Chapter 11
Luca
I circle to the outer stairs that lead to the second landing. A half wall provides cover, and I’m able to get eyes on Evan and assess the situation.
Cold fury rushes through me as I see a beaten and bruised Evan with three Patriots Now motherfuckers surrounding him.
One of them has a gun pointed at him, while another man has a long-range rifle pointed at the stage.
The third man unlocks Evan from the handcuffs that chain him to the observatory rail, puts a gun in his hand, and pushes him to his knees.
“Here’s the deal, Evan, you either cooperate and shoot yourself for the cause, or Liam, over here,” he nods toward the sniper, “is going to shoot someone in the crowd for every second you hesitate.”
Evan looks out at the crowd, and even this far away, I see his decision.
I don’t make a tactical plan. I see Evan in danger, and pure, primal instinct takes over. Pulling out my Baretta, I shoot at the fluorescent light panels just above the sniper. Lights flicker on and off like a strobe light, and sparks of embers fall like fiery rain.
Evan drops the gun as his captors duck for cover, assuming the shot was fired from above them.
I make a run at the sniper first, who sees me and raises his rifle at me.
Fucking rookie. Long-range weapons aren’t meant for close combat.
I yank the barrel of the rifle from his grip and swing it around to use it to coldcock the man coming up behind me.
Once he’s on the ground, I drop the rifle and turn my attention back to the sniper.
Hefting him up by his t-shirt, I half-push, half-throw him off the railing.
He screams like a baby all the way down until I hear a loud thump as his body hits the ground.
It's probably only a forty feet drop. He might live if he fell just right, but I don’t care.
As long as he’s unable to hurt Evan, I don’t give a fuck either way.
One man is left, and I saved him for last. He was the one I witnessed tormenting Evan.
He’s going to pay for that.
He sees the look I give him and runs for the stairs.
I shoot him in his left Achilles tendon because it will stop him in his tracks, and it's painful as hell. He goes sprawling to the cement. I’m on him in seconds, taking him by the hair and dragging him back to where he’d imprisoned Evan.
I use the handcuffs and secure him to the rail.
I think about shooting a few more painful body parts when I hear Evan trying to catch his breath behind me. I aim a kick at the bastard’s head designed to knock his lights out and turn toward Evan.
Evan is still kneeling, almost hyperventilating as he tries to breathe. Skidding to my knees in front of him, I cradle his head in my hands. “I’ve got you. I’ve got you,” I croon as he trembles against me. “I won’t ever let them touch you again.”
I pull back to get a good look at him. His face is bruised all over. I should have fucking killed them all.
“I need to make sure you’re not hurt,” I tell him and remember I said those same words to him the night of my nightmare.
I gently run my hands over his bruised body, checking for serious injuries.
He winces when I touch his ribs and again when I touch his clavicle, but I don’t think anything is broken.
I find the true source of his pain when he turns to me and finally speaks. “Cyrus and Barry…” he gasps. “I think they’re both dead.” Tears stream down his face. “They died because of me.”
“Shhh.” I catch his tears with my thumbs and gently wipe them away. “None of this is your fault. It’s the Reivers and the Patriots Now who are responsible for all this ugly shit.”
Sirens blare in the distance, reminding me that we are about two minutes out from a lot of company we don’t want to visit with.
“We gotta get out of here.” I can’t help dropping a whisper light kiss on his forehead before I release him and stand up. “Can you walk, or do I need to carry you?” I’m willing and able to carry him out of here, but we’ll attract way less notice if I can walk him out of the festival instead.
“I can walk,” he says. I hold out my hand and pull him up. He’s wobbly, but he’ll be fine as long as he leans on me.
Picking up the sniper rifle and the gun Evan was made to hold, I empty them of bullets, wipe them off of any fingerprints, and then throw them down next to the unconscious men.
I help him down the stairs and past the sniper, who lay groaning on the ground. “Come on.” I push him toward the freaked-out crowd who are rushing for the exits. They’ll provide the perfect cover for getting us out of here.
Once we’re out of the festival grounds, Evan starts stumbling from exhaustion.
There’s no way he’ll reach my truck, which I’d parked over a mile away.
I break into an old but remodeled Chrysler that looks like it still has some horsepower, hotwire it, and take off.
A look in the back seat shows a jackpot of a case of water and a bunch of blankets.
I hand him a bottle of water and cover him in the blanket.
