Page 26 of Run, Little Rabbit (Blood & Bonds #1)

Chapter Twenty-Five

Veon

I was going to kill them. In the most brutal way that I could think of.

Maybe I should just chuck them out of the car and drive over their bodies, leaving them broken for the foxes and the rats to feed on.

I could set up a camera feed just to watch them slowly decompose and become nothing more than bones and dust, and it would be the most satisfying—

Kai thuds my chest, cutting off my little murderous fantasy. “What’s got you all grouchy?”

I clench my fingers around the steering wheel so that I don’t reach for my gun.

“He’s probably planning murder,” Sphinx pipes up from the back seat, his words scarily accurate. It annoys me that Sphinx can read me so well.

I take a deep breath and exhale with a growl. “We’re five minutes out.”

I picked a spot a mile away from the property boundary so we could go in on foot. Less noise that way.

“Whose murder?” Kai asks, a dopey smile on his face.

Sphinx laughs, and I try not to notice the way it sounds. All deep and smoky. “Yours, you asshole.”

“What?” Kai is outraged, but I don’t see why. I’ve never liked the guy, and he should know that by now.

I pull the Jeep to a stop and turn to face the trainee hitman. “Sphinx is wrong.”

“Ha!” Kai barks triumphantly.

“I’m planning to murder both of you.”

“The fuck?” Sphinx says, but I’m ignoring him. My attention is on the sandy blonde, stage five clinger next to me.

“The pair of you are driving me up the wall, and so help me God, I will put a bullet in either one of you if you don’t follow my orders.”

Kai goes to interrupt, but I pull my gun out and aim it at him, the weight of it a comfort in my hand.

“That’s hot,” Sphinx murmurs, and fuck me, I want to shoot the guy.

No, I am. I’m going to shoot him.

“I’m being serious, Kai. This isn’t a chance for you to prove your undying love to Echo. It’s an extraction. Pure and simple. We go in, grab her, and leave. Nobody dies. Do you understand?”

He nods, slow and steady.

I cock the gun. “Need your words, buddy.”

“Yes. I understand,” he bites out.

I don’t care if he’s pissed; I’m not here to give him some chance to win Echo’s heart. This isn’t the time for that, however much he’s pining over it.

I turn to Sphinx, my gun aimed at his chest. “And you—”

“Pikachu!” He blurts, arms held aloft in surrender.

I blink at him. “What?”

“It’s my safe word,” he says with a nonchalant shrug. “Just in case you need my words too.”

I blink again. His words taking far too long to process, and when they finally do, I flinch backward. “Fucking jackass.”

He howls with laughter; Kai joins in, and I have to get out of the Jeep before I start causing bodily harm.

Fucking grade A, no good for nothing, son of a bitch!

I slam the door behind me, the action barely giving me any satisfaction.

I knew I should have left them behind, that I should have just chanced it on my own, but I also knew, deep down, that Sphinx had been right.

I needed the help. I had no idea what I was about to walk into, and heaven help the world if I found out that any harm had come to Echo.

Rory’s orders of leaving the Volkovs alive would mean jack shit because I’d tear them apart piece by fucking piece.

I need to get my shit together. I run a hand down my face and stare up at the sky.

The soft morning glow soothes my frayed edges, and I take a few deep, calming breaths to try and get control over my anger.

I feel fraught and incomplete without Echo next to me, and it’s making my temper shorter.

Not that Sphinx or Kai seem to care. I think they have a bet going on who can make me kill the other one first.

It would be Kai, by the way. I really don’t like him.

There aren’t many people I don’t like, but that guy just rubs me the wrong fucking way.

Probably because he keeps trying to make Echo fall in love with him when she’s clearly moved on.

Or the way he swans around thinking he’s better than others because he’s next in line to be the Quinns’ ‘Number Two’.

Part of me thinks that’s the only reason he’s so obsessed with Echo.

She fits his picture-perfect life. He’ll serve the twins and be married to their sister, and they’ll all be one big, happy family.

There’s only one problem with that. Echo won’t do anything for the Family, and if he loved her at all, he’d know that.

Maybe I can make it look like Kai took a stray bullet on this little excursion…

“Stop looking at him like you’re planning his funeral,” Sphinx says as he steps up behind me, a smug little grin on his face.

“How do you know I wasn’t planning your funeral?”

He steps closer, his eyes level with mine, and I’m suddenly lost in their depths. Those pale blue chips of ice that see so much but say so little. “Because you look at me like you don’t know what to do with me. I intrigue you. Kai just pisses you off.”

My brows deepen as I stare deeper into his eyes, annoyed that he can see right through me. The man does intrigue me. I don’t even know his real name, yet at the touch of a button, he can know practically everything about me.

“I agree with you, though. If I get the chance, I might just put a bullet in him myself,” Sphinx says with a chuckle, his black-rimmed eyes sparking with mischief. “Or let the twins have some fun with him.”

“What’s that about the twins?” Kai asks as he straps on his bulletproof vest.

Sphinx rolls his eyes and heads to the back of the Jeep to gear up, leaving me to deal with this idiot.

“Nothing,” I grumble.

“Yoh, Sphinx, did you hear about the head that got delivered to them?” Kai asks with a snort.

Sphinx’s bright white mop of hair pops out from behind the Jeep. “What? Who sent that?”

