Page 25

I roll onto my back and watch, wide-eyed, as he’s dragged away and thrown.

Literally thrown down the hallway.

The sound when his body meets the ground is a heavy, rolling thump.

“You good, Q?” Blinking, I gape up at Xavier. He’s hardly even breathless after literally yeeting a man ten feet. “Q. Use your words, sweetheart.”

I swallow, hating myself for preening a little at the first kind nickname he’s ever given me. “I’m okay.”

“Good. How many?”

“Three.”

His brows raise. “Oh. Easy.” The other bodyguard appears, and Xavier glances at him quickly before returning his attention to me. “Stay.”

He wastes no time striding toward his opponents. The big guy is still fumbling to get up, so Xavier focuses entirely on man number two. He throws a punch and blood spits across the wall. Another punch. Another. He grips the man’s head and slams it into the pretty wallpaper, and he almost comically drops to the ground.

“What is it you were saying to our girl?” Xavier asks the attacker, who has finally gotten to his feet.

Our girl.

Xavier doesn’t even like me.

“You fucking Silver kids have no idea what you’re up against,” the man says, sneering.

“An amateur.” Xavier ducks and weaves as the man throws punch after punch, but his muscles do nothing for him compared to Xavier’s speed. He’s toying with him, a smirk on his handsome face as he avoids every hit. “You can’t just buy a gun and call yourself a killer, y’know.”

The man roars in frustration. “I’m gonna fucking kill⁠—”

Xavier snaps his neck.

I gasp, my hand flying to my mouth, as he slumps to the ground in a final, ground-shaking thud. My skin chills, and nausea burns the back of my throat as my brain tries to make sense of what I’ve just witnessed—but there’s no time.

Ryker appears.

“Xavier!” I scream, but he doesn’t turn in time.

All I see is the flash of a blade before it’s buried in Xavier’s back. He turns, and Ryker yanks out the knife and pushes it into Xavier’s stomach.

I’m moving before I can stop myself. My pain forgotten, my heart in my throat, rage and fear racing through me as I grab Ryker’s wrist, using the last of my strength to push my thumb into the pressure point by his pulse. Instinctively, his hand flexes, and he drops the knife.

A sharp, piercing pain collides with my face.

My back meets the wall, blood pouring out of my nose and into my mouth.

He headbutted me.

The fucker headbutted me.

I’ve had my nose broken six times. Four of those occasions were before my fifteenth birthday. But I had a good streak going, and this fucker has ruined it.

I roar, snatching the knife off the floor and rushing at him. I flip the weapon so the pommel is at the base of my fist, pressing my thumb to the base and sweeping it out. I strike, the blade slipping through his shirt like butter, and given the resistance, I definitely cut him.

It must be muscle memory that drives me, because I fall into steps and movements that I haven’t used in a decade. My body isn’t as nimble, and I’m slower and out of breath faster, but I sweep, dodge, stumbling only once or twice, but never letting Ryker land another hit.

My heart thumps as I spin and throw my strength into jabbing the knife in quick, sharp movements. Death by a thousand cuts, my dad used to call it, but he’d use a piece of wood shaped like a dagger that caused more bruises than torn skin. My school would ask too many questions, otherwise.

Sweat has my dress clinging to my skin, and I’m desperate to heave in fresh air, but I keep my breathing low. Ryker, on the other hand, is panting, staring at me like I’m not human.