Page 107 of Pretty Lethal
“How can you be here?” she demands, and I’m fairly certain I hear a hint of uncertainty finally enter her voice. “Where is Robbie?”
“Do your people know you’ve been lying to them all this time?” I ask, ignoring her questions. A couple of the hoods turn to look at one another, but for the most part, their focus remains cemented on the six of us. “I wonder how they’d feel if they knew awomanwas the one leading them.”
I smirk cruelly at her, not giving a single shit that I’ve dropped her in the middle of it. Serves her fucking right.
Murmurs break out at my statement, several more heads turning to look at their King.
“That’s right, Elites. A woman has been leading you all this time. Giving you orders. Pushing her agenda on you.”
The words taste sour on my tongue, hating that I must emphasize that she’s a female to get them to turn on her, but I know people like them. I grew up surrounded by people like them. They wouldn’t be in this room if they didn’t agree with the founding principles of the King’s Elite. There is no humanity in these people. No empathy. If I want to appeal to them, I have to use what they’ll most despise against them—that is, they’ve been pushed around by a vagina instead of a dick.
As if it truly matters.
“Liar,” Carrie hisses.
“Am I?” I question, cocking my head to the side. “Then prove it. Pull back your hood and show your followers my lies.”
“Kings are anonymous,” she hisses, and her hood shifts as she turns to look at each of the followers surrounding her. “To preserve the sanctity of the Elite. To ensure all focus remains on our cause and not on our members.Thatis why we wear our cloaks and our hoods. To bind us together and unite us in a common goal.”
I notice some head nods and murmurs of agreement, but I refuse to let that deter me.
“Then remove your voice alternator. Let everyone hear your masculine voice. I doubt anyone will be able to identify you from a few words.”
I can practically feel the heat of her glower penetrating into my forehead, but we have her cornered now—albeit we’re still outnumbered. If I can put a wedge between her and the Elites, we could easily win this battle.
While the Elites are distracted, too busy muttering amongst themselves and staring at their supposed leader, while Carrie is drilling her gaze into my skull, Hadley and the others inch closer, spreading themselves out until they become five separate targets.
With a subtle nod from Hadley, unnoticeable to anyone not paying close attention to her, all five of them open fire. Chaos breaks out as some of the Elites return fire, and I lift my own weapon, directing it into the sea of cloaks. They’re so tightly packed together, like sardines in a can, that our shots easily hit their target, and gaps begin to form in their armor as, one by one, cloaks fall.
Hadley and the guys may not work for Nocturnal Enterprises, but they’ve all run drills with Kai—and me when I get time away from college and the office. Hadley prefers to keep her training from the compound fresh and the guys want to learn so they can protect her should an occasion such as this arises. It means we work seamlessly as a team, attuned to the others as we have one another's back in our fight to take out as many Elites as it takes.
It quickly becomes apparent that many of them lack the necessary training, blindly shooting across the room with their bullets going wide or embedding in the walls rather than in us—thank fuck.
At one point, Hadley laughs out loud, a broad grin on her face as she cocks her gun and shoots at yet another cloak, who slumps to the ground on top of his fellow Elite. How much she enjoys this should be disturbing, but who am I to judge? Besides, I can’t deny that there is something cathartic about reigning down cosmic justice on elitist assholes.
I get such a sense of satisfaction when a report passes my desk informing me that the husband of one of the women Kai helped rescue from an abusive situation or the parents of a child in a hostile home have been sentenced and incarcerated. However it’s nothing compared to doling out that justice for yourself, especially when those people have wronged you personally. Have harmed what’s yours.
Never again will they interfere with my family or hurt a hair on my Sparrow’s head.
They’ll never chase her terrified through the forest again.
Or bury her in a fucking box.
Carrie will never again knock my Sparrow’s trust or confidence in herself.
Never slide beneath her defenses and worm her way into her inner circle.
A flash of gold in the corner of my eye draws me out of my bloodlust and thirst for vengeance as I catch sight of a cloak disappearing behind another door—a door that I know from experience leads into the tunnels.
“Go!” Hadley yells, having apparently noticed the same thing. “We’ve got this.”
I hold her steely gaze for a brief second before nodding. With anxiety twirling in my gut as I wonder where Emilia and the others are and if they’re about to have a run-in with a fleeing King in the tunnels, I leave the growing pile of black cloaks behind and take off after Carrie.
Chapter34
WILDER
“So, how do we get into the tunnels?” Emilia asks as we separate from the others.
