Page 70 of Beautiful Liar

“It’s me you want. Send one of them with Micah. He can give Kieran a message that you have me. That’ll throw him off. He may even come for me.” I showed him my brand. “Honor and all that shit.”

I heard Micah’s eyeroll beside me.

Ashton grabbed my wrist. I started to yank it back but Beck placed my bokken under my chin. A threat. “How about,” Ashton said, removing a blade from somewhere behind him. A real blade. “You cheater,” I said like an idiot. With an evil gleam in his eye, he placed the blade over my thumb, the tip against my skin at the edge of my brand. “I send him a piece of your flesh with Micah.”

My heart thudded in my chest. “Ashton, come on. This is just a fucking game.” Maybe I was naïve. Maybe I didn’t belong in this crowd of killers. But fuck, Ashton and I had brought down the Ark Boys during the flag wars. I’d been scapegoated for him,for them. “Ashton.” My voice broke. Not entirely out of fear, but out of pity. For him. “We’re friends.”

His eyes narrowed as he pressed the blade deep. Blood pooled at the tip, and I flinched but didn’t move. “I thought so too until I found out you were fucking the enemy.”

I was dead. These homophobic pricks were going to kill me.

Beck moved the bokken to the back of my head.

“Ashton,” Micah said. “Please.”

The bokken lifted from my head. I felt the draft and I knew the fucker’s intent. They were going to send Micah back a vegetable. I pushed back just as Beck swung down toward Micah’s head. The bokken landed on my shoulder. Pain roared through me.

“Run!” I ordered Micah. If he didn’t run, he was dead.

I kicked out hard, hitting Ashton’s nose. I felt it give and heard him scream. I didn’t wait to enjoy the sight of blood on his face. Beck was the immediate threat. Annika ran after Micah. I prayed he’d make it, but I had to worry about Beck.

I jumped to my feet as he swung again, the bokken longer and clumsier in his hand. I grabbed his wrist, spun into the swing, and elbowed his ribs hard. He sucked in a breath and released the bokken. I used the momentum, spun with the bokken leading and cracked him in the face just as Kennedy slammed into me. Fuck it. My blood wouldn’t be the only blood spilled tonight. Just as I faceplanted, he was suddenly ripped away from my body. I spun onto my back, ready to kick, but Kennedy was gone. Just gone.

Darkness had already spread under the canopy of trees. Light struggled to pass between the branches, but it wasn’t enough to get a clear view of anything. I heard Kennedy’s scream and then nothing.

Beck had a gash on his cheek, blood pouring down hisface, eyes wide in terror. He ran.

Annika hadn’t returned.

Something was in the woods.

Ashton yanked me to my feet, pulling me against him, his knife against my throat. “Tell him I have a knife to your throat. A real knife. Tell him!”

“Who?”

The sting against my throat made me realize this wasn’t a fucking joke. Either Ashton killed me on purpose or on accident. “He has a knife!” I cried out.

Ashton shuddered, his knife hand shaking, his grip on my shirt strong. With every movement he heard, he swung me in front of it. Using me as a shield against the threat as if he believed whoever was out there actually cared about me.

River? Fox? Wren? They were the only three that would probably care if Micah and I survived. But they wouldn’t play with their target. And the way Ashton was trembling, he had seen something to spook him.

“Ashton,” I whispered. “Let’s just run.”

Too late.

Ashton stiffened behind me. His knife hand dropped from my throat. A slight inhalation brushed the back of my neck before I was pushed away from his body by strong arms. I heard Ashton fall to the ground, and then the gasping sound I recognized when Kieran had stabbed Jack’s throat.

A solid hard body wrapped an arm around my waist. “Don’t look back. You don’t want to see,” Luca whispered against my neck. I smelled the musky oily scent attributed to the make-up he wore. “Little angry boys shouldn’t play killer with killers.”

“You killed him?”

“Yes. Maybe. He looks like he’ll soon be dead.”

“We should help him.”

“Why?”

“So he doesn’t die.”

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