down,” was all he said.
I’ll do my best, kiddo, I thought silently. And then I hit the door and the ground running. Michael shadowed my every step. People were all over, running or starting their cars to careen over curbs. It would be nice to think we blended in with them, but the guys inside had spotted us quickly enough despite our cosmetic changes. I didn’t have any reason to believe we’d be any better off exposed in the bright noon sun. We bolted between parked cars, their colors streaking in my peripheral vision like those of a bad abstract painting. Within a few steps I had to shove one hero wannabe with a hunting knife out of my way. He landed on the hood of a shiny Ford T-Bird and slid across the ice-slick wax job to drop out of sight on the other side. I kept going without missing a step. His good luck was our bad luck; we were halfway home when disaster struck. The sound of the gun firing came as I was already falling. A searing pain tracked across my side as the world rolled from beneath my feet. And then, despite my silent promise to Michael . . .
I went down.
Thrown backward, I landed on the asphalt as the back of my head kissed the metal of a car door. Spots blossomed red and black across my field of vision, but I could still see the figure that slithered out from under the car opposite me. Cold black eyes measured me with sterile detachment. Jericho rose to his feet with a fluid grace that belied the brutal car accident of the previous day. There wasn’t a mark on the man, not a goddamn scratch. I’d seen the blood on him; yet now he stood, whole and unwounded. It was disorienting, as if this were allaB movie and we were suffering a serious hitch in the continuity. Keeping a sleek semiautomatic pistol centered on my abdomen, he observed with a dispassionate charm, “Naughty. Naughty. It’s not wise to take what doesn’t belong to you.” His scrutiny didn’t flicker for a second from me as he raised his voice slightly. “Move, Michael, and I give him a scalpel-free lobotomy. That may or may not matter to you, but the two bullets that follow will be yours. One in each knee. You know from class that shattered kneecaps never heal quite the same.”
And why not? Michael didn’t need to walk to be able to kill. A kid in a wheelchair—who would possibly suspect him when the president of Timbuktu dropped dead of a heart attack while shaking his hand?
Head and ears ringing, I slid blurry eyes toward Michael. He’d seemed unafraid when trapped in the restroom, as cool and calm under pressure as any soldier. But that stoicism had fled. I knew he feared Jericho. As far as I could tell, that was the only thing he did fear, but dread of Jericho wasn’t the emotion I was seeing now. “You’re hurt.” His face was as translucent as wax paper. “You’re bleeding.”
“Misha.” The 9mm was still in my hand that rested on abrasive concrete. It would take more than a bullet in the ribs to make me turn loose of that. A cop didn’t give up his gun and neither did I. Often enough it was all that stood between you and a headstone, for both the law-abiding and the somewhat less so. I was still in the game; I still had a chance to save my brother . . . no matter how small an opportunity it might be. “Misha,
Michael might have had language classes out his well-educated ass, but I was hoping Jericho was too preoccupied with playing the baneful God of Genetics to pick up your average Slavic dialect. Once again luck deserted me.
“He takes one step,
He didn’t know. He had no idea that Michael was my brother. How could that be? Years had passed, but the man had to guess that the family of even a much altered, long-renamed Lukas would still be looking for him. He couldn’t think that we’d just give up—even if one of us had.
Anatoly might have moved on, but I never had. In all the time that had passed, I hadn’t stopped trying to take care of my brother. That hadn’t changed. From then until this very moment, it hadn’t changed. “Misha, it’s okay.” My lips curled in encouragement as the blood spread on my shirt. “Now keep your promise.”
I don’t know what Jericho expected would happen. I didn’t even know what I expected, not really. But I knew what I hoped, and Michael didn’t let that hope die. He didn’t let me down.
He ran.
It diverted Jericho’s attention for the briefest second. I saw the flicker of disbelief cross the spare profile. Although Michael had refused to go to him days ago in the van, he still expected the boy to obey him. He couldn’t believe that all the manipulation and all the training hadn’t tamed Michael’s inner core. He simply couldn’t believe it. And when I shot him . . .
