Page 83 of Wanted
He’d kept it because it was Liv’s.
And he’d provoked the next fight at school because he’d known Liv would have his back.
He’d helped Liv dispose of a body, but he would have given Vlad that same push, were he in Liv’s shoes, because Liv meanteverythingto him. Even when he’d stolen Amanda, even when he ate the last slice of fucking pizza, even when he’d spent their rent money on booze or a new girlfriend.
But now Knox didn’t know how to move on from the new kind of relationship they’d developed in the junkyard. Because Livlikedhim, and Knox would probably accept that as enough the next time Liv’s treacherous fingers traced his nape.
He hated himself for this weakness, but how could he resist scraps of affection when they came from the only person he’d ever cared for?
“Nothing happened with that girl. Knox… just... will you give me a chance?” Liv asked as if he didn’t already know the answer the pathetic creature who was so painfully addicted to his attention would eventually give.
Knox had heard these words from Liv’s mouth before. The walls in their trailer had been thin enough to give Knox moreinsight into Liv’s past relationships than he would have liked to have. ‘Give me another chance’ was a frequent plea.
But what would this chance be for? A chance to break Knox’s heart when Liv inevitably chased another skirt?
He hated that Liv would get away with this, and could already see a future in which he got his heart broken over and over again. Where he got back home from work to find Liv cheating on him, because Liv wanted everything and wouldn’t stop until he got it.
He wanted to yell into Liv’s face, tell him how much he hated this situation, but the words got stuck in his throat, and not just because they had to stay quiet. What was the point of fighting a battle he already lost?
He’d be under Liv again by midnight.
The gunshots erupting in the house cleared his mind and forced him to focus on the here and now.
Someone screamed. Another gunshot followed, and Knox’s skin tingled from the tension in his whole body. A door slammed somewhere.
More screams.
“Fuck,” Liv muttered as they both shifted at the same time. The roar of Shane’s dogs became even louder, blocking out whatever information they might have gotten from the noise otherwise, but then, out of nowhere, a shadow dashed past their hideout, running for its miserable life.
Knox froze, but Liv was already raising the gun. “Stop, or I’ll shoot,” he yelled at the top of his lungs.
In the faint moonlight, he appeared gray, but Knox could still see the tense set of his shoulders, his feet braced, as if he expected needing to chase the fucker.
The guy gave Liv one glance and took his chances, no doubt hoping to hide in the vast junkyard.
Liv shot, and the man toppled, hit in the leg.
For half a second, Knox was too shocked to do anything and listened to the guy’s scream as Liv’s arms dropped. He stared at the gun in his hand, as if he too couldn’t believe what had just happened. But Knox saw movement a few paces ahead and looked that way in time to see the felled bastard roll to his back with a pistol of his own.
Knox could hear the bulletwhooshingthrough the air before it happened, and he threw himself at Liv with a scream on his lips. Losing balance, Liv grabbed his arm, and the moonlight captured his wide eyes as they both fell.
The world echoed with a loud bang, and Knox lost his breath as his shoulder turned into stone, numb by the time they both collapsed.
And then, pain erupted in his shoulder, turning the world red.
Chapter 27
Liv
Pain rushed down Liv’sthigh as his hip landed on something hard. But as the single gunshot made his ears ring, and the air filled with the scent of rust, he knew the blood he could smell wasn’t his.
Knox stiffened in his arms, uttering a single, dull gasp, and Liv rolled them over without thinking. The gun he was still holding trembled in his hand when he zeroed in on his target. He’d killed for Knox once already. Might as well do it again, even though his head pulsed so violently he barely knew where the ground and where the sky were.
The other man saw him too, but just as he dragged himself into a sitting position, a dark figure emerged from behind rusty cars. Dressed in tactical gear, with a bulletproof vest and a mask covering the lower half of his face, he looked like a character fromCounter Strike, not a real person.
The guy shot straight into the back of the fallen man’s head, as if he were putting down a rabid dog, and it became obvious he was as real as Liv himself.
He approached them, one red eye glinting at them like a ruby screwed into his head.
