Page 80 of Bratva Butcher

I stood to my full height, took one step and—

BOOM!

Chapter Twenty-Five

Autumn DeValos

“What the fuuuuuuuck?!” Ishrieked as my body was hurled into the air by a strong, concussive force. I barely had the right mind to curl myself inwards to try to lessen the blow. It all happened so fast.

I crashed into a hard body. We went tumbling to the ground. Reflexes took over, and I tried to jam the knife in my hand into the guy’s eye without stopping to processwhoI had actually landed on top of.

He blocked it just in the nick of time, the tip of the blade hovering an inch from his eye. “What the fuck, Autumn?!”

It was Dimitri. I’d just almost killed Dimitri. I would have felt bad about it, but I’d tried to kill him half a dozen times… What was one more?

“Oh, whoops.” I gave him an awkward smile, tucking the blade away. “That’s my bad.”

He narrowed his eyes and then threw me off him roughly.

Fair.

When I got to my feet, I stared wide-eyed at the destruction that lay before me. The colosseum, once a grand, beautiful monument was in ruins, one half of it completely blown to pieces, smoke, dust and sand bellowing into the air. The people who had been sitting in the stands were now running for their lives, screaming, trying to get away from the fire and rubble falling around them.

People in tactical gear carrying machine guns swarmed the arena, coming in from all different entry points. They shot at Talon’s men.

A rescue?

My gaze shot to Dimitri. He was wiping the sand off his body, his eyes moving around the arena, going from person to person. Recognition flashed across his face.

He knew who they were.

“Your people?” I asked.

He gave the barest nod as an answer. He looked about as shocked as I felt. Like me, he hadn’t expected anyone to actually find us—

“Duck!” I threw my knife as Dimitri ducked quickly. It sunk deep into a soldier’s chest who had been running up behind him.

“Left,” Dimitri barked. I spun right at the same time he launched himself forward, his fist smashing into a soldier’s face who was about to ram a sword into my back. He looked at me, breathing heavily. “Keep up if you want to get out of here.” And then he was off, running towards the gunfire.

Guess that was better than him just straight up abandoning me.

I smiled.

He totally likes me.

I bolted after him.

Talon’s soldiers were dropping like flies, no match for the high-powered weapons Dimitri’s people carried. The smart ones ran away now that the tables had turned, but over half of Talon’s army remained despite the overwhelming odds stacked against them.

Five of said soldiers stepped into our path, stopping us dead in our tracks. They each had a weapon of some kind in their hands.

Dimitri and I put our fists up. “You take the three on the left. I’ll get the two on the right.”

He just grunted in response.

Because a simple “okay” would have been too many syllables. The dick.

I tensed my muscles, preparing to strike when a rain of gunfire came out of nowhere, taking them all out instantly. A blonde-haired man jogged over a second later, a shit-eating grin on his face as he hiked his machine gun up onto his shoulder.

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