Max shouted, “Roll Call!” After a few minutes, every brother was accounted for, though a few of them had been hit, most were flesh wounds. Looking around the room, I counted heads myself, making sure everyone who was supposed to be here was, and they were, alive. It was then that I realized Mia wasn’t here. Moving away from Max, I looked around the room, searching for her. I spotted Ghost with his daughter, but no Mia. I spotted Viper tending to Shamrock, who had taken a bullet to his shoulder.
She wasn’t anywhere.
My heart started pounding. I last saw her in the kitchen. Turning, I was going to go check when I stopped dead in my tracks.
There she was with a gun to her temple. Blood covering her shirt.
In the arms of the devil.
He was here.
He came back for me.
“Momma,” I heard Becca squeal spotting her mother. All the men turned when they heard the little girl. The few seconds of calm vanished. Men all around me got slowly to their feet. Max stepped in front of me, shielding me from what was about to happen. I watched as Ghost handed his daughter off to his younger brother, Shadow. He quickly left, taking the toddler with him.
“Baby, it’s going to be okay,” Ghost said, reaching behind him for the gun he had at his back.
“I love you,” Mia whispered as tears fell freely down her cheeks. Her face pale from the blood loss. She was hurt and, from the looks of it, badly.
“I know, baby,” Ghost replied, moving closer.
“Give me Remi, or this bitch will die,” Darrin Reynolds said, looking directly at me.
“You are a dead man,” Max grinned. “You come into my home and expect to live. You’ve got balls, mother fucker.”
“It didn’t have to be this way, Reaper. We had a good thing going. All you had to do was toe the line, but you couldn’t. Your conscience got in the way. Now, everything is fucked up.”
“Not my problem.”
“People want me dead because of her,” Darrin said, pointing his gun in my direction. Give her to me.”
“Over my dead body,” Max said, reaching for his blades as Phantom and Player slowly came out of the hallway, each armed pointing their weapons at the bastard. Max lightly shook his head, warning them to back off, as Darrin put the gun back at Mia’s temple. She coughed, blood spilling out of her mouth. She was dying, and that mother fucker didn’t care. “You’re not leaving here alive. You know that, don’t you?”
“That may be true, but I won’t be going alone,” Darrin said cocking his gun. Mia coughed again, spewing more blood, her body shaking in fear. I wanted so much to take this from her. She didn’t know Darrin as I did. I could handle the pain. She couldn’t. She was innocent. I wasn’t. Reaching for Max’s gun at his back, I held it behind me and stepped out from behind Max and said, “Take me, Darrin. Let Mia go. She doesn’t know what you like. I do.”
Max stiffened but said nothing.
I knew he wouldn’t.
I needed him to trust me as I trusted him. I knew he would not allow Darrin to touch me. I believed that now. He would kill everyone in his path to get to me.
“Always were a good fuck, Remi. Never tired of you.”
“I know,” I whispered, moving closer to the devil. I didn’t know what the hell I would do, but I knew he was not leaving with Mia. That I could stop, even if it meant going willingly with the devil himself. Taking a step closer, I said, “Let Mia go, now, and I’ll go with you.”
“Remi,” Max growled.
“I can’t let him take her Max. She has a family.”
“So do you,” he replied.
Darrin smiled. “Is that true, Remi. Do you have a family?”
“No,” I lied. My family was around me, protecting me, giving me the courage, I needed to do this but I would never tell him that. I was thankful my brother and sister weren’t here. I didn’t want them to see what was about to happen. They were my reason for getting up every day, and I loved them all very much. If I could protect them then everything, I endured was worth it.
“That’s right, because I killed them all. You are mine, always were.”
That made me stop. “What did you just say?”