“Thank you, kind sir.”
“No…” He laughs at my southern accent attempt and I shrug.
“Fair.”
“Let’s round up the brothers.” Hoops takes the lead and we all follow, heading out of the definitely not a town hall. It was obviously just a big ole house.
In my head, I think I was picturing some shifter romance novel where they all live in the woods and rally around one main hall for their town meetings and shit. Whatevs.
“Bear, where’re the others?” Hoops’s voice carries across the outside space.
“Grinder and Boner are still playing in the trees, Psycho went to find them. That’s gonna be fucking messy. Kincaid and Crow have gone to get the cleaning supplies and a couple of vans. I sent Diablo back with them because he’s wasted and needs to sleep it off. Hopefully he doesn’t total his ride on the way home.” Sighing, Bear’s shoulders relax a little. Then he spots me and his brows rise. “They found you.” He smiles, a real, genuine smile, and it’s stunning.
I give a twirl, followed by a curtsey. “Actually, you all drove straight past me and Spencer found me.”
He frowns.
“I’ll explain it all another time. What Spence and I really need is to find our man.”
Rolling his eyes, Bear huffs a laugh.
A voice yelling out makes everything, including my heart, stop in an instant.
“Man down!”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Grinder
“Motherfucking fucker!” This asshole shot me and I didn’t even torture him. He must have been passed out when I tore out his molar because he looked pretty fucking dead to me. Oh, how wrong I was. Boner doesn’t even react so I do his job and call out for help. “Man down!” Then I turn back to the fucker l thought was fucking dead and press the barrel of my Beretta against his forehead, letting the moment sink in for him.
“Please…” Yeah, too late for that.
“Fuck off!” Then I shoot. One bullet and a lot of fucking brain matter later, I start to feel the pain of the bullet wound.
In my ass cheek.
“Goddammit! Of all the fucking places he could’ve shot me.” When I place my hand on my right cheek, the warm liquid coats my palm. “I’m surprised you aren’t cracking jokes. Help me out, would’ya?”
Twisting around so I can glare at Boner—because what the fuck?—it takes me a solid ten seconds to understand the scene in front of me.
He’s not standing. He’s not laughing or chuckling or even smirking at my predicament.
Instead, he’s lying on his back, his hand clutching his neck as blood spews and runs between his fingers. What in the fucking hell am I looking at?
Just as the puzzle pieces come together and it clicks that he, too, was shot, I scream at the top of my lungs.
“Man down! Man down! Man down!” The pain in my ass is gone, replaced by the shredding of my heart as I move as quickly as humanly possible, dropping to my knees and pressing both of my hands over his own.
“Hang in there, Boner. Don’t you fucking die on me, I won’t fucking allow it!” His eyes are wide open, like he’s trying to tell me how fucking scared he is. “You’re fine. Hoops or Shade or someone will know what to do. Just fucking hang in there. Do not fucking die on me.”
It’s the last thing I want to do, but I look up when I hear boots on the ground running toward us.
“Over here! Hurry the fuck up!” I’m pressing so hard on Boner’s neck I’m afraid I’ll end up strangling him before he dies from blood loss.
“What the fuck happened?” Psycho slides down to the ground like he’s just stolen second base with a home run coming in, then he proceeds to slap Boner because my dude dared to close his eyes.
“We thought he was dead. We thought he was fucking dead.” I’m not crying but it’s fucking close.