Chapter Thirty-Four Blaze #2
Nash whips around to face my father. “You got my parents killed. You knew exactly what kind of man Wilkerson was! My mom and dad and Uncle Aaron paid for it with their lives. You were supposed to be their friend, you fucking bastard.”
“I didn’t have a choice—” Dad stammers.
“You had a choice,” Nash roars. “You could have gone to the police. You could have told someone. Instead you let my family die, and you kept your fucking mouth shut. Kept working for him like nothing happened. Let me think it was just some random rival crew when you knew—you fucking knew—it was Wilkerson all along.”
“He would have killed me—”
“You should have died that night. Not them. You,” Nash bites out, his voice shaking with rage.
Savannah makes a muffled sound behind the tape, tears streaming down her face.
“I’m glad we’re all on the same page now,” Wilkerson says. “But we’re wasting time. Blaze, you’ve become a problem. You were supposed to make Savannah desperate enough to sell her ranch. Instead, you fucked up my timeline. That makes you useless to me. And I don’t keep useless employees.”
He steps toward me. “You failed. So now I’m handling it directly.”
“She won’t sell,” I say.
“We’ll see about that. I suspect she’s about to become much more cooperative.” His expression hardens, and he nods to his men. “Kill Colt and Harlon. Wound Nash. I want him alive for leverage. And Blaze . . .” He pauses. “Make him suffer first.”
“You really are a twisted fucking maniac.” I shake my head.
“Maybe. But I’m a damn good businessman, and I know when an asset becomes a liability.
I tried to show you what would happen if you didn’t stop defying me.
I sent you messages. Like your brother’s accident.
But you never learned your lesson. So here we are.
And I’m ready to eliminate another problem. ”
A cold sweat crawls down my spine. Savannah shakes her head wildly, her face wet with tears.
I look around at the menacing faces watching us. Ready to jump into action at Wilkerson’s command.
Savvie is in the middle. Vulnerable and exposed.
My brother. Nash. They’re here because of me. In the direct line of fire.
How the hell am I going to save us all this time?
Blood rushes between my temples, so loud it drowns out all thought.
Chaos tears through the tense silence. Gunfire erupts, Wilkerson’s men firing first. Colt and Nash dive behind nearby containers, firing shots at Wilkerson’s men.
My focus is on Savannah. I run toward her and drop to my knees.
I pull a hunting knife from my ankle strap and cut through the ties.
I snake an arm around her waist and carry her behind a pile of wooden crates.
“This is gonna hurt,” I mumble, pulling off the tape fast. But she’s so hysterical, I doubt she felt anything.
I position her behind me, peering around the side and squeezing off a few shots.
In the amount of time I grabbed Savvie, three of Wilkerson’s men are lying on the ground, pools of blood seeping into the concrete under them.
The thugs close in on Colt and Nash. I turn to Savannah. “You need to stay here, okay? Don’t move. I need to help the guys.”
She shakes, her arms wrapped tight around her knees. “H-help them.”
I start to crawl out from the crates when one of the guys charges me, knocking the gun out of my hand.
I duck out of the way of his fist and land a shot square on his jaw.
He flies backward against a crate and crashes against the floor.
I grab the gun and squeeze off a shot. He slumps over, and I run toward my brother.
Colt reloads his gun and takes aim. There are only about two or three guys left. Plus Wilkerson and that psycho vet.
“No!” Savannah’s cry punctures the air.
I turn to see Tyler raise his gun in my direction, but I don’t wait for him to take the shot.
I lunge for him, ignoring the crack of bullets around me.
I tackle him into a metal shelf. His gun clatters as it hits the ground.
Boxes of rusty equipment fall around us where we roll around on the ground, fists swinging.
“Nash,” Savvie cries out.
A quick look over my shoulder makes my gut clench. Nash is hit.
Colt drops another one of the gunmen and pulls Nash back behind the container.
A fist grips the back of my hair and yanks me backward.
Tyler hurls me into the cracked concrete wall.
Adrenaline fires into every cell as I slap the sides of it.
I flip him around and back him into the wall, my hand around his throat.
He thrashes, one hand gripping my wrists, his legs kicking me. His pupils blow open wide as he struggles to breathe. Then a searing pain explodes into my abdomen, like my flesh is being torched by the blade driven into it.
That motherfucker just stabbed me.
I let go of him and double over, my hand covering the wound. Staggering into the shelf, I hold a hand to my side, my fingers sticky and warm as blood flows through them.
