Page 26 of The Deeper Game (The Kinky Bank Robbers #3)

“Drag my bloody corpse, jackhole!”

The vehicle rocked, and I knew he was getting on top of it.

I scrambled underneath, moving on pure fear. Survive just one more minute, I told myself. One more minute. Add one minute to another. Add that minute to another.

The truck bounced above me again. Was he on the move?

Which side would he come at me from? I scrambled toward the front and something caught my dress, scraping my back.

I kept on—the front was the least likely side he’d come at me from, I’d decided.

Sometimes you have to go forward until you can’t.

Sometimes that’s the only option you get.

It was then that I heard the rumble of a nearby engine and the spit of rocks under tires. Somebody else was here. Would they die, too? I just kept crawling under the car toward the front. Maybe he’d already jumped off. Maybe he was crouching on the ground, aiming at me.

Brakes squealed. Doors opened.

And somebody—or something—yelled. Roared . The sound was very nearly inhuman.

Yet there was something wonderfully familiar about it. My heart pounded.

Something crunched the gravel—or more like tore it up.

I peered out under the bumper and caught sight of big black boots pounding past in the direction of the rock pile…

I scooted closer and saw that it was Zeus, chasing Manning to the rock pile.

Odin appeared, chasing after them. They were both still in their black bank-robbing clothes.

A voice nearby called out. “Isis?”

Thor.

“I’m under here,” I sobbed. “Thor!”

Tennis shoes appeared.

“I got her!” Thor yelled. “She’s with me!”

His knees and then his face appeared, shaggy blond hair hanging sideways like the most beautiful thing in the world. “Goddess,” he said, stretching his arm under the truck toward me. “You’re okay. We’re here.”

“He’s out there,” I whispered.

“Not for long.” He got down on his belly to be face-to-face with me. “You’re okay,” he said softly. He came under with me, right next to me, and wrapped his arms around me. “We gotcha.”

I burst out crying, big ugly sobs into his shoulder. “He was going to throw me into the pit! And you were in traffic—”

“Shhh.” He tightened his arms around me, pulling me close in the cramped, dark, oil-smelling space. “Shhh.” He held me there on the sharp stones.

“I thought you wouldn’t come,” I whispered.

“Of course we came. Are you hurt anywhere?”

“I don’t know! Kind of. But not really.”

“Come on out, goddess.”

I just held onto him, not wanting to move.

“Will you come out, goddess?”

I didn’t get how traumatized I was until that second.

I knew that with Odin and Zeus after him, Manning wouldn’t come for me, but I still felt frightened.

You’re okay, I told myself, making myself scramble out with him.

Thor helped me up. An angry shadow crossed his eyes as he got a good look at my chin where Manning hit me, then he pulled me into his arms.

“I’m so sorry,” he whispered into my ear. “I should never have left you.”

“You thought Lupe needed you.”

“ You needed me. It’s on all of us that we didn’t figure things out.” He pulled back and touched my chin. “He did this?”

“Yeah. Nothing broken.”

“Where else are you hurt?”

“My back. My feet.”

“Come on.” He picked me up and carried me back toward our SUV. “We were so worried,” he said.

“How did you figure it out?”

“Odin called about twenty minutes after I took off. He and Zeus were feeling wrong about the whole situation. Going ahead with these questions about Sleazy Travis being our guy—it was reckless. So Odin turned on his phone and called me, just to check in. He was freaked that I wasn’t with you.

I texted Lupe a trick question. She texted me back, and I knew it wasn’t her.

” He opened the back of the vehicle and settled me onto the end.

He grabbed a soft blanket and wrapped me up and slid in next to me.

There was eerie silence all around the quarry.

“They got out of there and went to the Nav and found the message. I got there a little later. God, when we saw that mirror—”

“He made me write it.”

“I know.” Tenderly, he touched my cheek and looked into my eyes. “We all knew.”

“Thank you,” I said.

He snorted, like that was ridiculous, me thanking him. “We should be begging for your forgiveness, goddess. We were putting vengeance over what’s really important,” he said. “The Prime, it’s just some bank. Fuck the Prime Royale. Fuck ZOX. What matters is our family.”

I took a lock of his bright blond hair between two fingers, loving him outrageously. “He killed Venus,” I said.