He believed that even less.
I wasn’t able to lift my hand to fire. He would’ve seen the movement even before I made it. So I didn’t move the hand; it wasn’t necessary. My finger was enough. At that angle the best shot I could make was his leg. Crimson spurted from his shin and there was the flash of pearly white bone as he screamed. Hoarse, deep, and full of fury, it was the cry of a wounded predator. I’d watched enough Discovery Channel to know that only made him less predictable and a damn sight more dangerous.
Grabbing the door handle behind me, I lurched to a crouch. His gun was still pointed at me and I could see him pushing aside the waves of agony to focus on his target. I found mine first.
Gutshot isn’t the best way to go. The pain of a torn stomach leaking flesh-searing bile doesn’t begin to cover it. I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy. For Jericho, however, I wished I had the time to send another slug in there to keep the first company. The close wail of approaching sirens told me that while it was a pleasant thought, it might not be practical. I had to get out of there . . . in one goddamn hurry.
The second time I’d shot him, Jericho had fallen onto his back. This time he had lost his gun, using his hand to try to stem the blood oozing from his stomach. The frozen stare had turned into one glossy with hate. Words, sharp and grating, were pushed painfully between clenched teeth. “I’ll . . . kill you.” Sucking in a breath, he closed his eyes and grinned with all the warmth of a toothy skull. “And if . . . I don’t . . . Michael will.”
Then again, how long did it take to pull a trigger?
The tackle of a speeding whirlwind made the question moot. Michael hadn’t run quite the distance I’d hoped. Arm wrapped tight around my waist, he dragged me along with a strength I wouldn’t have believed was in his slim frame. I was still tempted to take another shot at Jericho . . . the last shot, but as it was, I was lucky to stay upright even with my brother’s help. The bullet wound in my side was taking a backseat to the throbbing in my head. From the dizziness, nausea, foggy vision, it was safe to say I’d bought myself a pretty good concussion when my head had hit that car door. The simultaneous desire to puke and lie on the ground to die wasn’t too helpful in keeping my eyes open for Jericho’s flunkies, but I gave it my best shot. As we moved, from behind I could hear a choked, ugly laughter. Jericho was laughing. Through an agony that should’ve killed anything more coherent than a scream, the son of a bitch was laughing.
The sound was unnaturally chilling, the throaty cackle of a hyena muzzle deep in warm entrails. Trying to block it out, I picked up the pace as best as I could. “I told you to run,” I grunted. “If you think that’s running, you can kiss a track scholarship good-bye.”
“I guess I’ll have to depend on my brain, not my legs.” His breath was fast but even against my jaw. “And I did run—just not very far.”
“Kids these days.” I could see our car. It was barely fifteen feet away. As far as I was concerned, it may as well have been fifteen miles. “They never listen.” My legs buckled as the muscles went from rubber to water. How Michael kept me upright I didn’t know. I had to outweigh him by a good fifty pounds. Add one-twenty to that and deadweight became a very real concept to a skinny teenage boy.
Savagely biting my bottom lip to the salty taste of copper, I straightened and ordered legs I couldn’t feel to move faster. No one was more surprised than I that they actually obeyed. As we fell against the driver’s door, I was already digging in my jacket pocket for the spare key I’d found tucked under the sun visor. Pulling it free, I tried to ram it into the lock. It was more difficult than it seemed as twin images spun lazily before my eyes. Double vision is less fun when it’s minus the alcohol.
Michael snatched the key from my hand and slid it home. Flinging open the door, he stretched a hand to unlock the rear before trying to shove me into the backseat. I grabbed the edge of the door frame and resisted with a growl. “What the hell are you doing?” Icy sweat beaded my forehead and I swallowed convulsively. “You’re all about the theory, remember?” I slurred. “You can’t drive us out of here.”
“Yes, I can.” The next push was more forceful, not to mention more successful. I lost my grip and tumbled in.
