Page 15 of The Princes of Stone and Steel

That was, he was about to kiss me again until a loud crash sounded over the music and he jolted, whipping his head up and dropping his hand. My heart didn’t have time to break because that moment crazy descended. Very large, very grim-looking men flooded through the front door which had burst open, the hinge straining to the point of breaking and the handle hitting the wall behind which resulted in the crash we’d heard. “Get her out of here,” Steele ordered Korrigan before he took off into the fray. She grabbed my arm, tugging so hard, I stumbled.

“Stay close. Walk fast. Keep your head down and run when I say run.” Korrigan sounded concerned, yet not nearly as surprised as I would’ve expected.

Chaos. Frenzy. Punches flying. Bottles breaking. Blood. Teeth. Yelling. We’d almost made it outside when two incredibly strong hands gripped my arms, spinning me. “Millicent Merchant, where are you off too?” He knew my name. How did he know my name?

“Millie.Run,” Korrigan shouted. Leaping onto the burly man’s back, she shoved a fingernail in his eye as she pounded on him with her other fist. When he dropped his hold on me, I ran out into the dark alley, down the deserted street with bombed-out looking buildings and broken streetlamps. Yet as my boots slapped against the pavement, I became acutely aware of the other sets of feet pounding, bearing down on me.

I turned down street after street, not a clue where I was going, where I could go or where I should be going. Part of me thought I should turn back for Korrigan and strangely enough… forSteele. But the footsteps grew faster, louder and harder behind me. On the last turn I saw a city bus stopped, but I was too late. The doors closed and it eased away from the stop before I got there.

Men in leather appeared behind me calling out taunts of what would happen when they caught me. I’d rather have gotten hit by that bus than succumb to what those leather-clad men threatened, so I chased down the large, slow-moving vehicle, screaming and waving my arms frantically for it to stop. I finally caught up to pound on the side of the bus a few times before the driver braked in the middle of the desolate intersection, pulling back open the doors. And with shaky, grateful legs, I climbed the three steps to board.

“You all right?” the bus driver asked me.

“Men… chasing… me…” My words spurted out in jagged chunks along with my breaths. Bent over with my hands on my knees, I begged, “Please… go…”

He did just that, closing the doors behind me as the men reached the tail end of the otherwise empty bus. He sped off without another word causing my whole body to pitch forward, hitting against the metal handrail.

“Ouch.” My head hit the pole first, and let me say, it smarted. Rubbing what surely had to be a giant red spot on my forehead, I took the seat closest to the driver and tried to pay my fare, but he shooed my hand away.

“It wasn’t smart to be out there alone.” he said, the scolding unmistakable in his voice.

“My friend brought me to a club and ditched me.” Then out of nowhere, it must have been all the excitement catching up to me, but the waterworks started and I couldn’t stop them to save my life. He must have decided my tears came because I’d been scared of those men chasing me, which I couldn’t deny. Or he might have thought they started thanks to his mini “dad” lecture. The reprimand wasn’t exactly my favorite part of the night, but he didn’t know me, so his good opinion meant nothing. Mostly they flowed because I had no idea what had happened to my friend and the beautiful man who’d given me my first kiss.

“Well, I think you need to find better friends, but I’ll get you home. Don’t you worry.”

So even though the man would probably end up fired come the end of his shift, he drove me in that lonely bus all the way back to my dirt road. “You shouldn’t try to turn down the drive. I’ll be fine from here.”

“You sure?”

I nodded. “Yes. And thank you.”

“You are more than welcome, Millicent.”

Then I climbed off the bus and watched him drive away down that dirt road. As I walked along the wheel-worn path it hit me, he’d called me Millicent. Inevertold him my name. How did he know my name? Come to think of it, how did those leather-clad men chasing me down know my name?

Something was not okay.

Maybe I was going out of my mind. Maybe I’d wake up to find myself asleep in my bed, tonight having been nothing more than another stupid dream.

“I told you not to go out tonight, Millicent.” Aunt Cynthia surprised me, standing in the dark mere feet away, poised like a fighter ready to strike. I never even heard her approach. “Now, get behind me. And when I say run, you run for your life.” If tonight was a dream, I wished I’d wake up. Especially as she uttered that phrase, making it the second time I’d heard it in the span of what, a few hours?

“You can’t save her,” A burly man who resembled the men chasing me from the club appeared behind me. “She’s ours and you know it. We won fair and square.”

“You’ll get her over my dead body.”

Another leather-clad man in black stepped forward. “That will be my extreme pleasure.” He lunged for my aunt, for me.

She shoved me behind her and whispered harshly, “Run!”

So I did, like a coward, I ran, glancing back over my shoulder to see if anyone pursued me. And I was sure they were following closely, as I’d used up any athletic reserves earlier in the night chasing down that bus, but what I saw pretty much flipped my world upside down. My demure Aunt Cynthia kicking butt and seriously taking names straight-upninja style. She moved noiselessly, striking blow after blow.

One woman was no match for the man and his apparent invisible, impenetrable body armor. That was how it seemed, anyway, as every time her fist hit, it ricocheted off him the way a fast-moving object ricochets off a moving car. Under the moonlight, the ping marks where she’d hit were visible only briefly before they absorbed back into his skin.

Instead of running, I stopped dead in my tracks and turned fully to face the brutal battle. It had to be shock. But the scene unfolding in front of me was storybook imaginings, not real life. My aunt dented her opponent, like actually dented him, and all I could think was if she’d hit him any harder, he’d need a body shop to pound out those dents. The thought made me want to laugh until I saw the other one sneaking up behind her. A double team.

“Cynthia!” I shrieked.

She turned just enough for us to lock eyes before I watched her struck down. My aunt crumpled like paper to the ground.

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