Page 52 of Hell and High Water

But when you’re fighting for your life…

The mean son of a bitch just takes a knee like he’s taking a break and hits me with a fucking battering ram punch to the sternum.

Lucky, I was flinching back when he did.

I’ve seen Gavin shatter a man’s ribcage, collapse both a guy’s lungs with a single hit.

As it stands, I nearly pass out, nearly puke my guts out right there in the foyer of my hideout. Block the pain. I’m not there. It’s just my body. Need to go, gotta get out before they pin me down.

So I whip out my minigun and spray a quick line of ‘get-me-the-fuck-outta-here.’

Getting away after that was a breeze. They couldn’t follow me through the forest in his Jeep.

A panicked retreat is less than ideal, but I underestimated my opponents, and I shouldn’t have engaged them at all. Stupid move, Alaya.

Now they know where I was hiding out. And asses to aces, Gavin knows who I am now, too.

So much for that sweet safehouse.

I was hoping to keep the place and retire there someday. If I don’t get offed on the job.

But even if we hadn’t had a run-in, Gavin knows my style. My technique is one of a kind. Which is why I never leave witnesses. I'm good at what I do.

Just like my granddaddy, taking out the old fool in that mansion so many years ago. It’s a trademark Foxglove kill, if you know what to look for. A family affair, this trade I’m in.

No doubt, he’s been wondering about me since I shot his little girlfriend.

Zipping out of the woods and back onto a main road, I gun my bike, cursing my bad luck.

They just had to pop in on me and find the damn panic room.

And worse than that, they took the safe. I was meaning to get around to it eventually.

Oh, well. Saves me the trouble of having to crack it myself. I’ll just let them do the heavy lifting before I steal it back.

But giving that Evan guy more intel was not on my to-do list. He’s a real player in town. That much I’ve gathered.

Pretty, too. Too clean for my taste.

But he was with Gavin when they picked up the girl.

The girl I was not hired to shoot. Damon Michaels’s daughter was just a spur of the moment, flash of rage sort of choice. I should have ended her, thought about it.

With their arrival, the shot probably didn’t kill her.

Her aunt, on the other hand, was the entire reason I’m in Sanctum Harbor. The specifics of the job are what have kept me here, an oddity that stayed my hand for the first time in my entire career.

I’m asking questions I usually don’t ask.

Because I was lied to.

And there is so much more to this than I initially thought.

Sanctum Harbor’s always been the kind of place you think you never want to go back to after you leave, until you’re there again. It sucks you in, gives you clues and hints and vibes.

Next thing you know, you’re hunting down your grandfather’s old stashes, digging up a past your daddy told you stories about.

Then there’s the whole finding out Gavin was alive thing.

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