“No need to get antsy, boys,” he said, almost pleasantly, like he couldn’t see his death staring back at him as he looked at us, but the tightness in his grip on our girl proved that was a lie.
“Just let her go, Mortez,” Monroe growled and I committed that name to memory alongside his face.
He had the fucking audacity to laugh in response, his finger twitching on the trigger of his pistol in a way that made my heart leap with panic and I took half a step forward before I could stop myself. Blake caught my arm with the hand which wasn’t aiming a gun at that motherfucker’s head and I forced myself to stop again.
“What are you going to do with her?” I demanded and the way Mortez assessed me told me he knew exactly what I was. The darkest creatures always recognised their own kind after all.
“She’s my escape plan, that’s all. I did what I came here to do, her daddy is dead and there are no more loose ends for me to worry about tying off. Y’all just need to back the fuck up and let me leave. I’ll take her with me to make sure you don’t get any ideas about following and then let her out a mile or so down the road.”
“No fucking way,” Blake snapped.
The tension in my limbs was unbearable as this situation spiralled completely and utterly out of my control. There was a fury in me unlike anything I’d ever felt before as my gaze locked with Tatum’s and I swear I could feel her pain at the death of her father. It hurt me in a way that no emotion of my own ever could. She was ours. We’d sworn to protect her. I’d sworn to look after her. And yet now she’d been cut so deeply, I knew the wound would never heal right.
It’s my fault.
All my fault.
All my fucking fault!
“I want the keys to that car over there,” Mortez commanded and I cut a glance to the heap of shit Monroe usually drove. It was the only car parked on the track which led here, though there was an old motorbike parked alongside it too. I guessed Mortez and his band of dead men had come here on foot like us to keep their presence hidden until they sprung their trap.
Monroe hesitated and Mortez suddenly moved his pistol from Tatum’s temple to jab it into her stomach.
“A gut wound can take days to kill you,” he said in a low tone. “So I’ll still have my hostage, but you’ll have the added worry about taking her to a hospital. And in these wild and uncertain times, hospitals are not the safest places to be. Especially with that virus doing the rounds.”
“You’d be wise to kill me while you have the chance,” Tatum hissed in a low voice. “Because if you don’t, you’ll spend the rest of your miserable days running from me and wishing you had.”
“Aww, don’t be sore about your daddy, sweetheart,” Mortez cooed, his mouth pressed to the skin of her neck as he spoke while still shielding himself with her body.
Tatum was rigid in his arms, her face scrunched with disgust as she was held against him and my blood boiled.
“We’ll never let him take you,” I swore to her as my gaze stayed fixed on her big blue eyes as they darted between the four of us like she didn’t know where best to seek solace.
“Like I said, one mile and I’ll cut her loose. Last chance to hand over the keys before I put a bullet in her belly. Give them to the girl.”
“Here,” Monroe snarled, tossing the key to Tatum and she caught it mechanically.
“Good boys,” Mortez said, his tone patronising and his eyes wary as he backed up. He was marking each of us as clearly as I’d marked him. We were hunters pitted against each other now. And this feud between us would only end in death, whether that would be today or not was the only real thing in question here.
Tatum stumbled a little as he dragged her backwards towards the car and the anger in me made my limbs fucking tremble as we stalked after them like a wolf pack, the tension in the air so thick we were drowning in it.
“Just take the car and go,” I growled. “Leave her here now. We have no way to follow anyway.”
Not that that would fucking stop me from obliterating this son of a bitch.
“Lower your weapons and I might,” Mortez offered.
I knew it was a fucking lie, but I couldn’t just let him take her without trying to reason with him.
All of us lowered our guns as he made it to the car and he dropped down behind the wheel.
My heart thrashed as he yanked Tatum onto his lap and started the engine. All four of us lurched forwards as he threw the car into gear, but it was no use, the wheels spun in the dirt for half a second and he shoved our girl across into the passenger seat. But that was his fucking mistake.
With a roar of rage, I raced after the car, lifting my gun and firing at him, aiming for his side of the vehicle and forcing him to swerve as the rear windshield shattered.
He started shooting back, but I only ran faster as I took aim again. The pounding of footsteps around me told me the other Night Keepers were at my heels, running with me as we chased after her.
And as my muscles burned and my heart raced, I knew I wasn’t going to stop. I wouldn’t turn back or slow no matter how fucking
