Page 85 of Wicked Ambition

The cars!The mobsters left their cars on the street. What if she went through the neighbor’s yard? She could reach the vehicles and use one of them as a distraction.

Were men guarding them? Or were they so cocky that they didn’t bother?

Her money was on arrogant. Ayla stood, took a deep breath to calm the shaking, and moved. Gunfights didn’t last long. If she wanted to create a diversion, she needed to do it now. She thought of Oz, the way he took care of her, and she lowered the binocular night vision things over her eyes.

Oz was going to be furious that she took any kind of risk at all, but it was three men against eight. Ayla couldn’t stand by and let him and his friends die.

Or let her twin die.

As she crept through the carefully manicured yard of the other home, a memory surfaced. A news article she’d read.

Nowthatwould be a distraction.

If she could pull it off and didn’t get caught.

If she wasn’t too late.

Oz tookone side of the doorway, and Ski had the other. They were out of view from the hallway. They’d left Iona on the bed. Ayla would rip him a new one if she knew, but the sister was probably safer where she was.

Petrova wanted her alive. The same couldn’t be said for him and Ski.

“Eight men,” he heard across the comm system in the helmet.

That was Rusty. The intel was helpful. Oz guessed there were at least a couple of former Spetsnaz soldiers in the group.

Eight against two.

Grimness settled over him. Getting out of this was a long shot, and he knew a moment of regret that he’d never get to hold his child.

He shook it off. Not dead yet, and he wasn’t going down without a hell of a fight.

“I’m coming in,” Rusty whispered.

Oz went rigid. He couldn’t ream the kid out and order him back to watch Ayla. The situation was too precarious to speak, but he pressed the button on the mic, making clicking noises that any idiot should fucking know meant get your ass back to the clearing.

No response.

He thought about doing it again, but there was no point. If one time didn’t dissuade Rusty, a second round wouldn’t either.

Pushing aside the anger—and the fear over Ayla being left alone—he focused on the present moment. Now he needed not only to survive to have a relationship with his son or daughter, he needed to survive to protect Ayla because that dipshit left her unguarded. Rusty better fuckinghopethe Russians took out Oz.

Three against eight improves the odds.

Oz wanted to ignore that voice in his head, but it was right. Three improved the chances of survival and Rusty wasbehindPetrova’s team, not pinned down like he and Ski were.

If the kid didn’t fuck up.

A gunshot made his adrenaline surge. Oz tamped it down, harnessed it.

Petrova’s men reached the second floor, at least two of them. Oz heard them clearing the upstairs bedrooms in the same pattern he and Ski had used. Definitely Spetsnaz. The lackeys wouldn’t be as methodical.

Another shot.

Rusty? Maybe trying to draw off as many men as possible. It was a guess.

There was a salvo, multiple weapons firing.

Damn, he hoped the kid didn’t get himself killed. That was Oz’s privilege for Rusty leaving Ayla on her own.