Knowing my com is too far out to work, I take out my burner phone, hit speaker so Evan can hear, and call Eli, who answers on the first ring. “Shooter is down, and Evan is secured,” I report.
I hear a clear sigh of relief. “Thank fuck. Everything else is going to hell.”
“Did the sniper hit anyone?”
“Cash was shot,” Eli replies.
Fuck. I look over at Evan, who looks wrecked by the news. I reach out to hold his hand. He grips it tight, and as much as I’m offering Evan comfort, right now, I’m amazed at how much relief his touch provides me.
“He and Johnny are headed in an ambulance to the hospital—ETA seven minutes out. I’ll report back to you as soon as I’m informed of his condition.”
“Do that,” I say, hoping like hell that Cash makes it through this. “You should know that Evan told me he thinks Cyrus and Barry might have been killed when the Patriots Now shitheads took him.”
There’s a long silence on the other end, and then I swear I hear Eli say in a small, desperate voice, “I keep failing them.”
“Eli, are you okay?” I ask, used to hearing the young tech whiz always cool and in charge.
“I’m fine,” he says stiffly. “I’ll investigate and inform you of their status. For now, get to safe ground.”
Before I can respond, he ends the call.
“We need to get out of Lexington,” I tell Evan. “Things are blowing up here. I need to get you somewhere safe.”
“Back to my apartment?”
“No. We can’t be sure it’s safe anymore.”
The answer is easy—my cabin. It’s in Wisconsin, about a two-hour drive from Chicago. Built on the edge of a bluff with one forest road in and out that I control access to, it’s the perfect place to hide Evan.
“I have a cabin in the woods that I stay at when I need a break from everything.. Do you trust me to keep you safe there?”
His eyes flick over to me and then to where our hands are still joined. “Yes,” he says simply.
My heart feels impossibly big in my chest right now at the gift he just gave me. I squeeze his hand.
The moment breaks when he pulls his hand from mine and sits up in a panic. “Delilah.” He looks at me like I should know what the emergency is. “She’s still in my hotel room. We have to go get her.”
“Your hotel room could still be watched. It’s too dangerous to go back there.” I want Evan out of this Reivers-infested city now, and I really don’t want him near the hotel room where Patriots Now was tracking his movements. “Can you call a friend to come get her tomorrow?”
“You, of all people, should know I don’t have any of those. Delilah has been my only friend since I was seventeen.”
He looks wildly around him. “Pull over.” His hand finds the door handle. “I’ll go get her myself, so you’re not putting yourself in danger.”
I look in the rearview mirror, and making sure I’m clear, I drive onto the highway's cemented median and twist the Chrysler’s wheel to execute a U-turn.
“What are you doing?”
“Going to go rescue your cat.”
Fifteen minutes later, we’re in front of Evan’s motel room, staking out the place to see if there is still any Patriots Now activity there.
Sure enough, they left one of their clones to guard Evan’s motel room.
He’s younger than most of the guys I’ve seen associated with those assholes and looks like he’d rather be anywhere else.
I catch him unaware and stow him in the trunk of his car.
Evan’s room is trashed, and when Evan sees it, he freaks out.
He calls for Delilah, frantically walking through the room.
I’m worried they did something to the cat when we both hear a small, terrified meow as the fluffy white cat crawls out from behind the bed.
Evan scoops her up in his arms, and she nuzzles into his neck.
The look he gives me is so full of gratefulness that I’d rescue a thousand cats for him just to see that look again.
The drive to Wisconsin is brutal. It’s not the driving but the rollercoaster of good and bad news we get seemingly at every mile marker.
The ambulance that was taking Cash to the hospital was ambushed by the Reivers, and they have Cash and Johnny in lockdown at the clubhouse.
It doesn’t look good. Lockdown usually happens when the Reivers are at war against another MC. It’s going to take some serious firepower to get Cash and Johnny out of there, and if Cash has already been shot—
Evan has been quiet since we got the news. Staring ahead, he mechanically pets Delilah, who is cuddled on his lap. “I spent a lot of time hating Cash,” Evan announces.
“That so,” I say neutrally.
He nods and turns toward me. “Did you know about our past?”
“Past?” I growl, feeling my blood pressure skyrocketing. Maybe there had been a reason to be jealous.
He barks out a short laugh. “Not that kind of past. Cash threatened me and burned down my parents’ lake house, which they ended up blaming me for.”
“Sounds like a pretty good reason to hate a guy.”