Page 104 of The Butterfly Killer

“Hands up!”

Burns walked in with Diego. The man was naked from the waist down. The entrance had Mercer’s eyebrows raising.

Cortez’s men were taken aback by the sight which gave Mercer the chance to swipe Bruce’s feet out from under him. He went down hard, face slamming into the concrete. Mercer stomped his foot on his back to keep Bruce down.

Cortez darted to the right. The other men started shooting at Burns. The bullets hit Diego and he went down in a bloody mess.

Burns shot one man and darted behind the shelves holding large boxes of merchandise.

Mercer wrapped his legs around Bruce who attempted to get up. He got his legs around Bruce’s neck and squeezed until the man went limp.

The last guy chased after Burns. He shot at the box Burns had been standing behind. He peeked around?—

Burns punched the man in the face. The man swayed backwards. Burns hit him one more time and he went down.

The knock out was hot and it blindsided Mercer for a moment. He shook his head, confused by the out of control feeling. He never got out of control. He was anything but not in control.

He frowned as he waited for Burns to come untie him.

“Are you alright?” He asked as Burns came towards him.

Burns was slightly out of breath, but otherwise, he looked unharmed.

Burns chuckled. “I think I should be asking you that. They were about to crush your skull in before I rescued you.”

“I had it under control.”

“Riiight.”

Burns tucked the gun into the front of his waistband. He went around to the back of the chair and crouched. “Any idea who might have the key?”

He messed with the handcuffs, trying a key Mercer didn’t know where he got, but he assumed was off Diego who was now lying face down at the front of the warehouse.

“Check that one.” He nodded toward Bruce who was also lying face down on the ground. He wasn’t dead though.

Burns stepped over the passed out man and searched him up and down. He found a set of keys and came back around. After the fourth key, Mercer heard a click and the handcuffs loosened. They dropped to the floor.

Mercer brought his arms to the front of him and massaged his wrists. There were red marks on either one. The skin stung.

Burns was about to walk away, automatically surveying the area as they were both trained to do. But Mercer grabbed hisarm, stopping him from getting away from Mercer as he knew he was trying to do.

Burns avoided his eyes.

“Are you okay, Burns?”

Burns’s brows raised.

Yeah, Mercer wasn’t used to asking that either. He usually didn’t care about people’s feelings or their well being unless he could get something out of it. Or if it benefited him. However, anything related to Burns felt automatically his and he needed to take care of it.

“I’m fine. We need to find Cortez.”

Mercer didn’t believe that at all. He was tempted to force Burns to spit it out. His methods would be unethical and Burns would definitely not like him for awhile, but it was tempting. The sadist in him wanted to go through with it before anyone else showed up.

For a moment, he started to lose control again. He bit his tongue so hard he drew blood.

He didn’t lose control. He was better than that.

“Sure,” he muttered.

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