36. Taryn
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
TARYN
Gideon’s head snapped toward her, and his face went blank. “What?”
Wren ducked her head. “I didn’t know there would be that many.”
“You stupid bitch!” he snarled. “I’m glad your sister was one of the first I traded.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” I asked, hoping he was full of shit.
Gideon looked pleased that he finally had everyone’s attention.
Wren turned to me. “Robin?”
“That’s not Robin, and you know it,” Gideon spat out in disgust. “I told you I traded her.”
Silence.
Even amid gunfire, screaming, and rotters hammering against the fence, those words seemed louder than everything else.
Wren shook her head once. Looking smaller than I’d ever seen her. “No.”
Gideon smiled. “First deal I ever made with Caesar.”
Every muscle in Colson’s enormous body tightened as he moved toward Gideon.
Wren caught his arm. “Wait.”
As he looked down at her, the expression on his face frightened even me… calling it rage didn’t do it justice.
Gideon kept talking because apparently self-preservation had abandoned him completely. “She bought us enough fuel to get through the first few weeks. I would’ve traded you, because you were much prettier, but by that time you were already out of your mind.”
“Jesus,” Beck whispered.
Lucas looked sick, and Adrian’s face went so cold it frightened even me.
I stared at Gideon in disbelief. “You traded her sister for gas?”
“For survival. There’s a big difference.”
I couldn’t believe the nerve of this guy.
“For your survival.” I felt my hands clench with the need to strangle the son of a bitch.
Wren whimpered, eyes fixed on Gideon. “You sent me out scavenging to look for her.”
Gideon shrugged. “If I had to take care of your crazy ass, I deserved some kind of compensation.”
The sounds coming out of her were heartbreaking.
Colson pulled Wren back behind him, forming a wall of muscle and fury between her and Gideon.
“Who the hell are you?” Gideon frowned.
Colson’s voice came out low. “Death.”
Feeling protected by the men behind him, Gideon gave him a sneer.
Colson took another step toward him, but Wren grabbed the back of his shirt. “Wait.” She looked at Gideon. “Why isn’t she still here?”
“How the fuck should I know?” Gideon rolled his eyes. “She probably lost her shit like you did, and they fed her to the infected.”
I couldn’t believe the Gideon I first met could be this stupid.
Colson looked down questioningly at Wren.
I could clearly see he was itching to kill Gideon if only Wren would give him the word.
Wren stared into his face for a long moment, clearly somewhere else in her mind. I was just about to interject myself because we had dallied with this man longer than was sane in this situation.
Then she patted his arm and smiled. “We can share.”
“Okay.” Colson turned and smiled slowly at Gideon.
Gideon took one look at Colson’s face and finally seemed to understand that he had pushed too far.
But it was far too late.
A rotter slammed into the collapsed section of fence a distance behind him.
Then another.
Gideon turned toward the sound, and that was all Colson needed.
He moved fast. Faster than a man of his size should be capable of.
Gideon had barely gotten his weapon halfway up before Colson hit him. The force of it drove both backward and into the side of a concrete column.
Wren followed, walking calmly, as if she had all the time in the world.
The men with him had ran to intercept the rotters leaving Gideon to his fate.
Gideon swung at Colson, but he blocked it and drove his fist into Gideon’s stomach. He folded, as his breath came out in a whoosh.
Wren stopped a few feet away. “Was she scared?”
Gideon looked up, his face confused and gasping for air. “What?”
“My sister. Was she scared?” Wren repeated patiently.
Gideon didn’t answer.
“Was she scared when you gave her to them?” Wren’s voice was eerily calm.
A rotter latched on to one of Gideon’s men, and he screamed. Nobody moved to help.
Beck stabbed another that had approached and tossed it on the ground. Lucas threw his hatchet straight into a rotter's forehead, pulled it back out, and was tossing it from hand to hand, ready for whatever came next.
Gideon finally stood and spat blood onto the gravel. “How the fuck should I know?”
Colson hit him again. Hard enough to snap Gideon’s head sideways.
“Wrong answer,” Adrian muttered beside me.
Wren’s face had gone completely blank, then she nodded. “Okay.”
Colson’s face was thunderous.
Wren pointed at Gideon. “He’s yours first, but leave me some, please.”
Colson smiled sweetly. “I love it when you say ‘please’.”
Gideon tried to run, but he only made it three steps before Colson caught the back of his shirt and dragged him down.
Gideon rolled and reached for his gun, but Wren smiled as she kicked it away. “That’s cheating.”
Then Colson went to work.
I had to look away after the second hit. Colson was a man on a mission, and he was done playing around.
