Firethorn (Discarded Heroes) (52 page)

“Kazi, no!” Griffin’s terse words made her flinch.

Words thickened by saliva and emotion, Kazi tried to swallow. “I thought I’d be happy if you just left me alone—that’s why I have all your computer files, recordings of your phone conversations, video surveillance images hidden—but…I realized your power is in possession. You would never leave me alone.”

“You belong to me.”

With a growl, she aligned the sights and brought her other hand up to cradle the weapon properly to ensure an accurate shot.

His hands came up, that slick disgusting smile faltering. “Kazimiera. Love.”

“You don’t know what that means.”
But I do.
“So long,
love?

A shadow fell over her, blocking the sun as a dark hand touched her forearm.

“No,” she snapped—her voice squawked with piqued emotion. She sidestepped, hands sweaty against the grip of the weapon, hot tears sticking against her cheeks. “Back off, Griffin. Stay out of my business.” Throwing his words back in his face hurt her more than she ever could’ve realized.

“Kaz,” Griffin said with a light touch at the small of her back. “Don’t do him. Not like this.”

“I have to.
Have
to.” Throat raw, she ground out, “He took everything from me.”

Air near her ear swirled. “If you do this, he takes the last thing you have—your soul.” Dirt scrunched as Griffin’s chest pressed against her shoulder. “I’m not going to lose you to him.” The pressure on her arm increased. “Let go, K.” His hand on her back curled around her waist.

Like a tumble off a cliff, the fury within collapsed. In the second she lessened the tension in her arm, Griffin plucked the gun from her. Hauled her into the strength and safety of his hold.

Kazi pressed her nose to the tactical vest that hid the heart of a man so amazing he’d talked her down from the singular goal she had in returning: killing Carrick. Tears streamed down her face, remembering Roman’s face, his words. His apology. Now he was dead. She’d get no resolution, no way to hold him accountable for what he’d done to her. No justice.

“Legend!” A shout made her tense.

Griffin’s chest expanded. His grip on her tightened. He lifted. Turned.

Crack!

Kazi felt herself swirling around. Each thump of her heart beat like a cannon blast.

Back arched, Griffin brought both hands around her.

Thump!

Griffin’s chest rammed into her face. Pushed her backward.”
Oomph!”

CHAPTER 38

T
he blow to his back slammed him forward. His legs buckled. Hand on the ground, he braced himself on one knee. Fire wove through his spine and muscles. He couldn’t breathe. Saw stars. Eyes bulged at the deprivation. Instinctually, he reached for Kazi as she stumbled backward.

Arms flailing, she yelped and hit the ground. But her face was locked on his, a mixture of shock and panic.

He blinked, waiting for oxygen to seep through his chest.

She scrambled forward. “Griffin?” Cool hands gripped his face. “Griffin, tell me you’re okay. Please.”

Painful breaths expanded his lungs. Around him he heard shouts, gunshots, angry epithets as he waited for the blood to trickle between his shirt and the Interceptor vest. And waited…Maybe the bullet hadn’t pierced his vest.

Kazi tugged on his face, drawing his attention back to hers. Tears streaked her face with dirt. But she was the single most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah.” He hauled in a breath—filled with molten lava. “I’m good.” He felt around the back of his vest. And fingered the hot case of the bullet lodged there. It hadn’t penetrated. No blood.

“Legend, you with us?” Frogman called as he trotted over.

“Yeah.” Drawing up his courage, he shoved aside the prickling sensation—he’d have a trophy of a bruise to take home—and started to rise.

“The snake shot you in the back!” Max’s words held a snarl he hadn’t heard in a long while. But he turned to the Kid. “Good shooting.”

Griffin winced and arched his back, gaze hitting where Kazi’s brother lay—with Carrick. Lifeless. “I feel like A-Rod took a bat to my back.”

“Aww,” the Kid said with a snicker as he slapped Griffin’s shoulder. “Did the poor baby get shot?”

Griffin widened his eyes. “I know you didn’t…”

Blue-gray eyes sparkled with the taunt. “Oh, I see. It’s okay to call
me
a baby when I’m bleeding out on a mission, but you get a bump on the back and you’re whining.”

He lunged toward the Kid. “C’mere. I’ll show you a bump!” Wait. Kazi. He circled round and reached for her.

Unmoving, frozen in time, Kazi stared at the body on the ground. “He’s dead.” Her shoulders sagged in relief. “I never thought I’d be free of him.”

Griffin wrapped an arm around her small shoulders, and she fell into his arms as naturally as if she’d always been there. “I told you God would help get him off your back.”

“By taking a bullet to yours?” She peered up at him. “Is that how God handled it?”

“Baby Girl, do you see me hurt? I’d take that bullet every day if it meant you were free. That’s what God did for you—He sent me.” A wide grin filled his sweaty face.

He saw her chewing on that hunk of meaty information, but he had to know one thing. “Why’d you leave me?”

A facade slipped into place. “I knew I had a better chance of being effective, of helping your team, if I was on the inside.” But then vulnerability skated into her face. “And after the way you yelled at me, I wasn’t sure…if you even wanted me around. Where I stood.”

His heart tugged on those words. “Where you stand?” He nodded, then shook his head, grinning as his heart thumped crazy as a fool’s. He traced her face, loving the silky whiteness that was Kazi Faron. “Baby Girl, you standing in my arms.”

“Dude, kiss her already!”

Griffin swung around. “I am going to hurt you.”

Max laughed—until the Kid’s eyes widened. His face went hard.

“Dad!” The Kid took off running.