Tyler grabs Savannah and holds up the scalpel to her throat. I stare at Savvie, praying she can read my mind right now. “You lost, Hart—”
She lets her knees buckle and drops to the floor. I fire off a single shot, hitting Tyler square between the eyes. He crumples to the floor. I scoop up Savannah and start to pull her back behind the crates when Wilkerson’s voice rings out.
“Did you not hear me before, Hartman?” he asks. “This is my show, not yours.”
A bullet cracks, the sound reverberating between my ears.
“Blaze,” Savannah cries out.
I whip around to see Wilkerson collapse onto all fours, his hand blown apart by a bullet.
Colt lowers his rifle, smoke curling from the barrel.
Police sirens ring out. The last two guys dart out the door. Nash lunges for Wilkerson, his fists flying at his face, his throat, his gut. Six years of rage and anguish unleashed on the man responsible for ruining more lives than I care to count.
Colt and I stand back, letting him finally get closure.
Savannah covers her face with her trembling hands, sobs racking her body as Nash transforms Wilkerson into a bloody pulp.
He barely moves once Nash is finished with him.
With one final kick to Wilkerson’s head, Nash finally runs over to Savvie.
She hugs him close, and he falls against her, whimpering.
“I wanted to kill him,” he says.
“The cops are here now. They’ll take care of it.” Colt claps Nash on the back. “You did good for a farm boy.”
Nash glares at him over his shoulder. “Like you’re one to talk. Today’s the first time you shot a gun, yeah?”
“Nash, you need to get to a hospital,” Savannah says. “You were shot.”
“Eh, bullet just winged me. No big deal.”
I kneel down next to Savannah and reach for her hand. She pulls it away, and it’s like a kick to the gut.
“Drop your weapons,” the officer calls out as he enters, a gun in his outstretched hand. “Hands up where we can see ’em.”
The guys and I struggle to our feet, hands in the air.
EMTs run in. One treats Nash, and one heads straight for Savannah. He wraps a blanket around her shoulders, asks a few questions, and guides her out of the warehouse.
After we give our statement, the cops lead us outside. Wilkerson, bruised, bloodied, and hunched over, still manages to fire off a white-hot glare in my direction. “You haven’t won, Hartman. This isn’t over.”
I nod. “Actually, it is. For me, it really is finally over. And you’re gonna rot in prison, exactly where you belong.”
When we get outside, Dad is being treated for a minor bullet wound. I guess he got grazed in the cross fire. He’s also in handcuffs. A cop stands nearby, reading him his rights.
“We’ve been building a case against Wilkerson for years,” the detective says to me.
“When we got the call about shots fired, we knew it was our chance. Your father’s been on our radar too.
Financial records show he’s been laundering money for Wilkerson’s operation.
” He nods at Dad. “He’s going down too.”
I watch as they load my father into another police car.
He tries to catch my eye. I turn away.
Fuck him.
I was tangled in Wilkerson’s web for six years, to protect my family. To protect him.
And all along, he was the one I really needed protection from. He used me as a fucking human shield while he lined his pockets with dirty money.
Let the bastard rot.
“We’re going to need you to come by the station later to give a full report,” the detective says, nodding at my blood-soaked shirt. “You up to that after you get patched up?”
“Yeah. I’ll be there.”
I start walking toward Colt’s truck when I hear my father’s voice.
“This is all your fault, you know,” he calls out from the back of the police car.
I stop and slowly turn to face him.
“You couldn’t keep it in your pants, could you? Had to go sniffing around that girl again.” He shakes his head. “You had to go and complicate things. Like always.”
“Are you fucking serious?”
“You never showed up when it counted. Always screwing around when you should have been working. Now look what you’ve done. Because of her.” Disdain drips from every word.
“You’ve got some nerve blaming me. This was all your fault. Everything was. You’re a pathetic excuse for a father. For a man. Mom deserved so much better than you.”
I step closer to the police car. “One thing is for sure. We are done. I never want to see you again.”
Dad scoffs. “Fine by me, you ungrateful—”
“Dad, shut the hell up,” Colt says, appearing at my side. He looks at me. “Go check on Savannah. I’ll deal with him.”
But the look on Savannah’s face when I approach makes me stop dead in my tracks. She whispers something to the EMT, and he looks at me, then closes the ambulance doors, effectively shutting me out.
I let out a shuddering sigh. Wilkerson’s trap worked. He wanted to destroy me, and he did. I may still be alive, but he turned me into someone the woman I love can’t even bear to look at.
Death would be preferable.