Page 139 of Ruthless Reign

The Son who’d shot at us was joined by three more, and I knew I couldn’t let up on my cover fire.

“Is he hurt?”

Hardin’s low grunt of pain reached me as Vixen struggled to get out from under him.

“Hardin! Hardin are you hit?” she all but screeched, helping him sit back upright. She looked ready to crumble, her face twisted in anguish.

“Aodhán! Aodhán, help her!”

Aodhán grabbed Hardin by his vest, assessing him with the cold precision of a warrior. “Where were you hit?”

Hardin seemed to come back around all at once, roughly brushing Aodhán off. I kept my head on a swivel, firing once, twice, then turning to make sure he was okay.

Hardin got out a hard cough and then winced as he swallowed. Was that red on his mouth?

“It hit the vest,” Hardin said finally, his voice strained as if he didn’t have enough air to speak. I didn’t believe him for one fucking second.

Aodhán was around him in an instant, checking his back.

“Is he good?” I asked, and Aodhán’s violent green eyes met mine over Hardin’s shoulder.

“It hit the vest. He’s fine.”

As soon as Aodhán said he was fine, Becca shoved Hardin hard in the chest. “Don’t you ever try to take a bullet for me again,” she screamed at him. “You fucking hear me?”

She looked like she wanted to hit him or scream, her eyes wide and wild.

I mean, we fucking told her. We told her we’d take a bullet for her. Did she think we were kidding? Or was it just different hearing us say it versus actually having to witness it happening?

She pressed a hand to her stomach like she might be sick and then swallowed hard, a string of curses falling from her lips.

I knew she was thinking the same thing I was. Asking the same question.

What if it hadn’t hit his vest?

Fuck! I couldn’t even think about it.

We needed to finish this.

I turned to Aodhán. “Did you see your dad out there?”

He shook his head. “Not yet.”

What if he didn’t show?

No. He would show. He had to. This needed to be over.

“Come on,” I said through my fucking teeth. “We need to help.”

I moved to the edge of our hide, peering across the gym, searching for Séamas. Instead, I found Ma.

She stood on the bleachers behind a half-destroyed barricade of desks with a machine gun. She cried out as she lit up several Sons who were trying to move up the steps toward her, laying them all out on the seats like discarded dolls.

Jesus.

I’d never seen her like this. I’d heard how she was when we were younger and Dad was still fighting to claim this turf for the Saints, but I’d never really seen her in action.

Fucking Sloane St. Vincent.

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