Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 67905 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 340(@200wpm)___ 272(@250wpm)___ 226(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 67905 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 340(@200wpm)___ 272(@250wpm)___ 226(@300wpm)
I felt bad, but not bad enough.
He turned away as he cocked his shotgun.
Adrenaline and terror dumped into my body as the gunshots continued, distinctive outside the thick walls. Theo and his men might be killed before they even made it to the house, but three Hummers full of men and guns sounded like a force to be reckoned with.
Bolton called for backup, discharging more of his men to fight in the streets, while he remained safe in the house. These men were risking their lives just so Bolton could continue to keep me as a hostage. It wasn’t a life worth living, and it certainly wasn’t worth dying for either.
I had to sit there and listen to the gunshots and wonder what was happening. Wonder who was firing and who was receiving. My back was against the couch, and my arms were around my knees, bringing in my body tight, the vest so heavy it was hard to breathe. I wanted to take it off, but I didn’t dare.
The gunshots stopped.
Bolton’s men tried to radio the others—but were met with silence.
I closed my eyes as I felt the relief and the guilt. I was happy Bolton’s men were dead, when no one deserved to be dead that night.
“I’ve dispatched the others,” Bolton said. “They’ll be here before they can get in the house—”
A loud boom shook the entire house. My hands moved over my ears, and I ducked my head, expecting debris to fall from the ceiling and land on top of me.
There was a commotion between the men as they worked to barricade the front door like Alexander the Great was on the other side about to claim Persia in the name of Macedonia. There was another loud bang, like Theo was trying to take down the door with explosives.
Our front door was heavy and made out of iron, and now I understood why. It was the gates to the keep, the entryway to a king’s fortress, and it wasn’t coming down without an army to plow through it.
Windows shattered, and I covered my head again, expecting shards to fall from the skies even though I was nowhere near the windows. Another loud bang sounded, and then there was fire from the explosion that took the door down.
The smoke was immediate, filling the downstairs of the house and making the air hazy. It was chaos after that, and I couldn’t discern what was happening from behind the couch. There were gunshots and grunts, the same sounds of fighting that I’d heard outside my bedroom door when Bolton deployed those men in that fake robbery. The smoke burned my lungs, and I struggled to breathe right away. It became so much that I got on my hands and knees and crawled away, heading to the back windows. When I was halfway there, I saw men on the other side of the glass, men looking for another way in.
I didn’t know if they were Bolton’s men or Theo’s.
I got to my feet and moved around the couch, coughing because it was getting harder to breathe, ready to find a way out before I suffocated in the smoke, but the sight before me made me halt in my tracks. Dead men on the floor, one stabbing the other over and over in the neck, a man forced to eat the gun of another. It was a massacre—all because of me.
I didn’t see Theo.
I didn’t see Bolton.
I shrank into the corner, unsure what to do or how to escape. It seemed like staying out of the way was the only option I had right now.
Then a man was thrown across the room, rolled across the floor, and then smacked into the back of the couch with enough force that the couch nearly toppled over where I’d been just a moment ago.
I looked at him—and realized it was Bolton.
He was on his feet instantly, brandishing a long dagger.
Then I saw Theo through the smoke. He didn’t cough, even though the black smoke came from flames that had started to engulf the house. Theo had treated me coldly, shown me his annoyance with his hard stare, but he’d never looked at me the way he looked at Bolton. It made me realize I’d met Theo…but never the Skull King.
Theo lunged at him, unaware of me beside him.
Bolton was on his feet with his dagger, swiping at Theo across his throat and missing, then moving for his stomach, his body so fluid it looked like a dance rather than an attack.
Theo was able to dodge each thrust of the knife, but only barely. He tried to aim with his gun, but Bolton was so damn fast that he could never get a good aim. Bolton was like a samurai who had so much skill with the blade that a bullet could never keep up.