23. Maksim
MAKSIM
Isprinted toward the van as fast as I could. Pumping my arms and digging my feet into the scorched dirt, I prayed I’d reach it before Carina did.
So I could protect her.
So I could block her.
So I could make sure my body was in front of hers as the men fired.
I would take a bullet for her. I would surrender myself to save her in any way I could.
But she was too damn fast.
She was too nimble and agile. All that time in the gym and on her runs paid off in the heat of the moment.
Carina ran alongside me, ruining my intention of shielding her in this fight. But I couldn’t fault her. She wasn’t stupid enough to rely on me for safety. She wasn’t gullible enough to believe that she should defer to me when our survival was on the line.
My wife was sharp enough to do what was necessary. And if it meant keeping pace with me and then passing me to reach safety faster, then that was what she had to do.
“Watch out!” she yelled it as an order to Dean.
Just as she reached the roof of the van that was on its side, the wheels still spinning in the air, she crouched low and kept her hands on the gun.
She braced her back against the metal surface of the toppled van, aiming the weapon to shoot at anyone who tried to take me out until I reached her a few seconds later.
She was hidden, looking out for Dean, who was out in the open.
The car he’d been driving wasn’t hit. Mine was. The van was. But he was backing up, tires smoking on the pavement, as he tried to redirect his path. Instead of fleeing, he angled up to ram into the truck that had plowed into the van. Engine revving and the frame swaying, he dug in to attack.
But he couldn’t have realized another car was coming in from behind him if he was so focused on speeding into the truck and firing.
Before I could stop her, Carina narrowed her eyes at me. “You cover for him and I’ll cover for you.”
I didn’t have a chance to argue. No one else was here to help yet. The driver of the van looked like he was about to pass out as he continued to pull the second man out the window with him. Blood dripped down his brow, proving that he’d taken a brutal hit to the head.
Carina leaned around me, standing just enough to fire over the van. I rose too, alarmed and amazed that she was able to keep her cool even like this.
I fired at the driver of the car aiming at Dean. She fired at the men in the truck who shot at me.
It was a loud, chaotic exchange of gunfire made more destructive when Dean sped past and aimed his gun at the men in the truck.
He smashed it into the side of it. Glass and metal were crushed in a deafening thud of impact. Smoke billowed up. But the rapid report of gunfire was a constant drone through it all.
“Get down,” I told Carina, reaching for her before the scene would be cleared enough to see.
As we both lowered, I spotted one of the men running around the van and aiming for us.
No.
Hell no.
I dove in front of her, firing, but my aim was off as I was hit in the arm and side.
She screamed, not in panic but in curses as she shot at the man too.
He dropped, killed by her bullet, and she clawed at my shirt to pull me closer.
“Maksim. Are…”
I gritted my teeth, fighting through the sharp stabs of pain that struck me like lightning bolts. Rising up on my side, I shook my head and checked that she hadn’t been hurt.
“Stay with me.”
She cursed, focused on me as we hid behind the upturned van. Among all the gunfire on the other side of it, she was concentrating on me. Spewing out too-fast Spanish in a profanity-laced litany, she scolded me sternly.
“Stay with you? You stay with me. You’re hit. Fuck, you’re bleeding. You need to?—”
As she fussed over me, trying to push my shirt over my wound, I twisted around her to fire at another man trying to reach her.
No one would get to her.
No one was touching my wife.
Not to harm her.
Not to threaten her.
Not to capture her.
A fierce streak of possessiveness overtook me, turning my vision red and making my heart hammer like a freight train.
I shook and vibrated with pure fury to kill and slay anyone who dared to target her.
Like a wild animal unleashed and feral to kill, I staggered to stand and keep firing at the men on the other side of the van.
She didn’t sit. She clung to me, pressing her hand over my wound, unafraid of blood. Determined to keep me from bleeding out, she supported me as I killed as many of as that I could.
To protect her.
To save us.
Dean ran back toward the back of the van, shouting into his phone on speaker. He’d need to be the one to call for backup because I wasn’t lowering my gun until I could be sure that every one of them was down.
We were trapped, stuck on the other side of this van.
Without as much of a second thought, I fired indiscriminately at those shooting at us.
“A fucking ambush?” Dean growled as he stood and fired when he could get the clearance to do so. Dirt and grime coated his skin, but the smear of blood over one eyebrow came from a gash that didn’t look too deep.
“It’s the Cartel.”
We both swung our gazes to her as we lowered when they fired again.
“What?”
She nodded at me before frowning at the wound on my side. “The truck is. I authorized the paperwork for the title.”
Fucking Arturo Garcia was behind this?
My fury only escalated, reaching a fever point as I battled with a scream that built in my chest.
I knew it.
I fucking knew that asshole was turning against us.
He’d broken our trade agreement, the one our fathers had made. With that “mistake” of sending our fucking arms into enemy territory, he’d shown us the first strike of his losing all interest in being our trade ally. He was showing his colors now, ordering a fucking ambush on us like this.
“Those are the Cartel runners? From your— They’re from the Garcia Cartel?” Dean asked as the driver of the van and the other guard sat up more, groaning and wincing at the injuries from the collision.
“No.” The driver shook his head, rubbing his brow as he sat up more. “They’re…”
“Not the Cartel,” Carina said. “It’s one of the trucks from the Cartel. I recognize it. But those men are rogues.”
That wasn’t any better. Unless Arturo could prove that this truck wasn’t stolen or missing, I was operating under the understanding that he was a part of this. That he was acting against the Bratva. Against the sister he handed over to me.
“Look out!” She reached for me as I stood, not seeing the man who barreled toward us, daring to run around the hood of the upturned van.
Too late.
He fired at us, and as I pivoted to shoot back, the driver of the van got up and lunged at him, tackling the attacker and pinning him to the ground with a spate of hand-to-hand combat.
Fury ticked higher again.
These assholes.
If they weren’t sent here to ambush us on Arturo Garcia’s command, they had been sent here from someone. For some reason. This might be nothing more than trying to get the arms we requested from the Colombians. Or maybe it was set up to kill me.
As I slumped back against the van, my head throbbing and my heart racing, I wondered if this could be part of Gregori’s plan.
We’d just been talking about it. If Gregori was forming his network to overpower us, he’d need to kill all four of us, me and my brothers.
No. That can’t be it.
To assassinate all four of us?
He’d have to start with Adrik.
But then I recalled how we’d questioned whether our father’s health records could have been leaked. If someone might have spread the news that he had cancer—before we learned about it. He’d been so secretive, keeping the news to himself, that it had blindsided us when he had his stroke.
Grinding my teeth and letting this rage coat me from the inside out, I tightened my grip on my gun and looked at Carina. Seeing her unflinching determination to stay with me and fight with me, I vowed to protect her regardless of whether anyone on this earth could try to kill me.
Because the thought of losing this woman scared me more than facing my own demise.
She wasn’t a Cartel princess.
She was a warrior. Mine.
And I would never slack in trying to keep her with me despite how we’d begun as nothing more than an arrangement frosted with ice.