Chapter 6 #2
Inez stood, wrapping her arms tightly around her friend. “We’re going to figure this out. Together.”
Becca hugged her back, grounding herself in something real.
—
Not far away, screens illuminated Silas’s face in the dim room.
Security feeds. Street cameras. Drone thermal overlays cutting through the storm.
Jace leaned back in his chair. “Everything seems quiet tonight.”
Silas didn’t answer immediately.
He’d been on edge all day.
Radio silence from Lionetti’s camp since the conversation with his right-hand man.
Too quiet.
“They’ve never taken this long,” Silas muttered. “Not for a snatch.”
Jace glanced at him. “You think they’re waiting?”
Silas’s jaw tightened. “Just keep eyes on them.”
On screen, Rebecca moved through her kitchen — graceful, strong, unaware she was being watched for her protection.
Silas’s breath slowed.
Her hair loose over one shoulder. The firelight catching her tattoos. The way she moved.
Something tightened in his chest.
And lower.
Desire flickered — sharp and immediate.
Forbidden fruit.
He shouldn’t want her like this.
But he did.
—
“Girl, we’re low on wine,” Inez called out.
“And coal,” Becca added.
They looked at each other.
Silence.
Then Becca grinned. “Liquor store?”
“Didn’t you just say a storm was coming?” Inez laughed.
“It’s just snow. I’ve driven in worse. You can’t live in the mountains and not know how to handle weather.”
Inez shook her head. “You right. Let’s go on an adventure.”
They grabbed coats and keys.
—
“Boss… they’re leaving.”
Silas stood instantly.
“Where the fuck do they think they’re going?”
“Liquor store. More wine and coal.”
Silas rolled his eyes, irritation flashing.
“Of course they are.”
He grabbed his phone.
“Follow them,” he snapped to the man positioned a few homes down.
“On it, boss.”
Silas stared at the screen.
Storm intensifying.
Visibility dropping.
This didn’t feel right.
The SUV rolled down the snowy road, headlights cutting through swirling white.
Lady Antebellum’s Need You Now filled the car.
They were singing at the top of their lungs like they were seventeen again.
Laughing.
Carefree.
For a moment, Becca almost forgot everything.
But then—
The snow thickened.
Fast.
Visibility dropped hard.
The road blurred into white.
And that’s when she noticed it.
Headlights behind her.
Too close.
She didn’t say anything at first.
She just pressed the gas slightly.
The headlights sped up too.
Her grip tightened on the wheel.
Inez was still singing — until she noticed Becca wasn’t.
She turned the music down slowly.
“What’s going on?”
“Some asshole riding my ass,” Becca said evenly. “He needs to back up before he hits me.”
“Move over. Let him pass.”
Becca switched lanes slightly.
The car behind her switched too.
Silence.
The storm roared louder against the windshield.
“That’s weird,” Inez whispered.
Becca’s jaw flexed.
“Open the center console.”
“What?”
“Open it.”
Inez did.
Her hand hit cold metal.
She froze.
“Gun?! What the fuck are you doing with a gun, Becca?!”
“Relax,” Becca said sharply. “It’s legal. I have three. For assholes like this.”
Inez handed her the 9mm, hands shaking.
Becca gripped it tight in her right hand, steering with her left, eyes locked in the rearview mirror.
Then—
Another set of headlights appeared.
Behind the first car.
Inez’s breath caught.
“Becca…”
The bridge ahead loomed in the distance — long, narrow, exposed.
Snow whipping sideways now.
The car behind them accelerated.
Closer.
Too close.
Back at the surveillance station—
Silas leaned forward sharply.
“Zoom in.”
Jace’s fingers flew across the keyboard.
Two vehicles. Boxed in.
Silas’s voice dropped to something lethal.
“Get our car there. Now.”
On the bridge—
The car behind them flashed its high beams aggressively.
The second vehicle shifted lanes.
They were being sandwiched.
Inez’s panic was visible now.
But Becca?
Her face went still.
Focused.
Dangerously calm.
“Lock your seatbelt,” she said quietly.
The storm swallowed the road whole.
And the headlights behind them surged forward.
the SUV fishtailed violently across the bridge.
Snow swallowed the road whole.
Becca’s knuckles were white around the steering wheel, one hand gripping the 9mm, the other fighting the ice beneath her tires.
“What the fuck is going on?!” Inez screamed.
“I have no fucking idea!” Becca shot back, eyes locked on the rearview. “But whoever these motherfuckers are, they’re about to learn a lesson. Hold on and don’t freak out!”
“Don’t freak out?!” Inez’s voice cracked. “They’re trying to run us off the fucking road!”
Inez grabbed her phone — dead.
“How ironic,” she whispered.
“Grab mine!” Becca yelled.
Before she could reach it—
BAM.
The impact slammed into them from behind.
Metal crunched. The SUV lurched sideways. Tires lost traction completely.
The world outside turned into a violent blur of white and headlights.
Inez dove forward searching for Becca’s phone as it skidded somewhere across the floorboard.
