Page 61 of Archer
“Drop the knife, Ray.”
Off to the left side, the other greaseballs laughed. Slink and Cash as usual were glued to Ray’s side, but the two new guys I only heard of recently. Ghost I recognized from the black bandana, he was selling crank on our turf a few months back. And Shimmer, the bald, bug-eyed weirdo at my side, was apparently involved with the last murder but got off somehow. He was sneaking toward us, pulling a knife from behind his back, as if we didn’t see him. Crow pivoted to point his revolver at his face.
“Move another step,” Crow said to Shimmer with a blunt tone. Neither of them made any movement, instead stared each other down with their eyes like slits.
“Why the fuck are you even involved in this?” Ray spat, directing the words to Tank instead of me. “Just ’cause his bakery is on your side. He lives on ours. Made the deal on ours. Mind your own fuckin’ business.”
Ray waved us off and began to turn his back to us, dismissing our presence.
“Ray,” I shouted deep from my bottom of my chest, demanding enough that he hesitated and faced me again. I raised the gun higher at him and he gave a slight smirk.
That was when Slink piped up. “You fuckin’ moron. I went easy on you last time, hittin’ your leg. I’m gonna cut it off this time…”
He began to dart toward me when Rose screeched, making her first peep since we barged through the door. “Archer, no! Move!”
Ray held up his hand and Slink stopped like a puppet. “Hold on, I think I get what’s going on.” His stare moved from Slink and back on me, his lips curling even higher. “He’s a fuckin’ simp for this slut.”
My vision went red and I couldn’t think of anything more intimidating to say than, “Don’t—Don’t call her that.”
They all laughed, taunting me, making my blood steam inside my veins.
“Well, if she ain’t a slut now,” Ray said, “She will be once we’re done with her.”
With that horrific mental image in my head, I couldn’t restrain myself. Instead of shooting him, my primal instincts kicked in and I lunged toward Ray.
“Go!” Tank ordered the Rebels and chaos exploded in the room.
My hands wrapped around Ray’s throat, and even though he was much heavier than me, I knocked him to the ground. Squeezing as tightly as I could around his Adam’s apple, his hands tried to rip my grasp off, and I regretted not taking advantage of the clean shot. As Ray’s face grew purple and his eyes bugged out, I started getting cocky thinking I’d beat him, when a blade slashed against my shoulder. The leather of my jacket stopped it from cutting too deep, but it still made me flinch my hands off Ray.
Ray reached out for my own neck, but I rolled off him, grabbing my pistol that dropped to the floor. I was about to aim for Ray when I saw Shimmer standing above me with the blade that cut me. Nearly forgetting about him, I froze for a second when I heard a rifle shoot off. Before Shimmer fell on his face, a red stain grew through his dirty white shirt beneath his coat. As he tipped over, Crow stood behind him, looking unfazed. Turning back to Ray, I saw Tank had him wrestled back to the ground with a gun pointed to his face.
Fear pounded heavier in my heart when I realized I hadn’t checked on Rose or Ron. Leaping to my feet, I first saw Slink sliding over to Ron with his knife ready to stab when Wrench came from nowhere with a knife, stabbing him right in the back shouting, “Payback’s a bitch.”
Through his swollen and mangled face, I could tell Ron was panicked and scared. I rushed up to him and patted his chest, quickly saying, “We’ll be out of here soon, big guy.” Not wasting time to hear his response I looked up in time to see Cash and Ghost sidling up to Rose.
“Looks like we’d better make this quick,” Cash said, licking his lips like a snake.
“Bet we could sneak her out back without anyone noticing,” Ghost said and pulled out his knife.
“Hey, as long as she ends up dead,” Cash responded.
“No! Go away!” Rose squirmed in the ropes as the foul Freeways slithered toward her.
“Rose!” I shouted, making them notice me.
Rooster, Ripper, and Maverick were helping Tank fight off Ray when I roared. At once, it looked like the three had a silent discussion, giving each other a single nod. Maverick and Ripper jumped off Ray and leapt toward me.
In one movement, Cash jumped on top of Maverick, waving his knife inches from his face. Ripper swung a punch at Cash, dazing him, but he recovered quickly and grabbed Ripper’s ankle. I wanted to help them, but when I heard another sharp scream from Rose I had to look away from my brothers.
My stomach squelched.
He had his knife pressed to her throat, hard enough that a trickle of blood oozed from her neck, and his other hand groped her breast. I snapped, “Ghost!”
He turned around, and with a perfect shot, I wanted to take him out right then. But Rose was directly behind him. His light green eyes gleamed menacingly at me as he began to twirl the knife on her neck.
Rose’s blood-curdling shriek echoed through the bare cement walls of the office. Using all my weight, I lunged to Ghost and yanked his neck into a headlock. He flailed his knife around, trying to slash me without losing his footing until I finally dragged him to the floor. The way we fell, he had the advantage, being on top of me. While I struggled to hold my grip, he knocked the gun out of my hand.
Wrestling on the ground, I thrusted my fists to his face, trying to get a clean punch but he kept squirming out of the way. Cackling, he said, “Big man, you are. Come here to save your bitch, now she’s gonna watch you bleed out.”
