Counterfeit Love

That was only partly true. No one but a true psychopath could look down the barrel of a gun and feel nothing at all. But I had grown up a lot. I had learned a lot about this whole criminal world we lived and operated in.

And when men were there purely to end your life, they didn't need to talk your fucking ear off first. That was the shit of movies, not real life. In real life, if you wanted to take someone out, you did it the second you had a clear shot before they got the chance to take a shot at ending your life.

He wasn't here to kill me.

I knew him well enough to know that he would. If he had to. If he had no other choice. He wouldn't hesitate to wedge another couple bullets in my body.

But he had some other plan.

And, really, when it came to Ewan, there was only one thing.

Money.

And the people he could talk into making it for him.

Since he knew there was no way he was talking me into shit these days now that I knew exactly how untrustworthy he was and that I didn't fucking need him in the first place, I could only imagine he was here to try to force me into something.

This is where I am supposed to be boastful and say there was no way in hell he could ever get me to do something that I didn't want to do.

The fact of the matter is, though, Ewan had a mean reputation around our neighborhood because he was vicious and relentless in a fight. And that was back before he packed on a good fifty pounds of muscle.

I was good in a fight. Fast and unpredictable. The issue was, Ewan was just as fast, just as unpredictable. And now? He had a gun too. Mine was back in the bedroom where Chris had told me to leave it since she was going to bring the untraceable weapons for the road trip.

The only thing I had in my favor in the moment was the bone-deep desire not to be knocked out and dragged off somewhere, to be forced into labor, to be ripped from my life.

And from Chris.

I didn't expect for that to be in the top few reasons I didn't want to be forced into some twisted version of modern-day slavery, but there it was.

I didn't want to leave Chris.

I didn't want her to worry about me.

That said, though, if you were going to have your ass kidnapped and held somewhere against your will, I guess you should be thanking your lucky fucking stars that your woman was of the obsessive and methodical sort, the kind who would never take no for an answer, who would never leave any rock unturned.

So long as I didn't end up dead, I had to believe she would find me if I couldn't get myself out of this.

I wasn't the kind of man who felt weak for accepting that he might need to be saved by a woman.

I was just thankful I had one who would come looking for me.

That said, I wasn't going to go easily. It wasn't in my nature. I was a fight to the bitter end sort of person.

Maybe he would take me, but he would be hurting in a few places first.

Ewan reached out to his side, knocking on the end table a few times, making my brows draw together until I saw two big guys walking in from my spare room. My printing room. I knew without having to look that my money was gone. And because Ewan's plan seemed to be the sort that would have me doing forced labor, I would bet the paper, the inks, the plates, the press, they were all gone too. Likely moved out as soon as they saw Ferryn and Vance leave.

Fuck.

I had hope if it was only Ewan. One good punch, and I could grab the gun, find my gun, or simply run.

Ewan and two guards with guns? It wasn't looking great for me.

"Christ, Ewan, are you ever gonna learn to fight your own battles?" I asked, watching as he gave the guys a nod.

And that was when it all started to go down.

Two bulky guys and one man with a gun sitting back and enjoying the show.

The first punch was to the side, grazing off my ribs, sending a jolt of pain through me as I whirled under his arm, taking a cheap shot to the other guy's liver before turning to face the first one again

From there, it was all a blur. A pain-soaked blur. At some point, I threw a chair to gain a couple seconds of a breather. I broke off a bottle to use as a makeshift weapon, feeling it slice across my palm painfully as I jabbed it forward with enough force to embed it in one of their arms, hearing a satisfying howl of pain before the fucking moron pulled it out, blood going everywhere.