Thor’s blue eyes glittered darkly. “And I believe he’s paying right about now.”

“They’ll kill him.”

“Well…eventually.”

I shuddered. “He was Lincoln,” I added.

“We figured.”

“So…they just left the Prime open and unburgled?”

“Nah, Matteo pulled the Gigis in. So he’s the fucking hero. Those girls are shit at takeovers, but they can crack a safe. They’ll get into those boxes.”

“You won’t get the jewels. The revenge on ZOX—they won’t know—”

“Vengeance isn’t as important as you. As us all staying together,” Thor said.

I began to tear up. I’d needed to hear that so badly.

“Hey, it’s okay.” Thor held me. “I’m sorry I left you.”

I mashed my face into his soft shirt, breathing him in. “You had to help Lupe.” A crunch of stones sounded from the direction of the rock pile. The crunches sped up—two pairs of feet. I didn’t have to look to know who it was.

“She’s okay,” Thor called.

I turned to look.

Zeus was ahead of Odin, eyes shining like diamonds in his sweaty face. A violent smudge of mud glistened on his cheekbone, and as he neared, I realized that it was blood. Odin was behind him, dark hair tousled, hard planes of his face set in a glowering mask.

“Goddess.” Zeus mashed into me, holding me against his big, solid body. I circled my arms around him, taking comfort in his hulking strength and heaving breath.

Odin came in on the other side of me, grabbed the back of my head, and kissed me on the cheek. “Goddess,” he said, cramming halfway into Zeus. “I’m so sorry,” he said when our gazes locked. “We were such fucking-g fools, hypnotized by the jewels and vengeance.”

“But you came,” I said.

“We should’ve never left,” Odin said, eyeing my chin. “There is so fucking-g much we should’ve seen.”

“Forgive us.” Zeus slid a gentle palm over my shoulder, his expression a strange mixture of joy and grief. “You are more precious than anything in that bank,” he said. “And we almost lost you. Do you know what that would’ve done? Do you know how much we love you, goddess?”

For once I was speechless.

Thor took my hand. “We love you. We realized we’d never even told you that while we were racing over here.”

My heart nearly flew out of my chest.

“We love you. I love you,” Thor said.

“I fucking-g love you beyond anything,” Odin said.

“I love you, too,” I said, looking from Thor to Zeus to Odin. “I love all of you and each of you. Like wildfire.”

Odin’s voice sounded gravelly, serious. “We don’t deserve that love right now—”

“You’re wrong,” I said. “You always do.”

“No, Odin’s right,” Zeus said. “We don’t deserve it right now. But we are going to spend however long it takes making this up to you.”

“Because you are everything precious to us,” Odin said.

My eyes went to the rock pile. “Manning—”

“He’s dead,” Zeus said.

“Good,” I whispered.

“We ripped him apart. Literally,” Zeus growled. “Odin ripped his guts out.”

I shifted my eyes to Odin and I knew from his expression that it was true. Also, his black shirt was wet with blood. Zeus’s clothes were bloody, too.

“You want to see his body?” Zeus asked.

“Umm…that’s okay,” I said. “I’m just going to believe you.”

He looked disappointed. “But it might be good, psychologically, to have seen his corpse with your own eyes so you know deep down that he can’t hurt you again.”

It was sweet, but also a little bit morbid. “That’s okay.”

Zeus’s expression hardened. “Nobody fucks with the God Pack.”

“Right,” I said, feeling a sudden hopelessness at the reminder of their lust for vengeance.

“No, it’s different now,” Odin said. “Vengeance needs to be a choice, not a compulsion.”

“Except for killing Manning,” Zeus said. “That was kind of a compulsion for me, but now that he’s dead, vengeance can be a choice.”

“So we’re going to the island?” I teased. “To retire in splendor?”

“No,” Zeus said. “That still sounds just sad. The point is, we’re not the bitches of vengeance anymore.”

“Never again,” Thor said.

Ironically, I had twisted sensei Robert Manning to thank for that.

“You guys are amazing,” I said. Because really, this was huge.

Right in that moment, they seemed completely free, like wild animals.

Bloody.

Primal.

Beautiful.

Intensely alive.