Page 88 of Cohesion

Spencer snorted and patted him on the arm. “No, you can’t,” he said. “Ken will eat you alive.”

“Uh—do you—you don’t mean that literally, right?” Spencer didn’t answer. Henry took a hesitant step away from them both.

Sebastian ignored all of them as he fished out his phone, checking his emails as he walked across the dark underground parking lot. Twelve had dropped into his inbox since the last time he’d checked, not ten minutes ago.

A car approached as he typed out his response to the first email, and he slowed without looking up, so that it could pass before he crossed over to the other side.

He looked up with a frown when Spencer tensed beside him. The car suddenly veered toward them, high beams flicking on and blinding them as it sped up.

Henry grabbed Sebastian’s jacket and yanked him backwards. He awkwardly landed on the hood of a nearby car, jarring his hip.

The car coming at them missed Sebastian by barely an inch but hit Kendrick head-on, slamming him into the back of another car, sandwiching him between them with a sickening crack.

A different set of high beam lights flicked on directly in front of Sebastian, disorienting him as hands grabbed at him. His phone slipped from his grasp, and he twisted, pulling out of the hold. He blinked rapidly, trying to get rid of the spots in his eyes and get his wits about him.

One of the sets of hands was yanked off him, someone fired a gun, the sound loud and reverberating through Sebastian like an electric zap.

Sebastian saw brief glimpses of Spencer in the fray with him, blood running down his cheek from a gash across it. Thecrackand accompanying cryas Spencer kicked down on a leg signalled that he’d at least broken one of their legs. And then he dropped like a sack as he got hit in the back of the head.

No.

Sebastian fought harder against the hands, still blinded by the bright lights, the noise from the gunshot ringing in his ears. He finally got enough distance between him and the man to be able to throw a half-decent punch.

It was a little off-centre, and his footwork was all wrong, but it was all he could manage. His lip split as he was punched back, more accurately thrown than his own punch had been. He knew that being in the ring, even competition sparring, was different from a real-life situation, but the adrenalin and fear that were coursing through him told him just how different it was. Muscle memory guided him as panic tried to lock his reactions down. Hands attempted another grab, and he did everything he couldto stop them getting a proper hold. The door of the second car swung open, and he knew that it was meant for him. He couldn’t let them get him inside. The chances of survival dwindled to almost nothing if that happened.

They hauled Spencer’s dead weight into the backseat, and panic rose in Sebastian’s throat. He needed to get free, but did that mean leaving Spencer to his fate? Sebastian couldn’t do that. He had to stop them.

He used all of his strength to shove one of the men backward—how fucking many of them were there? The man’s body jerked awkwardly as another deafening gunshot rang out. Red bloomed on his forehead before he dropped. Sebastian stared in shock. It was the third time in barely months that he’d watched someone get killed. The contents of his stomach tried to rise uncomfortably. His job was about saving people, notshootingthem.

“Seb, to me,” Henry barked.

Sebastian’s head jerked up to find Henry holding his firearm firmly in two hands, aimed at the car and the two men that Sebastian hadn’t noticed.

Four. There were four men. One in the driver’s seat. One dead at his feet. Two with guns aimed at Henry. One of them was standing awkwardly, leaning against the car. Broken leg. The one that Spencer had pulled off Sebastian.

Sebastian flinched and ducked instinctively when they fired at Henry. Henry returned fire, an answering grunt in response. Another gunshot had Sebastian’s blood pressure rising dangerously. He wasn’t a stranger to people wishing him harm, but until barely two months ago, none of those attempts had involvedguns.This was somehow infinitely worse. Fuck, he needed a holiday.

His heart leapt into his throat when the next shot involved a cry fromHenry.His lips parted in horror when blood pouredfrom Henry’s cheek, and he instantly slumped to the ground, his firearm sliding out of his grip and out of reach. There was no slow motion, no finesse. He dropped, just like Spencer had, and Sebastian’s lower lip trembled. He couldn’t look away as he slumped on the concrete, blood pooling around his face.

Sebastian thought he saw a flutter of eyelashes, movement, but he had to be imagining it. Sharp pain erupted in the back of his head, and his knees buckled, his limbs turning to instant jelly. He couldn’t have stopped them from shoving him face first into the backseat, on top of Spencer, even if he’d tried.

“FuckingChrist,” someone spat. The car door slammed shut, hitting his foot and making him flinch. “We need him alive, you fucking moron, and his brainintact.Do you know what a hit like that could do to him?”

“I got him in the fucking car, didn’t I?”

Sebastian groaned as the car screeched, jostling him as they moved. He slid his hands up Spencer’s front, checking for any signs of life. The rise and fall of his chest was light, but it was there.Thank fuck. He couldn’t do this alone, couldn’t be going who the fuck knew where by himself. Maybe it was selfish, but he was glad that Spencer was here. And alive.

Thealivedistinction was important.

He managed to push himself into a sitting position and came face-to-face with the barrel of a gun from the man in the front passenger seat.

Shit.

Chapter Twelve

Quinn jumped out ofthe car before Grady had stopped completely at the boom gates. He couldn’t sit in the car and wait to go through the rigmarole of getting a ticket and then winding around the levels to reach the bottom, where Jericho had said Sebastian’s car would be.

He burst through the stairwell doors and made his way down the four flights of stairs to the bottom, almost slipping twice.

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