"Don't you…I'm not looking to intrude, man. It's—"
"It's like the trailer," I retort. "I'm barely there."
And she's not staying in that fucking nightmare of a shithole.
"But, I—"
"Listen, I know we don't have the strongest relationship, you barely fucking know me. I’m a dick, and I work a lot but know that I'm not one to argue. Just agree.” I fix him with an already exasperated look. "Cool?"
Hardy nods. "Yeah, man…cool. Thanks."
"Don't mention it." My cell buzzes in my back pocket, and out of habit, I pull it out while Hardy steers back to his daughter.
"I'm sure you mean that figuratively and literally?" he asks.
"You got it." Powering on my screen, all the air that was just filling my chest deflates and disappears.
EMMY: Hey, are you okay?
"You staying at the trailer tonight?" Hardy's voice seeps through my vision of Emmy and her blondish-white locks. The way her honey-brown eyes, when they lift to look up at me, make me want to fuck her until I can't see anymore.
Then I want to strangle her.
"Yeah," I reply offhandedly as if I'm talking through a fog.
My brother leans back in his seat and clasps his hands together. "Then you should know…Bubba is back."
"Touch my ass again, Mills, and I swear to God, I'm going to fuck up those boyish good looks of yours."
"I'm not trying to," he whispers sharply, immediately moving his meaty palms to my upper thighs. "It's in the fucking way, J-Lo."
He pushes me upward again, giving me enough height to grab onto the gutters of the house, but I'm too freaking short to grip anything but the steel gutters.
This isn't working.
"We need to find another way in," I quip. "Let me down."
"Hold on, Lou Boo." He then heaves me a second time, and my whole body flies through the air, my knees slamming into the rough texture of the roof through my thin leggings, and I wince.
"Fuck." I suck in a breath through my teeth as I climb to the side so I can help Mills up.
Or not.
A grunt sounds behind me, hinting that Mills is already on his way when the snap of a branch catches my ear from a few yards away.
"What the hell was that?" I whisper, clenching onto Mills's wrist, so he doesn't fall.
"We must've missed a dude. Pull me up." I do, and together we get him onto the roof just in time for a skinny guy in a brown leather coat to round the trees to the right of the house.
How in the fuck did we miss him?
Mills and I keep crouched down to stay out of sight when the dude begins to approach the front door.
Reaching behind me, I drag out my Wushu Whip chain. The weapon is steel but light, composed of short metal bars and rings that link them together. It allows me to move quickly and with less chance of injury to myself.
Mills pulls out his gun as I inch closer to the gutters.
"Em," Mills warns. "Don't—" Oops, I do, stepping off the house and right on top of the man who was going to die by one of our hands anyway.
He barely breaks my landing, my feet hitting the ground as we both fall together. My right leg bitches at me for the lack of thinking this all the way through and that I'm gonna feel this tomorrow morning.
Quickly getting the upper hand, I step off him to allow him access to sit up, but it's what I want him to do.
Wrapping my chain around his throat, I expertly position one of the rods along the base of his throat before rolling another layer over.
Then I yank—hard.
He gurgles for air on his knees, attempting to pull the steel chain away from his neck with both hands.
The man swings backward, trying to throw me off, but I casually step to the side. He's desperate for any prospect to get me to let go, but the moment I linked two layers, he doesn't stand a chance.
Marty's in this house—alone.
This idiot in my grasp is part of some stupid group that took his sister, Reagan, and his girl, Stormi, too.
People I care for.
It shoots a whole other wave of violence coursing through my body as I jerk harder, listening to him gurgle and gag for oxygen.
The stranger's weight begins to bear on my steel, prompting me that he's losing consciousness. I hear Mills's heavy sigh above me, envious that he didn't get to finish this prick off.
Jealous ass.
Undoing the chain from around this guy's neck, I let him fall face-first to the dirt and neatly put my weapon away.
I look up at Mills then bat my eyelashes. "Help me up again?"
"Jump on the air conditioner," he grumbles with knitted brows, walking towards it.
Climbing on top of the metal grate above the fan, I raise my arms while Mills hauls me up.
"We should've done that before," I reply, still feeling the slight pain in my knees and now leg.
“Where’s the fun in that when I get to hear you bitch at me for five minutes?” I roll my eyes as I get to my feet. “Where the hell is that governor of yours?"
He's irritated and, if you knew him, isn't like this at all.
Out of all the men I work with, Mills is the most carefree, the jokester, the one who'll make you feel better after a bad day, and the easiest to handle.
But this is Marty we're talking about, a man that is like a brother to us, and he's in serious trouble.
Hence why we're here.
"Probably through the laundry room already."
"Why the fuck didn't we do that?"
"C'mon—" I tug on his hand, not about to explain the plan to him for the second time. “—complain later." He follows, and we only have minutes, maybe seconds, to reach all three of them before something terrible happens.
Hopping over the governor's balcony railing, we enter Wade Lockwood and his wife, Reagan's bedroom. The smell of fresh sheets fills my nose as
