Page 54 of Under Control

Something smashes into our SUV and sends us careening into a light pole.

Someone needs to stop honking the fucking horn.

I’m groggy and my head hurts. A dream swims through my brain: Karine in my arms, smiling like she’s having the time of her life. I started a war for her. I set aside my plans because she’d been insulted.

I didn’t know I could be so fucking stupid.

“Valentin!”

Anton’s voice, coming from a distance. “Would you get off the horn?” I mutter. Someone roughly shakes me. Fuck, my skull’s pounding.

“Come on, you fucking asshole, come on.” Anton’s unbuckling my seatbelt. The world begins to resolve itself again.

The airbag is in my lap. I’m slumped forward, bleeding and hurting all over. The car’s wrapped around a light pole and the horn won’t shut the fuck up.

Outside, another car’s steaming in the cool afternoon sun.

And three men are climbing out.

“Shit,” I say, unbuckling my seatbelt. I turn to look at Karine, but she’s okay. She’s already scrambling for the door, trying to get out. I shove open the driver’s side and nearly fall out onto the sidewalk, and Anton comes after me just as the Armenian soldiers reach our SUV. They break the tinted windows, aiming guns inside at nothing, as I shuffle over to Karine. I grab her wrist and drag her into me, holding her tight.

“You cover her,” Anton says through his teeth. “I’ll take them.”

“There are too many.” I pull my gun and give Karine a look. She’s shaking with terror, and I hate the Armenians for making her feel this way. All the dead, all the blood, none of it compares to my wife’s pain. And I’ll make sure they suffer for that. “I’ll help.”

“You’re a goddamn mess,” Anton snarls.

He’s right: my calf has a long, bloody gash where I was grazed, and I’m bleeding from my forehead where I bashed into the airbag and clipped myself on the steering wheel. I’d also bet I have a couple broken ribs.

“No choice.” I’m in agonizing pain, but I prepare myself to fight anyway. The Armenian soldiers are coming around the car. “Ready?”

Tires scream as another truck comes to a violent stop. There are shouts and screams as guns go off, rough explosions in an otherwise peaceful intersection.

I lift my head and watch as Artemy jumps from the driver’s seat of his vehicle, gun raised, only to take a bullet in the chest. The old man goes down, but his loyal guards keep fighting, and soon the Armenians get overwhelmed.

“We have to move,” I command Anton and Karine.

I surge up and pull Karine after me, barking orders at Artemy’s men. They drag the injured brigadier into the back seat and try to stabilize him as Anton gets behind the wheel. I keep Karine in my lap, holding her tight, and the truck screeches as Anton speeds away from the bloody wreckage of the battle.

Chapter 19

Karine

Valentin deposits me into his room, posts a guard on the door, and orders me not to go anywhere. Then he disappears, leaving me to curl up in a ball on an easy chair.

I try to get the sound of killing out of my head.

But it’s stuck like a catchy tune, and no matter what I do, I keep seeing the spray of blood, the screams of men dying, the roar of bullets thudding into the walls all around me.

And it was my fault.

It wasmy fault.

How could I have been so stupid? How could I have been so naive? I should have kept my mouth shut and let that horrible woman insult my parents. If I had been the bigger person, Valentin’s men might still be alive, and his plans might still be in motion.

Instead, I let my anger get the best of me and I started a war.

I play that moment over and over through my head. I think of a dozen different ways I could’ve handled myself. But always, no matter what, the shooting starts again, because my aunt was setting me up from the very start.

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