Looking in that direction, Max spotted two men heading around the back of the mine.
Choppers.
They were going to escape.

“Move, people!” Max hopped into a jog and headed along the trailer. “Cowboy, you got eyes on the Kid?” His boots thudded as he hurried across the exposed space that sat at a right angle to the mine. Around the back of the loading bay.

“Negative. No eyes.”

Max wanted to curse. The Kid—and just about every other Nightshade member—wanted blood. From Warren Vaughn. But the Kid didn’t need that burden, the one he’d have to live with for the rest of his life over killing his own father.

Slowed, Max moved with precision, with expertise, scanning up, down, under the deuce and a half parked in the bay.

“Tents secure,” an Aussie voice announced through the earpiece. “Holding.”

“Copy,” Max said as he eased around the front of the two-and-a-half-ton truck. Careful. Scan right. Left. Up, down. He walked backward, checking the cab.

Shouts pulled him up straight. He hustled forward, weapon ready.

The road rose and dumped them onto the loading platform. Around the back of the packed-up earth that formed a roof with the aid of the pier and beams he’d seen inside.

He eased around the corner, down the barrel of his weapon—

The Kid threw a hard right.

Older but still fit, Warren Vaughn stumbled backward.

“You tried to kill us!” The Kid’s shout echoed through the narrow gorge.

“No, no!”

The Kid threw another punch.

Max let the weapon dangle from the harness and raced forward. Hauled the Kid backward. “Easy, easy.”

The Kid wrangled free. “Get off me, man.” He shuffled to the side. “He’s getting what he deserves.”

“No.” Legend stepped between the father and son. “That’s not going to happen. Not on my watch.” Hand on the senator’s chest, Legend guided him back against a wall.

It almost looked comical. The senator in his slick suit and now-bloody shirt from the busted nose his son gave him, and about a head shorter than Legend, who pinned him with a single hand.

Legend pointed a finger in the senator’s face. “You
deserve
to die a long, painful death for what you did to me and my boys. Know what I’m sayin’?”

“We have the senator,” Max spoke into the coms.

“But we’re not like you.” The storm in Griffin’s face brought Max a step closer. Then another. “The respect and honor we have—your son has—it’s real. Not trumped up and built on the lives of innocent people and terrorism.”

“No,” the senator said with a frantic shake of his head.

Legend drew back a fist.

The senator clamped his mouth shut.

“Now, see? You’re learning. What I’m extending you is called mercy.” A sinister gleam shot through Legend’s expression.

“He doesn’t deserve mercy!” The Kid lunged forward, shoving his forearm into his father’s throat.

Legend pulled the Kid into a full nelson.

“Legend, get off me, man!”

“Not till you calm down.” Legend nodded to the senator. “See? I’m doing you another favor.”

“Listen to me,” the senator said.

“Not yet.” Max motioned to him. “Assume the position.” He held the senator’s right wrist and turned him around, face against the wall. With a zip cord, he secured the man’s hands behind his back. “Bring in the chopper,” Max said into his coms. “West side of mine.”

Senator Vaughn looked over his shoulder. “It’s not me. I didn’t do this.” Released but cuffed, he flopped around. “I swear I didn’t try to kill you men.”

“Bull! This is all your fault.”

Warren hunched his shoulders. “It’s my fault—yes.”

“Augh! I’ll kill you.” The Kid’s feet lifted off the ground, but he remained locked in Legend’s thick arms.

The senator blanched at the fury emanating off his son. “It’s my fault because I should’ve paid more attention to the details. Saw between the lines rather than hearing what I wanted to hear.”

“What details?” Max asked.

“It’s true that I sponsored this mine—but I was under the belief it was a
diamond
mine. That the operation was entirely legal. Everything looked clean.”

“Plausible deniability.” The Kid used the full nelson hold to his advantage, throwing his weight into Legend and driving a kick straight into his father’s chest.

The strike nailed the senator in the ribs. A crack resounded. Senator Vaughn doubled.

“Get him back!” Max pointed to the Kid. “Get it under control.”

Grunting, Vaughn came up—but not all the way. Pain etched into his face.

“If you aren’t behind this, then why are you here? At the exact moment we’d be here.”

“Melanie.”

“No way. No way, Dad! Don’t bring her into this. Don’t dirty her name.” Something shifted in Marshall’s face.

Vaughn coughed and shook his head. “All this time…she’d been faking the mental instability, said it was the only way to get Nathan to leave her alone.” He groaned.

“Nathan?” Max looked between the Kid and his father.

“Nathan Sands,” the Kid said. “My father’s protégé—he forced my sister to marry him.”

“No.” Vaughn groaned again. “Not true. Melanie admitted she was smitten with Nate at first, but he turned on her.” His brow knotted.

“Frogman!”

Max glanced back toward the loading bay and found his brother jogging toward them. He met him halfway. “Report.”

“I have Squirt and a couple of men who are loyal to me guarding the mine to make sure it’s not destroyed.”

“Good.”

Legend spun toward the senator. “What did you promise Carrick?”

“Nothing!”

“Carrick said he met with the senator,” Max said. “We need to know what to stop.”

“It wasn’t me. I got here, and Sands was already well ingratiated into the man’s graces. Whatever they planned, I don’t know. But it’s not my deal.”

“Enough,” Max said. “Chopper’s en route. Round up what we can. The Old Man is sending in high profiles onsite to investigate and shut this place down. Let’s ghost ourselves. Legend, get the senator.”

The Kid jogged up to Max. “Listen,” he said, intensity weighting that word. “We take him back there, he’ll just talk his way out of all this. He’s done it for fifteen years—actually, all my life.”