Page 71 of Beautiful Dark Temptation

I heard Mad Dog beside me breathe but didn’twant to look at him. My face burned with all the scratches momsleft me. I didn’t want to ask the question I knew was true.

Mad Dog was my brother.

I wasn’t a Brennan, which meant that Mad Dogand I did not share fathers. Which considering he killed my father,that was a good thing for him. But Daniel. It made sense. Thereason he saved my life.

I licked my swollen lip and winced. Touchingthe swelling carefully just to be sure. Yup. It hurt.

The city landscape changed to highway road.We were headed to the airport. We’d leave Chicago behind. I’d neversee moms again. Maybe not Nick. Definitely not the neighborhood.And I didn’t feel particularly sad about that. But I still neededto know. I wasn’t good at keeping shit inside. Brenda, Daniel’snice girlfriend had once said I was like Tinker Bell. She couldonly hold one emotion inside at a time before she exploded.

“Are you my brother?” I asked. It soundedstupid. Anticlimactic. I wanted to take it back.

“Katarina is my biological mother,” heanswered. “Yeah, we’re brothers.”

“Did you kill Daniel?”

“Idid not kill Daniel,” he said.Stressing theIpart. I didn’t ask for clarification. Afraidof his response.

“When did you find out?”

“That night. Daniel used it as his trumpcard. Said he found my birth certificate and that we were brothers.Of course, I didn’t believe him, so I took some of his hair for DNAbefore…”

I swallowed the bile rising in my throat.Before someone killed him. “He knew? He didn’t tell me.”

“I wasn’t sure,” Mad Dog shook his head at amemory, probably. “I wasn’t sure if that day you knew. That youcame to kill me because you knew. But when you said what you didabout her, I knew you didn’t. And then the gun was empty…” he shookhis head again and turned away from me.

“It wasn’t the money,” I snorted and winced.“I could’ve afforded the bullets.”

“I know. You’re not a killer like us.”

“Us?”

“Joaquín killed Trinidad for some reasonwe’re still unclear about. Miguel was there, but Cruz and Danielweren’t. A surveillance camera across the street caught them. Theybroke their vows.”

“Daniel didn’t. And neither did Cruz.”

“And that’s why I gave them a pardon.” Heslammed the steering wheel hard. “I switched their bodies, gavethem new identities, sent them to boofoo Egypt with a warning ifthey ever popped up on a radar, I would erase them and theirbloodline.”

“Daniel’s alive?”

“Delete that shit from your brain, Tomás. Imean it. If my father finds out what I did, we are dead. He willuse you to get to me. To get to Daniel.”

I swallowed. Kieran had said that two menwere there for me. That others would be coming. I had a contractout on me. It all clicked. “I think he knows. He put a contract outon me.”

Just then, a semi-truck slammed into theback of Maddox’s car, sending us into a ditch. The airbag explodedin my face and for a second all I felt was pain. My ears rang andeverything around me seemed to slow. Maddox was already climbingout of the car, gun in hand.

Pop. Pop. Pop.

Three muffled shots erupted. Three popsreturned and the sound of bullet against metal somewhere around me.Hands were on me and my little bubble burst. I flailed, slammed afist at a jaw.

“I’m trying to get you out,” Maddox growledout.

My seatbelt ripped and I stumbled out.Strong hands grabbed me way too hard and shoved me into themotherfucking trees. Everything surreal. A shootout in broaddaylight in Chicago traffic. What the ever-loving fuck? Where was acop when you needed one?

“Move,” Maddox ordered.

I spat out a glob of blood. “I thoughtairbags are supposed to protect you.”

He grunted, grabbed my collar, and shoved meahead of him. His gun aimed somewhere behind him. He must’ve seensomething I didn’t because another pop rang out.

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