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Ryan (Mallick Brothers #2)(36)

By:Jessica Gadziala


I landed on my side with a shooting of pain from my hip to my shoulder.

But I barely registered it, all my attention focused on Bry as he was pulled away. When he tried to double back to me, seeing me fall, Ray's arm cocked back and swung, landing solidly into his center and making him fall to his knees, gasping hard for breath.

"No!" I shrieked, unable to keep it in, hysteria bubbling up like never before.

"Shut the fuck up, cunt, or it will be you next time."

I didn't hear a shuffle. I didn't hear any of the men shouting.

I didn't hear anything out of what was the ordinary.

Except the next second, a voice that hadn't been in the room before spoke, breaking through the tension like the crack of a whip.

"Care to call me a cunt too? I mean, I do have the right body parts for it."

And there was a woman.

Really, one look at her and you realized she wasn't merely a woman; she was a force to be reckoned with. It wasn't that she was overly bulky or butch or intimidating. Actually, she had a perfectly curved, feminine body with long legs, a flare of hips, and a great rack. She was dressed in somewhat military fashion with camouflage printed utility pants and a tight nude-colored tank top. She had long blonde hair and intelligent, observant warm brown eyes. But there was just something about her. There was an air of authority and strength.

She stood in the doorway with her head cocked to the side, calm as could be. Like it was every day she walked into a drug dealer's compound.

I worried momentarily that maybe that was because she was a part of their organization or something. That was until Dom stiffened in his chair. "Who the fuck are you?"

"I'm Lo. And this," she said, moving to the side and allowing another woman to step in. She was younger, black-haired, blue-eyed, and covered in tattoos, "is Jstorm. And this," she went on as Jstorm filed in to allow space in the doorway again, "is Ryan Mallick," she said and I felt like my belly dropped to my feet.



       
         
       
        

Ryan?

But even as I was trying to convince myself that I was hearing things, hallucinating, losing my ever-loving mind, he stepped in.

Just like when Bry walked in, he didn't look at the men on the stage. He didn't look at Bry on the ground or Ray standing over him. His eyes went and stayed on me. There seemed to be a thousand words in their light depths.

But it wasn't the time or place.

"What the fuck are you doing here and where the fuck are my men?" Dom hissed, sitting up straight, but seeming to refuse to leave his makeshift throne.

"Funny story," Lo said, leaning back against the doorway, casual as you please. Who the hell was the woman? "You employ a bunch of street rats with absolutely no training. I mean the first guy to pull a gun on me, he held it out at me on an angle. For fuck's sake. Like a gangster in a movie. Ridiculous. Needless to say, they were easy to disarm and get control over. Mine and Mallick's people have them all corralled into one of the other rooms."

They had them corralled into a room.

So, they essentially... had control over the situation?

I wasn't going to be raped and murdered.

"You're not as pathetic-looking as you sounded on the phone," the other woman, Jstorm, said, directed it seemed to Bry.

"Gee, thanks," Bry said, still sounding winded and I worried about his ribs.

"Why are you here? You want the fucking girl?" Dom asked, waving a hand toward me and it was right about then I thought to pick myself up slightly, getting onto my knees.

"We will be taking the girl," Lo said, a little edge in her voice. "We will also be taking your former dealer with us as well."

"That's where I am going to draw the line," Dom said, voice getting firm. "He is mine. He fucked up. I get to deal with him however the fuck I want."

"It's funny, you're talking like you have any leverage here. You don't."

"I don't know who the fuck..." Dom started, getting up off his chair and reaching into the waistband of his jeans.

I had seen enough movies to know what he kept there.

And I knew enough about odds to know he could probably put a bullet in at least one of the other people in the room before they could get out a gun and put one in him. If they even had guns. I knew Ryan was a loanshark and everything, but I was pretty sure he never had a gun on him when I was around him.

But, as fate would have it, his hand never reached his gun.

Because, in an action that I never could have predicted no matter how many times I could reimagine the situation, Albert stood and raised a hand. I caught a flash of silver before I heard the bang.