“The Volkovs. Probably Nikita,” Kai says with an appreciative grin. “Message came through on the group chat.”

The group chat I’m not part of. I might work for the Quinns, but it was clear that I’m not welcome in the inner circle. Probably another reason that Kai pisses me off.

“Whose head was it?” Sphinx asks as he comes towards me. I do a quick scan of his gear, and I’m surprised he’s managed to put it all on correctly. Perhaps he’s more capable than I thought.

“Alex McLoughlin. It was hand-delivered to the twins’ apartment with a note that said, ‘ To Conor and Cillian, I hereby return your rat, his head severed with love ’.” Kai checked his guns and holstered them. “Guess we’re getting ready for war.”

Well, shit. This gives Echo’s kidnapping a whole new meaning. Whether it was planned or not, Maxim Volkov has handed Rory Quinn a solid reason for joining in a war. No wonder he doesn’t want me to kill them straight away. He wants the satisfaction of tearing the Volkov Empire down first.

“Come on, let’s move.” I don’t bother waiting to see if they follow. If they know what’s good for them, they’ll stay the fuck out of my way. “And Sphinx, put a fucking hat on.”

We reach the edge of the tree line, and I slow our pace down to a silent, barely-there step. I drop to a knee about five feet from the open field and pull my rifle up to view through the scope.

That’s when I see her. And I can’t seem to process what I’m looking at.

“Is that… an orgy?” Sphinx asks as he kneels down next to me, binoculars pressed against his eyes. “Jesus, fuck. It is. It’s fucking hot . I didn’t know Echo was into th—”

I slap the back of his head. “Stop watching.”

He looks at me with a pout and puppy dog eyes.

“Don’t look at me like that.”

“Why?” He grins widely. “Is it having an effect on you?”

“Yes,” I reply, and his eyebrows fly upwards. “It’s making me want to punch you in the face.”

He scowls at me and looks back through the binoculars, and I do my best to ignore the sound of Echo orgasming from across the field. What the fuck is she doing? Buying time? I thought she’d been kidnapped. Was this her plan all along? Was she already involved with them?

My mind runs at a thousand miles a minute, trying to come up with every goddamn reason under the sun to explain what I’m seeing, but nothing makes sense.

Why is she with them? And why all three of them?

“You’ve got to be kidding me.”

I look up and find Kai staring at Echo with a sneer of disgust on his face. His jaw is clenched, and his fingers are twitching by the holster on his hip.

“You can’t kill them,” I remind him, even though I very much want to.

He looks at me, his honey eyes full of anger and pain. Maybe it’s a good thing he’s seeing her with someone else. Maybe now he’ll move the fuck on.

“What’s the plan?” Kai asks, his voice a little too calm.

I hope he doesn’t go rogue on me. I don’t want to have to rescue him as well or explain to his father why he didn’t come back.

I mean, how would that conversation even go?

‘Sorry, Jace. Your son is dead because he saw his girl getting fucked by three Volkov brutes and he snapped.’

What a fucking mess. I’m not even sure how I feel about what I’m seeing. It’s a mixture of disbelief, jealousy and pain. I thought we had something. Did I leave it too late?

Kai taps my shin with his boot, dragging me back to the problem at hand.

Right. The plan. “I’ll clip one of them with a bullet, which should send them into action. There’s no clear cover, so they’ll either run to those trees or to the structure to the west.”

“What structure?” Sphinx asks.

Fuck me. “Did you even look at the map?”

“Um… what map?” he says, a confused little frown tugging at his brows.

“The map of the location. The one I specifically told you to memorise on the way here. What are you gonna do if you get split from the rest of us? How are you going to find your way back to the Jeep?” Sphinx just looks at me blankly, and I want to throttle him.

“You know what? Never mind. Just stay on my six.”

I knew I should have left him behind. Should have just done this on my own. I could have taken down the top tier of the Volkov hierarchy on my own, right?

“I’ll circle the tree line and try to cut them off before the summer house,” Kai says as he readies his weapon.

“Remember. Don’t kill them,” I remind him again. I don’t trust that he’s not going to take an opportunity if one presents itself to him.

“Yeah, yeah. Boss’s orders.” Then he disappears into the trees, and I have to admit, he’s good at being stealthy. Asshole.

I turn to check on Sphinx and find him staring at his gun and gnawing on his bottom lip.

There’s a vulnerability in his pale eyes that I’ve never seen before, and I’m not quite sure what to make of it.

I’m so used to the snarky, prickly exterior and the sassy comebacks that this honest expression of his hits me dead centre.

“Are you okay?” I ask softly and instantly regret it.

He flinches, and his bored expression slips back over his features. “Yes. I’m fine. Come on. Let’s go get Echo.”

“Sphinx—”

“I said I’m fine, Vee,” he snaps. “Just leave it alone.”

“Okay,” I reply, ignoring the fact that he shortened my name and I actually quite like it. No one calls me that except my sister. “Then stay behind me and do exactly as I say.”

“I know. I was paying attention.”

I shake my head at him and take a deep breath.

I will not kill him. I will not kill him.

When I’m confident I’m not going to put a bullet between his eyes, I turn my attention back to Echo and the Volkovs.

I raise my rifle and look through the scope. I take a deep breath and release it slowly.

Then I squeeze the trigger.