Page 72 of Fearless
“Gunner, I can’t—“
“It’s okay, Mari. Please.” His voice held a tinge of desperation. “I want this. I wantyou. Fuck the circumstances. I’ve always wanted you.” His palm cupped the back of my neck, holding me in place for another deep kiss full of longing. “If this is the only way I can have you, so fucking be it.”
“Elric. Make them hurry it up.”
Corinne’s voice snapped me out of it like ice injected into my spine. A gun cocked, the barrel pointed at Gunner’s legs. “Pants off. Now.” Gunner obeyed without hesitation, unzipping and shoving the worn denim down his thighs while leaving his boxer briefs in place. “And you,” the barrel swung to point in my direction. “Top off. Let’s see those pretty tits.”
“No,” Gunner bit out, moving to stand in front of me. He glared directly at Corinne. “You want to see how good I am? She doesn’t need to be naked for that. And you’re not gonna find out anything by rushing us. As a woman, you should know it takes time to get warmed up.”
“There’s a difference between warming up and stalling,” she retorted. “And I don’t appreciate you wasting my time. In any case, I think I’ve seen enough. Unchain him, Elric, and bring him to my personal slave pen.”
“No!” Now it was me fighting to get in front of Gunner, trying as hard as I could in vain to prevent them from taking him.
But his body went impossibly stiff, rigid like a block of stone.
“Gunner?” I looked up to see his eyes had rolled back so only the whites were visible. His brow and eyelids twitched, his mouth slack and open.
“What’s going on with him?” Corinne demanded. “Is he fucking epileptic? Oh, that won’t do at all…”
I used to think the same thing, but when my eyes caught sight of the bird circling above us, my heart dared to soar with hope where there had been none before.
“Horus!”
It had to be. And Gunner must have been seeing through his falcon’s eyes right at that moment. He was right about no motorcycles being nearby, but the clubhadto be here if Gunner’s falcon was.
The bird circled so high, it became a barely visible speck. Gunner seemed unsteady on his feet, so I wrapped my arms around his waist to support him.
“Shoot him,” Corinne ordered with disdain in her voice, seemingly oblivious to her impending peril. “The last thing I need is a twitching, drooling idiot in my bed or on the market.”
“No!”
I covered as much of Gunner’s body as I could with mine just as Elric took aim. He squeezed his trigger with an evil smirk, and I shut my eyes as the shot rang out.
“Aghhh, fuck!”
Something hit me, but it wasn’t a bullet. It was wet and warm. Blood.
I cracked my eyes open to see Elric clutching at his neck, blood spurting between his fingers with each beat of his heart. He fell to his knees, on death’s doorstep already.
“Elric—what?” For the first time, Corinne showed emotion besides smug superiority. Her eyes widened in fear as she watched the life drain from her favorite henchman.
Above and behind her, dark feathers clung to a chunk of rock wall. It was clear from her and everyone else’s reaction that no one saw Horus shred Elric’s neck open.
“Madam, we seem to be under attack—“
“NO FUCKING SHIT, WE’RE UNDER ATTACK!” she roared at her guard. “Secure the perimeter! Find out who—ahhh!”
A dark blur moved like lightning throughout the room, going so fast it seemed to defy the laws of physics. An image flashed in my mind's eye--the rough shape of a man whose face I couldn't see. The man from my dream who claimed to be Hades. A voice rang out so loud, it should've echoed off the stone walls. But it seemed to come from within my head.
Their lives are ours to take. We will reap what has been sown.
Gunner had come to at some point and wrapped me in a protective embrace as we observed the carnage around us.
Corinne and all her men were on the ground, wailing, screaming, crawling. Blood dripped from their ankles as though a major tendon had been severed. And Hades, muscles sleek and rippling, walked between the bodies with his lips pulled back and teeth stained red.
His dark predatory eyes met mine and once again, I got a flash of the faceless man who sat at the end of Jandro's bed.
"Mari! Are you hurt?"