Then the entire side of Dom's head exploded. 

Exploded.

Red shot out of one side, splattering everywhere as his body wobbled then collapsed.

As much as it hurts my pride to admit it, I screamed.

And I mean... screamed.

And it didn't stop until I felt a hand clamp over my eyes as an arm went around my center and pulled me backward.

I didn't need to see to know.

Ryan.





SEVENTEEN





Ryan





The plan Jstorm came up with was surprisingly simple. There wasn't even a hint of flare to it. It was a cut and dry invasion, disarmament, and containment. Really, that was it. We, which meant me, Lo, Jstorm, the guy driving whose name was Malcolm, along with about a dozen or so other people in accompanying SUVs and my entire family who followed behind in their own, my fucking mother included, all climbed out of the cars in unison after one of Lo's men in the SUV behind us got out and picked the lock for the gate so we could all drive in.

Then Lo hopped out and walked right up to the first guy who saw our presence, some kid with a Glock who held it out at an angle which Lo apparently found so amusing that she threw her head back and laughed before her right arm went across her body, grabbing the whole side of the gun then bringing her left fist up in an uppercut to the man's jaw. It was comical how fast he was knocked out and on the ground and Lo in possession of his gun.

From there, everyone else filed out of their respective vehicles and I was handed a gun, looking back to see my parents and brothers had brought their own, something we very rarely, almost never carried.

And then we simply moved in, everyone aware, each taking down a threat before they could scream or get a shot off- alarming the boss to our presence.

Once they were all filed into one room on their knees, Lo's guys and girls and my family there keeping an eye, the three of us moved down the hall to the sound of voices.

Had I not gotten a very stern warning from Lo and then Jstorm, the latter much more filled with piss and vinegar, about staying calm and letting Lo lead, I would have fucking darted across that room to her.

Never, never in my fucking life had I been even as close to worried about something or someone as I had been about her over the past two hours. It was a constant, overwhelming, all-consuming sick feeling. Every God-awful worst case scenario flashed across my mind.

Seeing her down on that floor, everything within me begged me to run over to her, to slide my hands over her and make sure she wasn't hurt anywhere.

But I couldn't.

I owed Lo and Hailstorm more than just the money I would pay them for this. I owed them my respect and cooperation.

So I stayed where I was.

And I took comfort in the fact that she was fully dressed, not even a shoe kicked off, so the worst-case had definitely not happened. And aside from what looked to be bruises on her wrists and the redness in her eyes that hinted at tears, there seemed to be no injuries.

I could look her over as soon as the situation was handled.

Fact of the matter was, the situation was still somewhat volatile until Dom, Albert, and Ray Cleaver were neutralized.

The last thing I could have expected, though, was a goddamn mutiny.

Brother taking out brother.

It was fucking biblical in its simplicity.

One bullet to the head and none of us even had to get our hands dirty.

Lo and Jstorm each raised their guns, unsure of the situation, as Dusty screamed, her face twisted up in horror as she sat frozen, watching the bullet tear through Dom's skull, watching brain matter splatter everywhere, watching his dead body fall to the ground.

And, well, fuck the rules.

Fuck respect and gratitude.

She needed me and they would just have to fucking deal with that.



       
         
       
        

I rushed up behind her, clamping my hand over her eyes, wrapping my arm around her center, and dragging her backward, eyes focused on the man with the gun.

Bry twisted from his position, letting out a cry of pain and it was clear he had a busted rib or two, but he did it anyway, knocking into Ray's knees and sending him flying onto his back.

"Well, that's certainly not a loss for any of us," Lo said, calm as ever and I was left to wonder what kind of fucked up things she had overseen and been involved in in her career to make her so unflappable.

"I was looking for an opportunity to do that," Albert admitted, voice a little rough and, I guessed, killing your own brother would do that to a man. He held up his hands for a second, showing submission, then slowly lowered his gun to the ground, kicking it away.

"Not that we're not pleased as punch to not have to do it ourselves, but care to tell us why?"