25. Jax #2
It doesn’t take us long to cover the two kilometers, and we ignore the weird looks we get from the students who are once again milling about the paths.
Jace holds up his fist to signal for us to slow down to a walk. Seconds later, a group of guys carrying big black bags comes around the bend in the path in front of us.
This part of the path snakes behind several academic buildings and is completely empty of students except them and us. I don’t give a shit if the entire school is watching us, but it’ll be easier to deal with them without having to worry about witnesses.
Their eyes widen when they see us, and all five of them stumble like they hit an invisible trip wire as they bump into each other and drop their bags like they’re in a Vaudeville routine as they try to stop.
Jace and Killian grab the guys closest to them, closing their hands around the other men’s necks to hold them in place.
I grab the one in front of me by the hair and bring him to his knees with a hard yank. I don’t give a shit if he’s the ringleader or just a minion, he’s the closest, so he’s the one who’d better give me some answers.
“Where is he?” I demand in a deadly calm voice.
He gapes at me, his eyes wide and his mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water.
“Don’t even think about moving,” Jace warns the two who aren’t being held and flips his butterfly knife around in a pattern designed to look as intimidating as possible.
“Otherwise your boy is gonna get my signature carved into his throat with my trusty friend here.” He presses the tip of his knife into the guy he’s holding, and a trickle of blood snakes down his neck.
The guy lets out a pathetic whimper, but that just earns him another poke from the tip of Jace’s blade.
“Same.” Killian spins the Italian Stiletto he likes to carry in his hand a few times.
“And just an FYI,” he tells them in a deadly dark voice that’s just as devoid of emotions as Jace’s.
“We can throw these knives faster than either of you can run, and we’re damn accurate when we’re pissed off.
” He taps the edge of his blade against the throat of the guy he’s holding, causing lines of blood to well up. “And you’ve pissed us the fuck off.”
The other two guys shift from foot to foot, but neither of them runs.
“Where. Is. He?” I repeat and draw my Beretta M9 from under my sweater and press the barrel into his temple. “Think before you answer, because you’re not getting a second chance to tell me the truth.”
The guy stares up at me as a dark stain spreads out from the crotch of his jeans, his face a mask of terror as he pisses himself.
“Where is he?” I push the gun harder into his temple.
“He ran,” one of the guys who isn’t being held in place squeaks. “He got away and he ran into the woods.”
“Jax?”
Myles’s voice cuts through my rage, and I instinctively look toward where it came from.
Myles steps out from behind the closest building, and I immediately sweep my gaze over him, checking for any signs that he’s hurt.
The guy I’ve got on his knees takes advantage of my momentary distraction and flails wildly. He manages to knock my gun away from his temple, and one of the guys who isn’t being held down lunges at me while the other rushes toward Myles.
“Don’t kill them,” Jace says, his voice calm and even, just before a blood-curdling scream rings out.
I have no clue if he’s talking to me or Killian, and I don’t have time to check as the guy on his knees grabs my arm with both of his hands and tries to wrestle the gun from me at the same time his buddy comes at me.
Fuck this.
I hit the mag release on my Beretta, causing the entire magazine to slip free.
There’s still a shell in the chamber, but the dumbass on his knees lets go of my arm as he makes a desperate grab and tries to catch the magazine.
A well-placed kick to the mag, and his hand, sends the magazine flying so it lands about a dozen yards away, and causes the asshole to scream as his fingers crack and snap from the force of my kick.
Now it’s my turn to take advantage of his distraction, and I smash the side of the gun into his temple, then give him a hard kick to the stomach that sends him falling away from me with a groan.
He might be taken care of for now, but his buddy slams into me and starts flailing like a dumbass who’s never been in a fight as he tries to knock the gun out of my hand.
Jace rushes into my field of vision and grabs the asshole by the hair, then drags him away from me, twisting his hand and yanking so hard he tears a handful of hair right out of the guy’s scalp.
The asshole drops to the ground with a scream that could wake the dead while Jace drives the blade of his knife deep into the guy’s shoulder.
More screams and shouts ring out around me, but my vision tunnels as I turn toward where I last saw Myles, my gun raised and my entire being focused on ending that asshole before he can touch one hair on Myles’s head.
A flicker of something weird and foreign breaks through my focus when I see I’m too late and the guy has Myles in a bear hug.
White-hot rage fills me, and I fire the shot still in the chamber.
Another shot rings out almost on top of mine, but I’m so focused on Myles I don’t even flinch. The guy holding him jerks like he’s been electrocuted as the bullet embeds in his shoulder, and he slides to the ground in what looks like slow motion as his knees and legs buckle and give out.
I’m already running to Myles when the asshole finally falls to the ground, but before I can reach him, Myles gives the asshole a sharp kick to the side of his head.
“Fucker,” he spits at the guy.
I sweep him up into my arms, and he immediately wraps himself around me like a boa constrictor and buries his face in my neck as I carry him a few feet away from his attacker.
“It’s clear,” Jace says calmly. “Nothing to see here folks, just some house business,” he adds in a louder voice.
Ignoring everything going on around us, I peel Myles off me and check him over for any signs of mistreatment or injury. He looks okay, scared and frazzled, but then I catch sight of the bruise forming on his temple, and my rage is reignited.
“I’m okay,” he says over and over again, like he’s trying to convince himself as much as he’s trying to convince me.
Killian appears next to us, and I hand Myles off to him. Killian immediately holds him against his side as Myles clings to him, his eyes wide with concern.
The rage that’s still simmering inside me is so strong I’m barely able to think straight as I take in the scene around me.
The guy who rushed Myles is lying motionless on the ground. The wound from the bullet I shot into his shoulder is wet with blood, but it’s the black handle of the Karambit buried in his stomach that catches my attention.
I flick my gaze to Myles, who gives me a little smile. I smile back, even though I’m pretty sure I just look deranged and not nearly as proud as I feel.
I wasn’t able to get a kill shot without risking Myles, but the blade in his belly should do the job. My finger itches with the desire to make sure and put a few more bullets into his brain, but I turn to check out the rest of the scene.
The other four guys are all on the ground in various levels of consciousness and pain.
One of them is holding his shoulder as blood leaks through his fingers, another has a slash wound on his cheek and staring up at the sky like he’s in shock.
Another one is rolling back and forth as he moans in pain and holds his hands over a wound on his thigh, and the last is curled up and crying like a bitch.
Xave is standing over him, his gun held loosely in one hand, and it says a lot about my mindset that I didn’t notice him come up to us or register that he most likely fired the second shot I heard.
Pulling the gravity knife free from my pocket, I slide open the mechanism and snap out the blade.
Jace steps in front of me as I advance on the group of incapacitated guys, ready to end all of them for what they did to Myles.
“Get out of my way,” I tell him.
“No.”
His voice is as flat as mine, but the look in his eyes is intense and focused.
“Move.”
“Do you really want him to see what you’re about to do?” Jace flicks his gaze toward where I left Killian and Myles. “Do you think he can handle that right now?”
I follow his eyes, and something in my chest clenches when I see the look on Myles’s face. Even after everything he just went through, he doesn’t look afraid of me. He’s scared for me.
“He needs you more than you need to kill them,” Jace says, his words penetrating my rage and slowly dispelling it. “And dead men can’t tell us what the fuck they thought they were doing when they pulled this stunt.”
I give him a quick nod to let him know I got the message and use the mechanism on the knife to sheath the blade again. When the knife is back in my pocket, I stride toward Myles and Killian.
Myles throws himself into my arms, and I hold him tight as the last of my rage leaves in a rush and is replaced by a sense of rightness and coming home.