Hunted (A Sinners Series Book 2) (2 page)

“Not just that. I mean, we’ve been through so much in the past few months. I couldn’t even hold a gun when we first met, let alone shoot one.”

“Or boost a car.”

“And what kind of person can sleep standing up?” I half-expect him to respond, but when he doesn’t, I continue on. “It shouldn’t have to be this way.” My voice trails off, worried I may have ruined the moment. “Cole?”

He doesn’t acknowledge me right away. His eyes are distant, focused on the horizon. Maybe he can feel it too, the dread in the pit of my stomach. That feeling you get when you know the moment won’t last. I stretch out my left arm, wrapping it around his neck while I gently kiss his jawline. “You’re amazing.” Immediately, I feel his body relax. He turns his head, and the same gorgeous smile plays at his lips.

“You’re pretty amazing yourself. A total badass with a gun
and
a great kisser.” Cole’s intense look is somewhere between satisfied and troubled. Holding his gaze, I smile back, hoping he can’t see how sad and lost I feel.

Compliments are hard to come by nowadays, so when Cole offers one, I savor it. I want him to be proud of how much I’ve changed, how well I can handle myself. I need him to see that I’m not the same girl he rescued from the Hole.

Hair gets caught in my mouth. I push it away from my face and look out the window, watching the sand dunes flip past. Anything’s better than the Hole. I can’t go back to that place. I won’t.

Now we rely on Sutton’s underground resistance members to shelter, feed, and hide us. On occasions like this, we might almost get a break from living like animals, if we can determine whether a possible safe house is actually safe. But even if this safe house turns out to be useful, we can never let our guard down, get too comfortable.

The face of a former revolt member named Molly flashes through my memory as I grip the handle of the car door, turning my knuckles white. At nineteen and only a year older than me, Molly survived being branded orange and living in the Hole for two years on her own, only to be murdered in a safe house that wasn’t secure. When one of her friends found us, he told us she had failed to clear one closet in the house, the only time she’d ever missed one, and was promptly shot by a guard hiding inside. So despite riding in a car with beautiful and soft upholstery, snuggling up to Cole, I cannot become complacent. Complacency can get you killed.

I exhale, letting my thoughts drift away as I examine Cole’s newly buzzed head, glistening from sweat. Just last night, he asked me to chop off his long, dark, greasy hair, grown out of control without the aid of a razor. Now, he looks like the Cole I met on my first day in the Hole—minus the spotless uniform and bossy attitude.
But he’s still just as intense.

“I miss Zeus, even though he can be a royal pain in my ass,” he says, raising an eyebrow in my direction before planting a kiss on my cheek.

“How can you say that about Zeus? He was protecting me.”

“I miss him, but it’ll be good for us to be alone without any interruptions, don’t you think?” Cole chuckles and squeezes my leg again, quickly taking a moment to look me over.

“What’s so funny?”

“I just pictured him, sitting next to our bed, resting his head on the mattress, with his head cocked staring at us.” He leans back into his seat with that mouth-watering dimple dented in his cheek.

I feel my face warm. My mind replays the night before, when Zeus interrupted us by licking Cole’s back in the middle of a highly charged make-out session.
Yes, time alone will be good.
I laugh to myself.

I give Cole a coy smile, but he doesn’t notice. He’s turned his attention back to the road.

After a check of the rearview mirror, his lips seal into a thin line. He squints to get a better look and tightens his grip on the steering wheel.

“Damn it.” His body tenses. “We’ve got company.”

The hair on my neck rises. “What?” I glance behind us. A fast-moving, sleek, black vehicle trails a mile or so behind. One day, I’ll learn to trust my instincts. I knew this was too good to last.
I flip back around and face Cole.

“I’m gonna grab the guns.” I can feel my heart begin galloping as adrenaline starts to pour into my veins.

“Yeah, we’re gonna need ’em,” he says.

I pull out his Glock and my SIG Sauer P229 compact that one of the resistance members gave me. Sweat trickles down my back as I place the guns on my lap and wipe my clammy hands on my pants.

“Hold tight. Don’t shoot till I say.” His voice is low and calm, but his rigid posture tells me he is just as nervous as me.
Fear makes us better fighters
, Keegan used to say. “Get ready.” He checks the rearview again.