Another hit.
Harder.
The second car surged forward, ramming them on the passenger side.
“Lock your seatbelt!” Becca barked.
Inez barely had time to react.
Becca rolled her window down despite the storm blasting in.
“Duck your head!” she shouted.
She leaned her arm out into the freezing chaos and fired.
The shots cracked through the snowstorm.
One. Two. Three.
Metal sparked.
She hit something.
A tire exploded.
The vehicle behind them swerved violently but didn’t stop.
Instead—
The driver’s window of the first car rolled down.
A masked man leaned out.
“Pull over or you’re dead!”
“Fuck you!” Becca screamed back, firing again.
The second vehicle accelerated.
And rammed them hard from the right.
The SUV spun.
Bridge railing coming fast—
“BECCA!”
Everything went black.
Ringing.
That’s all she could hear at first.
A high-pitched ringing inside her skull.
Then—
Heat.
Something warm sliding down her face.
Blood.
Becca blinked hard.
The world was upside down.
No.
The car was.
She tasted iron.
Her chest burned. Her arm throbbed — warm liquid pouring from a deep gash.
Adrenaline hit.
She snapped fully awake.
“Inez!”
The passenger side was crushed.
Inez hung limp in her seatbelt, blood running down her temple.
“No no no no—”
Becca fumbled for the seatbelt cutter attached to her visor.
The storm howled around the overturned SUV.
Headlights approached.
Multiple.
Becca kicked the windshield out with everything she had left in her body and crawled through the shattered glass into the snow.
The cold slapped her lungs.
She staggered to Inez’s side, cut her free, dragged her halfway out.
The 9mm lay in the snow near her boot.
She grabbed it.
Then she heard doors opening.
Four men stepped out of the vehicles.
Black suits.
Black gloves.
Professional.
And then—
Another door opened.
Becca’s blood ran cold.
Izzy.
Blonde undercut. Face tattoos near his temple. Leather jacket. Snow collecting on his shoulders.
He lit a cigarette like this was casual.
Like this was normal.
“Izzy?” Her voice cracked in disbelief. “What the fuck is going on?”
Inez stirred behind her, coughing. “Becca… what—”
Becca raised the gun, arm shaking but steady enough.
“What the fuck are you doing?”
Izzy dropped the cigarette and crushed it under his boot.
His face wasn’t smug.
It wasn’t emotional either.
It was empty.
“I’m sorry, Becca,” he said low. “This shit had to come down to this.”
Beside him stood Lionetti’s right-hand man.
That’s when it clicked.
This wasn’t about jealousy.
This was about power.
Guns lifted around them.
Multiple barrels aimed directly at Becca and Inez.
“Get in the car,” the right-hand man ordered calmly. “Or your friend dies first.”
Inez whispered behind her, voice trembling, “Becca… what do we do?”
Snow whipped between them like ghosts.
Becca calculated.
Distance. Numbers. Ammo.
She leaned close to Inez.
“Trust me.”
And then—
She shoved Inez hard behind the overturned SUV.
And opened fire.
Gunshots tore through the storm.
Men dove for cover.
Becca slid into the snow beside Inez behind the wrecked vehicle, firing until her arm burned.
She hit one in the shoulder.
Another in the thigh.
They weren’t expecting her to fight.
Izzy shouted, “Snatch them!”
Two men and a woman charged forward.
“Run!” Becca yelled at Inez.
“I’m not leaving you!” Inez screamed back, clutching her ribs.
Becca fired again.
Click.
Empty.
“Shit.”
She tossed the gun aside.
One of the men lunged.
That’s when they learned something nobody knew.
Becca didn’t just survive her past.
She trained because of it.
After the Bronx.
After the assault.
She learned to fight.
Hard.
The first man grabbed for her arm—
She pivoted, elbowed his throat, twisted his wrist, dislocated it with a sick snap.
He screamed.
The woman came next — fast, trained.
Becca ducked, drove her knee upward into the woman’s ribs, followed with a brutal palm strike to the jaw.
The second man tackled her.
They hit the snow hard.
He swung.
She blocked.
Headbutted him.
Blood sprayed across the white ground.
Behind them—
Izzy watched.
And for the first time—
He looked uncertain.
Miles back down the road—
Silas’s vehicle tore through the storm.
“Boss,” Jace’s voice crackled in his ear, “Drone just caught visual. They’ve got the girls pinned. Rebecca’s fighting back.”
Silas’s eyes darkened.
“That’s my girl,” he muttered.
His men locked and loaded in the backseat.
“Three minutes out,” Jace said.
Silas pressed harder on the gas.
“Hold on, Becs,” he whispered to the storm.
Back on the bridge—
Another gun lifted toward Becca’s back.
She didn’t see it.
But someone else did.
Silas
I was too late.
By the time we broke through the storm and reached the wreckage, the bridge was empty.
Just twisted metal.
Gun casings.
Blood staining the snow.
The SUV overturned and abandoned like a corpse.
“Spread out!” I barked.