Vicious Angel (Criminal Sins 2)

Anna’s at my side before I can think too deeply about it. My first instinct is to hand the murder weapon over to her, but she seems unphased. “You keep it,” she yells through the chaos. “I’ve got a backup!” Sure enough, her little hand is filled with a fresh silver stake.

She doesn’t have to tell me to start running. In the blink of an eye, we’re both moving as fast as we can towards the free opening in the collapsed hedge ahead.

Anna’s fingers find my hand again just as a rogue gust lifts my flowing gown over my eyes. I don’t fear. Instead, I just trust my new friend, following her hand as it leads me through the chaos. Her grip tightens around my palm—and then, suddenly, it’s gone.

“Anna!?” I shout, as I desperately fight through the shroud that is my windswept gown. When I finally get the damn thing down, there’s no sign of her... but I do see a wall of angry security guards racing towards me from the west. Luckily, the route to my freedom lays to the east—I hesitate to take it, though; I don’t want to leave my friend behind.

“Cat!” That’s not Anna’s voice, but it is one I instantly recognize.

My gaze snaps away from my pursuers and towards the newest hole in the hedges.

Angel stands in the opening like a rebel king behind his wave of revolutionaries. My heart catches in my throat, but there’s no time to get caught up with sentimentality. My feet find me running again.

In the distance, I see Angel barking orders at his ragtag group of intruders. They make a beeline for my pursuing guards. We rush by each other and I swear, even though my focus is locked entirely on Angel, I can hear them chant my name like a rallying cry.

That all disappears when Angel and I meet in the middle of the chaos.

The earth goes silent, the wind goes still; my heart explodes as I jump into my savior’s big strong

arms and plant my lips against his.

For one blissful moment, nothing moves. Angel’s heart beats in sync with mine as our body’s meld and our souls intertwine, finally together again...

And then, just like that, everything erupts back into focus. Gunfire, screaming, explosions—a veritable war surrounds us—but as my senses return, only one thing comes to mind.

“Anna!” As if Angel would even know who that is. Before I can explain, though, his thick finger is on my lips.

“She’ll be fine,” he states, nodding back behind me.

I turn around and flinch from the violent fight that’s broken out. Bright red blood splatters across the green grass as allies and foes fall to each other’s hand.

But out of that chaos, scrambles a familiar young woman.

Anna breaks from the fight, her fresh needle newly bloodied. Another fallen tree has opened up a new path out of here—she breaks the threshold even before we can.

“Are you ready to go now?” Angel’s voice is low and hot.

I sneer back at the chaos we caused, then nod. “Let’s get the fuck out of here.”

15

Angel

We’re not out of the woods yet.

It looks like the Colombian army has been called in on us. I unholster my gun with my free hand and pull Cat in close with my other arm. She falls against my body and I whip around, putting myself in between her and the approaching militia. Bullets upend the earth around our feet as an incredible wind blows at our backs.

I fire at the wall of soldiers and they quickly disperse. Behind them, though, comes something not even I can fight. A tank. “We need to get out of here,” I growl, looking for a new route of escape. I knew that there was a good chance Dante would have the army nearby in case I came to interrupt his wedding, but I also figured that he would never expect me to have so much support. My little brother has an iron grip over everyone who would ever work for a former cartel kingpin, after all—but he has no control over those who choose to revolt with a fellow revolutionary...

“This way!” I shout. Taking Cat’s wrist, I lead her towards a nearby alleyway. Just before we can break into the protected pathway, a huge shockwave knocks us off of our feet. Before we can hit the pavement, I wrap Cat in my arms. My skin scrapes against the hard ground, but I don’t give the pain a second thought—I’ll be fine as long as she is.

“Are you okay?” I ask, as we scramble back to our feet.

Cat’s wedding gown is splayed up over her head. I grab the edges and tear it away, ripping the fabric at the seams and freeing her from that terrible fate. “Yeah, yeah, I’m fine,” she responds, almost in a daze. Her eyes are fixed on something just over my shoulder. I turn around and see the smoking barrel of the approaching tank; a huge crater lies in front of it, no more than forty yards away from us.

These idiots are actually shooting at us with fucking tanks. They’d rather tear their own city apart then let me get away with my brother’s prized hostage. The fools. They’ll see what true destruction is. This is just the start of the revolution.

A new flurry of bullets nips at our feet and we both snap out of our daze at the same time. I push Catalina behind the alleyway’s brick wall and race ahead, then I crouch down. “Get on,” I order. Catalina is no slouch, but I know we’ll go faster with her on my back. She doesn’t meet me with any resistance. Her long legs wrap around my hips like we’re back on my bike. When she’s on, I start sprinting.