Ride Hard (Raven Riders #1)(100)

She kept the weapon pointed at him, even as his hand went slack around his own gun. But he was still holding it.

From down the hallway, she was remotely aware of people screaming, but she couldn’t pay attention to it. She couldn’t pay attention to anything except Dare and her father. Not to the sweat pouring down her hairline and the center of her back. Or the way her heart raced so hard it was difficult to get a breath. Or the way her hand shook around the gun. Her own breathing loud in her ears, she stayed crouched over Dare’s body, gun at the ready, finger still on the trigger. Just in case.

Footsteps came pounding toward her and she whirled. “I’ll shoot!”

The men skidded to a halt in the darkness. “Haven, it’s okay. It’s Maverick.”

She scrabbled to Dare’s other side, putting her body between him and this new threat. “Stay right there or I’ll shoot you,” she said, her voice cracking, wetness on her face.

One of the men stepped slowly into the light, hands in the air. “Haven, it’s Maverick. See? Put the gun down, sweetie.”

Her brain couldn’t process what she was hearing. “Mav . . . Mav . . . Dare . . .”

“I know.” He came a little closer, and then Phoenix and Ike stepped into the light, too. “Put the gun down. Okay?”

But she couldn’t. She couldn’t make her muscles respond. She couldn’t let herself believe the threat was over.

Maverick was within a few feet of her. “I’m gonna take it from you, Haven. Okay? Just real easy,” he said, leaning in and wrapping his big hands around the barrel. He gently tugged it free.

Which was when Haven realized just how bad she was shaking. Her teeth chattered. Her bones hurt. It was suddenly like she was plugged back into her body, because all at once she heard a voice through the loudspeaker giving instructions and saw the colored whirl of emergency vehicle lights in the distance.

Maverick went to his knees beside Dare. “Dare?” he said, leaning over his cousin. But Dare was completely nonresponsive now. Mav pushed his cut open to reveal the full measure of his blood loss. “Get help. Now,” he said, looking up to the other men.

“Oh, God, Dare,” she said, her hand brushing his hair off his sweaty forehead. She curled over until her face touched his. “Don’t leave me. You hear? Don’t you leave me.”

“I need a f*cking ambulance at the west concourse hallway,” Phoenix said into his radio. “Right now. It’s Dare. And it’s bad.”





CHAPTER 31


Everything f*cking hurt.

His head. His arm. His side.

As consciousness returned, Dare remembered the full horror of what happened. And that’s when he realized that the thing that hurt worse than anything else was his heart. Because he’d failed Haven. Failed and let her father take her away.

On a groan, he forced his eyes open and licked dryly at his lips.

“Dare?” came a deep whisper.

Blinking up at the ceiling, he forced his eyes to the right to find Maverick sitting at his bedside. In a dimly lit hospital room. He tried to form his cousin’s name, but his mouth wouldn’t work.

“Don’t try to talk, man.” Maverick grabbed a white cup off a tray and held the straw to his lips. There was a joke in there somewhere. If Dare felt up to jokes, which he f*cking didn’t. But the water was like drinking the finest aged whiskey. Dare couldn’t get enough.

“You look like hell,” Dare rasped.

Maverick barked out a hushed laugh. “You ain’t winning no beauty contests right now either, D.”

Grimacing, Dare went to scrub at his face, but only his right hand would move. Forcing his head to look down his left side, Dare’s chin dropped. Haven was sitting in a chair, her head and shoulders resting on the edge of his bed, her hand holding his. “Haven?” he said in a soft, disbelieving rasp. “Is that . . . I thought . . .”

“You should let her sleep,” Maverick said. “I think it’s the first time since everything went down that she finally managed to fall. And she won’t eat anything either.”

“I thought she was gone,” Dare said, emotion clogging his throat. Emotion that the pain and the drugs and the wonder of her being here wouldn’t let him hold in. He pressed his hand over his mouth and closed his eyes, holding his breath to staunch the f*cking embarrassing sobs that wanted to break free.

“She saved your life, D. Saved your life and guarded you like a lioness guarding her cubs.” The admiration was plain in Maverick’s voice.

The words unlocked a door in Dare’s memory, and he could see her hovering over him, shielding his body with hers, grasping the gun from his holster. “Her father? What happened?” He scrubbed a hand over his eyes, catching a bit of stray wetness.

Mav nodded. “She took care of him, though she’s already been cleared by the police for self-defense. Nick’s guys took care of a few others, including Cora’s father. Our people took out the rest when they tried to come back to their cars, which is where we found Bunny, tied up in the backseat of one of them. She’s doing okay,” he said.

“I’m so damn sorry she got hurt in all of this,” Dare said, knowing it must’ve killed Maverick to see his mother banged up again.

Maverick shook his head. “Don’t worry. Doc, Rodeo, and Bear are with her at home. You know how tough she is. She’s more upset that she can’t be here with you. Meat’s okay, too. He’s down the hall. Jeb and the Winston kid driving number five didn’t make it, though. The whole incident on Friday night is being pinned on Randall’s crew and their attempted kidnapping of Haven.”