“I’ll never leave you again,” I said. “I promise.”
“I love you,” she said.
“I know.” I took her hands. “Listen to me. Things are going to get messy from here.”
“What do you mean?”
“We’re going to shoot our way out of this.” I stepped back from her and took the two guns from my jeans. “Stay close and stay low.”
“Okay. Close and low.”
I turned toward the door, adrenaline pulsing through my body. “Ready?”
She nodded, a look of steely resolve on her face. “Ready.”
I stepped up to the door and kicked it open. The guards were surprised and stared up at me. The younger guy was lighting a cigarette with the end of his other one, and the older guy had a bag of beef jerky out.
I put the gun against the older guy’s head and blew his brains out. He crumbled to the ground as the younger guy stumbled back, eyes wide. I turned the gun to him and shot him between the eyes. His head snapped back and he fell to the ground.
I moved out into the hallway. Sadie stepped up behind me and we both hustled back down the hall. Suddenly, from the opposite end, voices were yelling. I looked back and fired off a few shots, forcing whoever was following to jump back.
“Around the corner!” I said.
They started to return fire. We jumped around the corner, getting out of the way just in time. I fired off a few shots back at them but couldn’t get a good look. We turned and ran back down the hall, not bothering to be stealthy.
We got about halfway down before our pursuers turned the corner and started firing. I grabbed Sadie and threw her into a room just off the hall, diving in next to her.
“Fuck,” I said. We were pinned down. I fired a few more shots out there, forcing the pursuers back.
“Gage,” Sadie said. “Look.”
I followed her eyes and saw another door toward the side of the room. “Go,” I said, firing back down the hall.
She got the door open. It led into the adjacent room. I ran after her, into the next room, and we went down the hall that way, room to room. I stopped every other room to fire off a few shots, but finally we reached the end of the hall and the end of the connected doorways.
I pressed up against the wall and peered out. I saw two men rush into the first room we had gone into and another two running down the hall. I stepped out and fired at them, dropping to my knees. They dropped as my bullets tore them to pieces.
“Come on!” I yelled. I turned and ran, Sadie fast on my heels. We dove into the locker room I had first come into, the body of the first guard I knocked out still lying there unconscious. I slammed the door and we ran outside and back down the hallway.
They were coming for us, close on our heels. I turned to fire off a few shots, but I didn’t slow down. I shoved Sadie in front of me, forcing her to go faster. We turned out onto the main street and headed toward my car. It was just ahead, parked right where I left it. I tossed her the keys as I fired back at the mobsters following us.
“Get it going,” I instructed, stopping and crouching down behind a car. “Come get me when it’s ready.”
“Okay!”
She kept running. I popped up and fired off a few shots, forcing the guys after us to back off.
There was a moment of silence. They didn’t fire and neither did I. We were separated by about twenty feet and some concrete.
“Gage,” one of the men yelled. “I’m coming out.”
I knew that voice.
It was fucking Vadik himself.
“I wouldn’t if I were you.”
“You won’t shoot the man that gave you life.” I watched as he turned the corner, his hands raised in the air.
I don’t know what stopped me, but for some reason I didn’t pull the trigger. I didn’t fire. Maybe it was all the years of working for him that stayed my hands, but I wasn’t sure. I was trained to kill, lived to kill, and my fingers ached to pull the trigger. I had every reason to kill Vadik then and there.
“You don’t have to run,” he said. “You’ve done enough. Give us the girl. We’ll let you rejoin the family, hell, I’ll even promote you. A man that can survive this is a man I want to keep around.”
“Why would I do that? After all this?”
“Because I’ll make you rich and powerful. You know that I will.” He gestured at me. “I brought you up in this world. I gave you a chance. Don’t disappoint me, Gage.”
I stared at him, not sure why I couldn’t pull the trigger. I should’ve killed him the second he showed his face. He was going to murder Sadie and me without a second thought, and now he was suddenly asking for my mercy. Hell, he wanted me back.