A scream tore across the yard, and I turned to see Caesar standing near the building that housed his office. Two enhanced men flanked him, all three of them holding rifles.
“What the fuck are you doing?” he shouted.
Apparently, he objected to losing one of his business partners.
Beck pulled out his gun, but Caesar shot first. With a deafening crack, the shot slammed into the column nearby, and Adrian's fingers dug into my arm, yanking me down.
Lucas crouched beside us; blood streaked across one side of his face. “You okay, Menace?”
“I’m not bitten or shot yet. So yeah, I guess.”
He smirked. “If you can still be a smartass, then I know you’re good.”
Another shot punched into the concrete above us, and Adrian turned his attention toward the east side of the compound. “Three shooters.”
“I see them,” Lucas said.
Caesar shouted, and his men spread out. A shot cracked from outside the fence, and one of Caesar’s men dropped.
Then another.
Additional shots came from deeper south, and from various points. The person firing wasn’t just shooting aimlessly.
Smoke suddenly rolled across the eastern side of the yard. Another metal canister bounced once across the gravel before disappearing beneath a truck.
White smoke poured from it.
“What the fuck?” Someone screamed.
Caesar’s men started firing blindly toward the fence.
Idiots.
The smoke thickened. Another shooter outside picked off the man on the guard platform, and his body toppled over the railing.
I looked at Adrian. “Who in the hell is helping us?”
His expression went blank.
Before I could ask, the western fence groaned, and every head turned in that direction.
Rotters piled against it. Dozens. Maybe more.
Bodies.
Hands.
Teeth.
The weakened section buckled, and the support post tore free.
Then another.
“We’ve got to get out of here!” Adrian shouted.
The fence collapsed inward, and rotters spilled through.
The compound ceased being a battle and became a slaughter.
One of Caesar’s men fired until a rotter tackled him. Another ran directly into Beck.
Beck caught him and shoved him into a second rotter. “Make yourself useful.”
The thing latched onto his shoulder, and his screaming followed us as we moved forward.
“Is that your new thing?” Lucas smirked.
Beck shrugged. “Maybe.”
A rotter rushed me, and I drove my knife into its eye. Another grabbed for my hair.
Lucas buried his hatchet into the side of its skull before it touched me. “Fuck off.”
He kissed my temple and turned back toward the fight.
Caesar emerged from the smoke, his rifle gone and a knife clutched in one hand. His face was streaked with blood, stripping away any semblance of the royalty he claimed to be. Instead, he looked more like the scared man he truly was—a person who had gone to despicable lengths to survive.
He charged.
I barely got my knife up in time. His blade struck mine, and pain shot through my wrist. He drove me backward, much stronger than I had expected. I pivoted, let his momentum carry him past, then cut across his side.
He hissed. “I’m going to make you pay for that.”
“I don’t fucking think so.” Beck moved toward us, but a rotter came at him from the side.
Caesar came at me again; I dodged his first swing and drove my elbow into his ribs. He grabbed my hair, and pain ripped across my scalp. I stabbed backward, but I missed.
Then Lucas slammed into him from the side.
Caesar released me, and I spun out of the way.
Adrian and Beck closed in from different directions.
Caesar looked at the four of us surrounding him and laughed. “Is her pussy that good? Worth dying for?”
“Yes.” They answered in unison.
Caesar lunged forward, and Adrian stabbed him in the thigh. Beck punched him in the ribs, and Lucas knocked the knife from his hand. I joined in and drove mine into his chest.
Caesar fell to his knees as his eyes widened in shock, as if the king he claimed to be somehow couldn’t be killed.
I leaned close to his ear. “Long live the fucking queen.” I pulled the knife free, and he collapsed.
I heard Wren whoop from somewhere behind me. “That’s my sister!”
In the past few minutes, she had already forgotten everything Gideon had said, and I was fine with that. I didn’t know her entire story, nor did I need to. That girl loved deeply, and I felt privileged to have her in my life.
Suddenly, a shot cracked and Lucas dropped where he stood.
Everything inside me stopped. “Lucas!”
He came to his knees as blood spread across his thigh. “Just grazed!”
A man emerged from the dark, aiming a pistol straight at him.
I moved in his direction, as did Adrian and Beck. “Lucas!”
The man aimed.
A rifle cracked from yards away and the shooter’s head snapped sideways.
Another rifle fired, and two more of Caesar’s men fell.
“Who in the hell is helping us? The U.S. military?” I watched three more men, and several rotters drop almost simultaneously.
Beck laughed as he stabbed a rotter in the temple. “You’re not that far off.”
Figures moved through the smoke near the broken fence, armed to the teeth.
One stepped ahead of the others.