Falling into You (Falling Stars 3)

I surged forward. “We’re getting her back.”

She looked up at me. “What if we don’t?”

My spirit howled, refusing to even contemplate the idea, and those nerves were scattering over me again when my phone buzzed. I hurried to check it.

Unknown: Told you I was gonna end you, bitch. That I was gonna end you and all your friends.Panic seized me when I read the words, and my widened eyes flew to Royce and then to Kade before I rushed for Lily, shouting, “Get down!”

I dove at her, wrapping my arms around her waist.

We toppled to the floor, and I scrambled around to create a shield.

The window at the front of the house shattered as a spray of bullets flew through, same as the one in the kitchen in the next room.

I reached around to rip out my gun.

I was wrong.

We hadn’t been walking into a trap. It was an ambush.

A crash banged against the front door. Wood splintered and the chains creaked. Kade whipped around with his rifle drawn.

Royce pushed his back up against the wall, his gun drawn as he started to angle down the hall. “Where are the rest of the girls?” he hissed.

“Back room,” Kade growled.

Rhys was behind him, both of them heading toward the back room to protect what we’d always wanted to save.

These innocent women who’d been stripped of it.

The front door busted open at the same second a man burst through the window.

Gunshots rang out.

Deafening.

Me pulling the trigger and fucking hating it, but still knowing this was the duty I’d promised myself to.

The promise that I would stand up and fight.

That I would protect.

No matter the cost.

The guy went down in front of me, falling face-first to the floor. Blood pooled around him, saturating the white carpet.

Lily screamed.

Horror and fear.

“I’ve got you, Lily. I’ve got you. Just stay down. Don’t move.”

I looked to Kade who’d taken down the man who’d kicked in the door, and he angled his head that way and pressed himself tight to the wall as he peeked out, clearly anticipating there would be more.

Two guys came rushing in just as I was climbing to my feet.

Kade fired.

Once.

Twice.

Three times.

They fell.

And I was gasping, trying to see through the storm of agony and chaos that filtered through the air.

But all that air was gone when the dust cleared, and Violet was suddenly there.

Her body pinned against the monster who dragged her inside with a gun pushed up under her chin. An arm locked around her chest as she struggled to find footing. Her hands clawing at his arm.

Thunderbolt eyes found me in the turmoil.

Terror.

Sheer, absolute terror.

So gutting that I felt it stab through the middle of me.

The girl whimpered, and then she choked back a sob when she saw Lily behind me on the floor.

I’m sorry, she mouthed.

My head slowly shook.

In caution.

In encouragement.

In this stunning determination that we were going to overcome this.

Our love was too big for those who wanted to steal it.

Two more men entered through the window, and I could feel another approaching from where he’d come in through the kitchen.

I straightened, gun drawn, turning slow, and Kade was doing the same as we were surrounded on all sides.

“You see what happens when you make the wrong choices, Richard Ramsey?” the bastard sneered, wrenching Violet closer to him, glaring at me from over her shoulder. “You were offered the world. Everything you could ever want. Money. Fame. Fortune. Your every fantasy.”

I wanted to spit.

Curse that fucking twisted thought-process. These sick bastards who used and abused and debased.

He huffed the air from his nose like I was the one who disgusted him. “And you had to go and make a mockery of it. Now we’re going to have to take it from you.”

Violence skated across my flesh.

Singeing.

My hand trembled on the trigger, and I gulped, trying to keep aim, Kade tracking behind me.

He kept glancing at me, and I wondered just how many of these motherfuckers he could take out if I made a move.

If I just started running straight for them.

A decoy.

A distraction.

As long as Violet and Lily got to safety it would be a small price to pay.

He gave me a slight shake of his head.

A warning.

It was too risky.

“And then there’s the small matter of your brother-in-law. He started this entire shitshow by staging his ridiculous coup on Fitzgerald. He should have stayed in his lane. Shouldn’t have rocked the boat. But I guess he didn’t know how high those waves he was making were going to go. He was never going to get away with this. Just like you weren’t.”

I scoffed out a laugh. Biding time. Praying for backup. “You think it’s not already done? You think the records aren’t already sitting on the prosecutor’s desk? Right this second, there’s a warrant being issued for every fuckin’ one of you scumbags. Every asshole who took part in those parties. Every person who participated in getting those women and men to that house and everyone who kept them there. The dealers. The traffickers. The lowlifes on the street all the way to that piece-of shit, Lester Ford, sitting at the top thinking he’s the ruler of the world. Know he owns those ships. Ones that come into port. Know how deep his affiliations go.”