold. Hopefully dead. “Wait right here. Don’t move.”

Her lips twitch like she’s trying to smile. “...be right here.”

Toggling the trunk release, I push myself out of my crouch, catching the distant wail of sirens. River called 911. Help is coming. Not willing to wait, I hurry to the rear of the car and throw open the trunk lid to peer frantically inside, the contents of Sloane’s trauma kit flung across the inside of it in a jumbled up mess.

Comeoncomeoncomeon...

Scanning the trunk, I spot the C-collar, wedged between a case of water and what looks like a portable spotlight, I reach into the trunk. “Got it. Hang in there, baby.”

Slamming the trunk closed, I lift my gaze to find Ethan standing next to the car, swaying slightly. Blood oozing into his eye from a cut above his brow, hand pressed against his side like he’s trying to hold himself together. His other hand is wrapped around a gun and it’s aimed right at my face.

He gives me one of his psychotic grins. The same one he gave me when I asked him about the pile of dead rabbits in the gardening shed. The same one he gave me after the judge handed down her sentence when she deemed me responsible for the death of a girl I’d nevereven heard of. “Well, this didn’t go at all the way I planned.”

“Yeah...” I feel the corner of my mouth lift in a nasty smirk while I move slowly out from behind the trunk. “Sloane’s quite the monkey wrench, isn’t she?”

When I say her name, Ethan’s face falls into a scowl. “I fucked your girl, so you fuck mine—is that how it is?”

I hear another siren enter the fray. This one behind me. Closer. Moving faster.

Colt.

From the sound of it, he hasn’t quite made the bridge yet but he will, soon enough.

“She’s not yours, you crazy fuck,” I tell him quietly, barely able to push the words past the clench of my jaw.

“Are you sure?” Ethan flashes me that psychotic grin again, right before he pulls the trigger.

Body jerking instinctively, it takes less than a second for me to realize that instead of the loud bark of a gunshot, all I hear is a dry click.

Dropping the C-collar in my hand, I don’t hesitate. Charging forward on a roar, I lower my shoulder, slamming it into his mid-section, lifting him off the ground before we both go down, gun knocked out of Ethan’s grip on a sickening howl that tells me I’m right. His ribs are broken.

The wail of sirens, approaching from both north and south—the ambulance, coming to help Sloane. Colt coming to stop me—is almost deafening. Sandwiched in between, I hear the slam of a car door, right before I hear my name. “Jensen.”

As promised, Cade got here first.

Popping up on a surge of adrenaline, I spot the gunwhere it landed, a few feet away. Bending over to scoop it up, I wrap my hand around it and turn, lifting it just in time to watch Ethan stagger to his feet.

Wracking back the slide on the gun, I clear the jam the way Tank taught me, popping the stuck bullet out of the chamber. Tightening my grip, I aim the gun at his chest. “You’re not very good at murder, little brother. First Red and now me—you should’ve stuck to hiring out your dirty work.”

“Idunno—” Ethan shrugs on a wheezing laugh. “did pretty good with Lyla, didn’t I?”

“Jen.” Cade says my name again, the cautioning sound of it coming from somewhere behind me. “You’re bleeding.”

“I know.” My stitches ripped open when I tackled Ethan. I can feel blood oozing down my back.

“Colt’s on the bridge. Whatever you’re gonna do, you better do it fast.”

I know that too.

“Help Sloane,” I tell him without looking away from my brother. “The C-collar to stabilize her neck is around here some?—”

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