Page 75 of The Wicked

He grabbed my wrist. “Come on, on the count of three—”

“No, wait, we’re not—”

“Two.”

“We have no fucking cover, E—”

He was on his feet, pulling me along with him as we sprinted down the open area towards the SUVs.

From the corner of my eye, I saw one of the boats filled with men taking cover and shooting at the other party that had just arrived.

What the fucking hell is happening?

Elio pulled us down again behind one of the SUVs. He blew out a short breath, his eyes doing that sharp movement thing again as he looked around. “Were you shot?”

“No, I wasn’t, but you’d love that, wouldn’t you.”

He ignored me. “We’re taking one of their cars, they’ll probably chase us, but you have an outstanding aim, so we should be fine.”

I swallowed, leveling my breathing. “What the fuck is in this painting? They literally brought a whole goddamn army.”

“How much were you paid to retrieve it?”

I hesitated, sucking in my pride as I spoke. “Five thousand dollars.”

His head snapped towards me sharply. “Five thousand dollars?” he almost yelled.

“It was a moment of weakness; trust me, we regret taking the job.”

“Nobody would send this many people to kill for a painting worth five thousand dollars,” he stated, his stern gaze locked on mine.

We stared at each other, my head roaming with thoughts, mind racing, gears shifting.

“Well fuck,” I finally said, cocking the gun. “Now four parties are gunning for this fucking twisted chihuahua.”

“Four?”

“Yeah, the person who paid us, the people who shot him, the people currently shooting at the people who shot him, and now us, the people who stole it.”

Elio shook his head in disbelief. “Greedy fucking thief.”

I smirked. “Psycho fucking killer.”

He let out a frustrated sigh. “Come on.” And then he was moving again; I followed him swiftly.

We quietly maneuvered through the maze of cars, ducking when we came in line with some of the men standing guard while the others shot at the boat people.

I held tighter to the painting, knowing that whatever it was had to be something big. Big enough to cause this amount of chaos in such a short period.

“Hold,” Elio said, stopping, and I froze behind him.

Scoffing, I tsked. “Acting like you were in the army,” I muttered.

“I was,” he said without looking back. “A year. It was enough to learn that when a superior says hold, you shut your mouth and hold.”

I did shut up, stretching my neck to see him eyeing a car by a near end; a man stood there, alert, gun in hand, looking for any unusual movement, presumably.

“We’re taking that one,” Elio said, voice low, calm, and precise.