Page 82 of Dangerous Command
Muro threw an uppercut into my stomach, knocking the wind out of me. Then again into my chin. I laughed, trying to piss him off even more.
Maddie pulled herself forward, her hand finding my knife, tossed on the floor. She glanced up at me. We needed to survive this.
“I bet my father made her come like a whore,” I said, looking down at him.
Muro grit his teeth. “Maybe he did, Adler. ButI betyour mother is quite the lay. I guess I’ll have to taste her before I kill her too. See why Gerard kept her around all of this time. Why he left her stale ass for my wife.”
“Don’t talk about my mother like that,” I growled, forcing myself to seem madder than I actually felt.
“Or else what?” He breathed onto my face, holding his knife against my throat. “Maybe I should force your mother to have another child. Let her old ass die in childbirth.”
“Fuck you, Muro!” I howled.
“Ah. So the leader has a breaking point after all, doesn’t he? And it’s because he’s a mama’s boy!” Muro grinned. “I don’t care who your mother is,” he snarled, “I’m going to kill your family. Every single one of them. Down to that measly half-brother of yours.”
Maddie stood up slowly, leaning to the side. The knife was in her hand.
“And I’m going to enjoy every minute of it,” Muro muttered.
“You wouldn’t,” I said, baring my teeth.
“Oh,” Muro said, raising his knife in his palm, “I will enjoy it. I will enjoy itverymuch.”
Right as he struck forward, I grabbed the knife in my palm, stopping him from stabbing me and Maddie lurched forward, hitting her knife into his back, pulling it out quickly. Muro paused, staring at the blood on his hands, paralyzed for a second. He forgot about his knife.
He turned toward Maddie. The bloody knife gleamed in her palm. She looked him in the eyes, unafraid.
“But you’re Margot’s daughter,” he sneered. “You’re not supposed to fight.”
“I amnotmy mother,” Maddie said. She speared the knife into his face and I swung my cuffs over and around his neck, using the chain between them to choke him out. Tighter. Tighter. He pulled on the chain, his knife falling, but I gripped harder, pulling his feet from the ground, cutting off his air. Maddie thrust the knife into his stomach, into his ribs, his face, anywhere she could stab, and Muro kicked at us, pulling at us, anything he could do. He struggled in vain, his eyes bulging, but neither of us stopped.Maddiedidn’t stop.
Finally, he went still.
I let his body drop to the floor. Struck like a pin cushion. A purple line across his neck.
I opened my mouth to ask if Maddie could get the keys, but she jumped on top of Muro and stabbed his face repeatedly until he was a bloody mash of bone and flesh.
“Maddie,” I said, but she didn’t stop. “Mads!” I shouted.
She froze that time, her breathing loud and hoarse. Her jaw dropped.
“The keys,” I said.
She breathed for a few seconds, not registering what I had said. I nodded towards them on the floor.
“The keys, Mads?”
“The keys!” She threw her body to the side, flailing her arms until she found them. With shaking hands, she undid my cuffs. The metal links dropped to the floor and I grabbed the knife from her hands, shoving her against the paint-chipped wall, pressing the blade against her throat.
We were covered in blood, bruised and swollen, our bodies wrecked. Both of us were only standing through the force of sheer adrenaline.
“You disobeyed me,” I growled. “I told you to get out.”
She stared at me, her eyes shifting across my face, then her whole body leaned against me.
“Some rules are worth breaking,” she whispered.
I let the knife drop to the ground, forcing her into a kiss that would last a lifetime. To show her that this was over now. Whatever her past was with Muro, whatever future he had tried to shape for us, it was over. He was gone.