Cole slams the gas pedal into the floor. My head jerks back, hitting the headrest. The car bucks against his demand, protesting his urgency with an engine that has seen better days.

I grip the guns, willing myself to be calm and breathe like he taught me.
Here we go.

Cole clenches his jaw. “Crap.”

“What?” I glance over my shoulder again.

“They’re gaining on us!” He unbuckles his seatbelt.

The speedometer ticks up past eighty, but it feels like we’re moving at a snail’s pace compared to the approaching car. I shake my head. I check Cole’s Glock one last time, cocking it before handing it to him. Then I unbuckle my seatbelt too.

Cole raises an eyebrow at me, and I nod while pushing the seatbelt off to my right.

“Let’s do this,” I say.

“Remember, shoot to kill, don’t hesitate, not even for a second.”

“Got it.”

I scan my own hand, wrapped around my two-toned silver and black SIG. I double-check the extra magazines I have strapped around my waist. It amazes me that just before he died, Keegan showed me how to use a gun. Now he’s gone, and handling guns feels like second nature.
I’ve become a killer.

My eyes focus on the vehicle closing in, though thoughts of Keegan bring me to tears.

The pounding in my chest gets louder. Just then, the sun disappears, and dark clouds, pregnant with rain, loom over us. I exhale while fingering the trigger of the cold metal weapon in my lap. I lick my dry lips and bite down in anticipation.

I hope we’re ready for them.

“Holy sh—” Cole yells.

I grasp the door handle as a dark Charger swings onto the road with a flash of black paint.

Cole swerves left, narrowly missing the oncoming car by a hair. Gunfire erupts from the other car
.
We’re so close I can see the green eyes of the driver and the black uniform he’s wearing.

“Ahhhhh!” I scream as the passenger side window behind me shatters into the backseat.
They’re shooting at us
.

Adrenaline bursts through me like fire, burning my veins. I lean out my open window and fire, pummeling the driver’s door with puncture holes. “All right, bastards. Let’s see what you got.”

The guard steers his car into ours, slamming us into the left-hand shoulder. Our car thumps over God knows what along the edge, bouncing me all over the place. I struggle to hold on. Cole’s shouting. Squealing tires and torrents of gunfire echo all around me as I’m thrown into him.

“Dammit!” I scream as I struggle back up and fire more rounds.

Click
.

I’m empty. I eject the empty mag and slam another one in. Gripping the inside of the car with one hand, I try to aim with my right. But everything’s going too fast. My hair blows in front of my face, and my hand slips off the ledge. A knife of panic slices through me as I try to brace myself back up.

Cole’s cussing becomes background noise as he fights to keep the car on the road. “Shoot out their tires!” he yells. “Now!”

“I’m trying.” It comes out whinier than I expected.

Cole keeps swerving the car, making it impossible to get a shot off. I don’t want to waste bullets if I don’t have to.
This is damn near impossible.

“Shoot, Lexi.” Cole jerks the wheel right, bashing our car into the guard’s door. I don’t think I’m even breathing as I take a few more shots. My ears are ringing, and my body’s on overdrive.

The cars are locked together in a mass of spraying bullets. All around me, glass is exploding. I feel it slice across my face in a million little pieces, and I blink furiously as pain jabs my eyes like miniature needles. My hands fiddle for another magazine, and as I slam it in, I focus through the watery film of my eyes and meet the gaze of the guard. His neck’s corded. He’s screaming something at me. But I can’t focus on his mouth. And I can’t hear anything he’s saying to me. All that matters is putting him away.

He raises his gun at the same time. And as we’re staring down one another’s barrels, he flinches, and without hesitation, I squeeze a shot off.

Blood gushes from his face as his body slumps over the wheel. Abruptly, his car banks right and slows down. A cloud of dust rises as it rolls off the road into an embankment. I watch as it rebounds over the sand dunes and smashes to a stop.

Cole brings our beater back onto the road. His chest’s heaving up and down, and he glances over at me.

“You were unbelievable.”

Just as I start to respond, the other vehicle rams us from the back.
Crash
! Crunching metal and more shots split the air as I slam into the dashboard. I throw my elbows up to block my head. Beside me, I see Cole’s head snap back into his headrest.

