Page 106 of Her Mercenary

Both men were on their feet now, viciously beating each other to a bloody pulp.

I felt drunk, my brain not quite catching up with the adrenaline beginning to stir inside me. But I knew I needed to get to Roman. To help him.

Standing was out of the question, so I crawled across the mud on my hands and knees, my vision blurred, my pulse a deafening whomp, whomp, whomp in my ears.

Roman’s body slammed against a tree. Blood dripped from his chin.

Conor didn’t relent, advancing on Roman like a wild animal. He kept screaming, “You were my blood, you were my blood.”

Roman swung a punch and missed. His steps faltered against Conor’s rapid-fire punches, the rage pouring off the evil man like an invisible force.

I tried to stumble to my feet but collapsed again onto my hands and knees.

I heard a loud pop of fist against bone, and then, like a tree falling, Roman went down like a plank, his body disappearing into the thick brush.

“No!” I screamed in a pathetic gargled hiss.

Conor turned to me. His eye patch had fallen off during the fight, revealing a scarred black hole where his left eye should have been. Blood poured out of his mouth, and one of his bloodied teeth was missing.

His chest heaving, he stumbled over to me, his eye sparking with that same feral rage as when he’d looked at Roman.

I scrambled backward, willing my body to leap up and run away from this horrifying monster advancing on me.

“Oh no you fucking don’t.” Conor lunged forward, his bloodied face contorted with rage.

I screamed, bracing for the attack, but my attention was pulled behind the madman.

Roman leaped from the brush like a lion, slamming his fist into the side of Conor’s head, the vicious blow sending Conor flying into the air like a rag doll.

Roman fell to his knees next to me. “Are you okay?” He frantically looked me over.

My chest heaved as I stared into his bloodied face and frantic eyes, unable to form words.

“Sam, are you—God, tell me you’re okay.” Roman desperately gathered me into his arms.

I nodded and opened my mouth to speak, but something pulled Roman’s attention away from me.

Conor had emerged from the fog and was scrambling to his car on all fours.

Roman’s fingers slipped from my body, his grip around me released. I collapsed back onto the ground. Wild-eyed, Roman turned his back to me.

He didn’t hear my grunt of pain as I hit the dirt. He no longer saw me.

I was no longer his focus. I no longer existed to the man.

His eyes were unlike anything I’d seen before. His face was absolutely terrifying.

Conor reached his car, throwing himself inside and slamming the gas.

Roman turned toward a truck, which was running, ready, the door standing open as if calling to him.

My stomach sank. He’s going to leave me. Roman was going to catch Conor and kill him, avenge his mother, avenge Bear, and finish the job he’d built his life around.

I no longer existed in his world.

And it broke my fucking heart.

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