Page 71 of Lover Forbidden
“Gimme your hand.”
Shuli followed the command partially because he was surprised the guy wasn’t fucking him off. And then it was a case of—
“Ow! Fuck! Slow down—”
Now he knew what birth was like.
That was all he thought of as he was pulled out on a oner, his body scraping between the front seats, bumping over the backseat, squeezing through the window frame, and landing on the trunk.
The next thing he knew, he was up on L.W.’s shoulders, and they were on the move. Which was about as comfortable as having a sledgehammer massage.
“Didn’t we just do this last week,” he muttered with exhaustion as the big fella took off at a run.
And jumped up onto the top of the mega-trashbin.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
As the shooting intensified down below, Lyric tried to count the bullet discharges, but why bother? She didn’t know who was pulling what trigger—and it wasn’t like she knew how many bullets were in a magazine, anyway. What she was sure of was that beneath her, the pump of Dev’s breath was slow and steady, and the warmth from his body was spreading into her own in spite of the cold—and all her fear.
What if her brother or the other two were killed? Injured seriously? Captured? It would be all her fault. She’d sent her brother and—
“Come on,” Dev said urgently.
Except then her hearing registered a change in the noise chaos. Still distant shouting and all kinds of sirens, but a pause in the shooting.
“Inside,” he ordered as he shuffled them upright. “While we can—”
She raced right back for where they’d been standing. Except just as she got to the ledge, he grabbed her by the waist and swung her around.
“Are you crazy?” He started to carry her off. “That’s a full-blown turf war out there—”
As if to prove his point, there was an abrupt flash of light down below that was so great, it lit up everything behind the building—and then there was a series of loud booms, like someone had upgraded theirweapon, big-time. Wrenching around in his hold, she caught a glimpse of a showdown at the far side of the parking area.
The crashed car. Cops getting closer. A couple of figures, not that she could make them out—
Her view was cut off, and the next thing she knew, she was in a stairway, with Dev closing the door and leaning back against it.
He was breathing hard. So was she.
Outside, the fighting sounds dimmed, and not just because they’d found a little shelter. She could tell the battle was moving away, going to the west, toward the river.
“Fun, fun,” he muttered as he took out a pack of cigarettes.
He shook out one of them, put it in his mouth, and flicked a Bic. Just as he was touching the flame to the tip, he did a double take.
“Sorry.” He frowned. “You mind if I smoke this?”
She had so many bigger problems than that. “No.”
Pushing her hair out of her face, she fumbled for her phone. But like she could ring her brother? Like he could answer?
“The cops are already here,” he said on the exhale. “Who are you calling?”
She looked down at the cell. “I… don’t know.”
And if she reached out to the Brotherhood? How was she going to explain how she knew what was happening? Besides, it was protocol, asking for backup—she’d overheard her brother talking about it loads of times. One of them, down there, for sure already had.
“I have to go,” she blurted.