“What the hell!” he’s shouting.

I grip the dashboard and try getting up, but my hands are slick with sweat. Cole floors it again, and this time, there’s nothing. My head feels like someone took a mallet to it. I crawl halfway onto my seat, looking in the rear windshield before I realize what’s about to happen. A black Charger has backed off, but suddenly, it zooms onto our bumper.

“Brace yourself for another hit, Lexi.”

It rams us from behind again. A horrific crunching reaches my ears as I slam forward into the dashboard and slither onto the floor. For a moment, I’m disoriented. Warm liquid drips down my face.
Blood.
All I hear is the groaning, straining engine of our car. I’m wiggling my fingers in front of me, trying to focus, when I hear a thump.

“Lexi, are you all right? Come on, get up. Please.” Cole’s panicked voice rips through my fog.

I grip my head as splitting pain pulses through every nerve ending in my body. I’ve got to pull myself together. Dropping my hands, I move slowly up and onto the seat, looking for my gun.
Oh crap, where the hell is it?
I panic when the guard leaps onto the trunk of our car, threatening to get inside.

Cole fishtails, trying to throw the guard off, but instead of getting rid of the guard, it shakes me up even more. My blood burns in my veins, and fear builds in my chest.
Where is my damn gun?
I’m almost on my knees, shaking and frantically searching for my weapon.

Bingo.

I pick it up just as a shadow falls over the backseat.

I lift my eyes.

The guard’s right hand pulls inside the frame of the blown-out back window. I notice his bulging muscles through his sweaty uniform shirt and know we don’t stand a chance if he gets all the way inside. He looks like he could swallow me up. I raise my gun, trying to hold it steady, its metal parts rattling as I point it in his general direction.

But he’s too quick.

He slides in and manages to grab Cole’s neck. Cole grips the wheel with his left hand as he gasps for air. He’s making gurgling noises, and I know I’ve got to act. With his right hand, he feels along the seat for his gun. I’m frozen in place, watching this nightmare unfold.
It’s really over this time.

Suddenly, I hear Cole wheeze. “Do some … thing.”

A flash of silver catches my eye, and as the guard pulls out a knife, everything clicks into place.

“Get off him!”

The guard’s maniacal gaze turns to me, but I’m faster this time. I press my gun to his head, and without hesitation, I fire at point-blank range.

Bang
.

Everything’s amplified in the car, and I drop my gun to the floor and grab my ears. My head’s ringing. The splatter of blood and brains makes me scream.
He’s dead
. I must remember to breathe. Everything’s tinged crimson, and my throat’s dry like I’ve gargled with rocks.

Cole grunts and gasps for air. We’re covered in blood and brain bits when he reaches out, cups my face in his hand, and whispers my name. But the body’s strewn across the backseat, and the smell of blood makes me want to vomit.

“There’s more!” Cole says in a hoarse voice. But I barely register his words.

I glance back and catch a flash of another vehicle.
Don’t they ever give up?
Almost as if in answer to my question, another sleek Charger pulls up beside us. I see the driver’s body tighten when his eyes meet mine. He must know what happened.

The black car drops back, and I brace myself for the worst.

“Oh sh—” Cole’s cut off.

The Charger rams into our car, and we fly off the road and into a ditch.

Bodies, glass, blood, guns, and supplies collide. I squeeze my eyes closed, unable to focus on the melee surrounding me. I think I hear screaming. It sounds vaguely like my own voice. I grasp for anything to hang on to before we come to a rest upside down. The loud noise of an airbag inflating accentuates the madness.

Am I alive?

I inhale and wait for the blinding light people talk about seeing when they’re near death. I close my eyes and then open them again. I see nothing but the dingy red of the car intermingled with stark silence.

I reach out, feeling around for anything familiar. My hands hurt from the glass as I attempt to pull myself out from the wreckage. My vision’s cloudy, and every limb is marked with gashes. I stop and pick an inch-long piece of glass from my elbow, gritting my teeth as I pluck it out. All our stuff, backpacks, food, everything, is splayed out like a trail leading to us. I wince as I army crawl through the melee, unsure of where I am. My head feels thick with liquid, like it needs to be drained so I can remember who I am again.
Cole? Where the hell is Cole?