Page 97 of Vitaly

I glance at the glove box where my gun is safely tucked inside but decide to leave it. The other guy’s is much better.

Throwing open the door, I raise one hand by my head and slowly climb out. Pony-tail motions for someone to come get me. When the guy’s machine gun sticks in my face, I wonder just how threatening Nikita believes I am. Maybe I should be honored.

“You guys aren’t being very friendly,” I say, my hands raised as one man frisks me while the other holds a barrel a centimeter from my forehead. “Have I done something wrong?”

From this angle, I can’t see if the gunman’s finger is on the trigger. But they must not have been ordered to kill me. Not yet.

“Shut up,” the gunman growls.

When I’ve been properly searched, the gunman’s head turns to Pony-tail’s, which is such a mistake on his part. I wrench my head to the side and slam my hand down on the barrel of the gun to knock the butt into his chin.

Before he can so much as sway, I yank it from his grasp and slam the stock into his nose. Flipping the gun around, I grab the guy’s shirt and pull him against me before he can stumble backward.

Then I start firing. First at the guy who frisked me, then at Pony-tail, then I send a random spray of bullets to anyone who comes within a semicircle of me. My body vibrates with the recoil, my teeth chattering.

“Don’t shoot!” someone shouts, and it takes me a solid few seconds to realize they aren’t talking to me.

Nikita wants me alive.

I throw the useless man in my arms to the ground then pop two bullets into him before walking over his body toward the parked cars. No one is in sight.

“Don’t shoot?” I call, my eyes scanning the ground for a dropped round. I’m very close to being out of ammo.

“What’s the matter, you pussies? You’re just gonna let me kill all of you?”

When stomps sound from my right, I twist that way and fire three rounds into a hero who falls to the ground before he can tackle me.

“You must bereallyscared of Daddy.” I poke my head around an SUV then fire as someone creeps slightly around another. I miss, and they lurch back to safety. Lucky them.

I walk between two SUVs and lay down on my side, pointing the barrel at the crouched men I see before letting my finger tap the trigger. Yells fill the air, which is great for them because it means they’re wounded instead of dead, and finally,finally, I’m jolted by a bullet catching the side of my thigh.

A low groan vibrates my vocal cords as I glance down at the hole in my leg. I only pause a moment before lifting my gun up to aim at the person who comes running between the SUV. I take him down in a single shot, but he isn’t alone. Someone behind me kicks the gun from my hands, then two more show up to roll me onto my stomach, pinning my hands behind my back.

I wonder if that’s all the men that are left.

The man strungup beside me screeches as the skin on his face is carefully pulled from him. I say carefully because Alik is working especially hard to keep him alive during the process while Nikitastands in front of me, watching my reaction to the man who shot me being skinned alive.

I watch for a while, my arms above my head as I dangle from a chain. Not the man, but Alik. It’s so strange to me how he’s capable of doing something so…

Then again, look at what I’m capable of.

“Do you enjoy this?” I ask Nikita over the man’s screams, bringing my gaze to him.

He smiles. “Orders must be obeyed, Vitaly. The man shot my nephew, for Christ’s sake.”

“You do know that if you don’t take care of me soon, I’m going to kill you. Right? Why are you not getting on with it?”

His smile widens.

The screams finally stop, and Alik puts two fingers against the neck of my fellow prisoner. “Faint,” he tells Nikita.

Nikita takes a deep breath and hums as he lets it out. “Leave him be… I feel merciful.”

I turn my head to the man. Patches of skin on his chest have been removed. Half of his face is gone, nothing but bloodied muscle and a bulging eyeball visible. He’s not going to live. The merciful part is not keeping him alive any longer than he has to be to feel more pain.

Wow.

When Alik leaves, Nikita steps closer to me, his eyes zeroing in on my bare chest. His lips are pursed when he raises his gaze to my face. “Why did you pick the lake house?”

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