The Shadows (Black Dagger Brotherhood, #13)(96)

Kissing her, holding her, feeling her body against his own, he discreetly took out his phone and brought it up behind her back. The text to Manny and Rhage was short and to the point: Owh tx.

On way home. Thank you.

The elevator reached the lobby just fine, and all the kissing helped him stay good and distracted, too. And then they were walking out of the building, into the cold, blustery fall night. Fritz was across the street in the Mercedes, and the doggen brought the car over the second he saw them.

There was no waiting for the butler to get out and do the duty with the door.

Trez wanted to be the one to wait on her.

Just as she was sliding into the warm interior, the last sound he ever wanted to hear when she was in his presence caught his attention: Pop-pop-pop.

Gun fire.

Fuck.

Trez jumped into the sedan with her, and jacked up between the seats. “Get us out of here! U-ie now!”

Fritz didn’t miss a beat. Throwing the S600 into reverse, he pounded the gas so hard Trez nearly ended up playing air freshener on the rearview. Recovering fast, he covered Selena with his body—so he could get to her seat belt. Yanking the band across her, he’d just gotten the catch home when centrifugal force threw him against the opposite side of the backseat, ringing his bell—but he didn’t give a shit. Bracing his feet against the wheel wells and his palms against the roof and the door frame, he kept himself from battering Selena as they finished the spin that got them pointed in the right direction.

Make that the wrong way on the one-way they’d come in on.

“Let us proceed,” Fritz shouted over the squealing tires.

The roar of the Mercedes-Benz engine and the explosion forward reminded Trez of an airplane takeoff. And as his body was sucked into the bucket seat, he looked over at Selena.

Her eyes were popping wide. “What’s wrong? What happened?”

The buildings on either side of the three-lane road were steel and glass and pale concrete, and they started to flash by, faster, faster, faster. Glancing up in the front, Trez checked the road ahead, the grilles of the parked cars facing them like disapproving parents as they went in the wrong direction.

“Nothing’s up!” he yelled over all the noise. “I’m just really excited to get you naked—”

Selena’s brows rose even higher. “Trez, I heard something—”

“—’cuz I’m that desperate to have you!”

“—that sounded like a gun!”

They were both hollering over the engine, going back and forth as Fritz bat-out-of-hell’d it away from all the bullets.

And then the fun really began.

They’d gone about two blocks when the Caldwell police cars started showing up. And unlike the Benz? The blue-and-whites with their flashing lights were going the right way on the street.

“I shall have to go onto the sidewalk,” Fritz called out. “Just a bit of a bump—”

That crazy bitch-ass butler yanked the steering wheel to the left and hopped the curb, capping a fire hydrant that promptly exploded in their wake, sending a gusher of water up into the air. And then, by the grace of God, the Benz landed like a gentleman, its superior shock absorbers cushioning what was no doubt a slam and a half.

Wrenching around, Trez looked out the back windshield. Cop cars were spinning around and breaking rank to follow them as Fritz hit a wall of newspaper dispensers, sending the red and yellow and green plastic boxes flying behind them. The flimsy things broke apart as they crashed on the sidewalk, sheets of papers fluttering off like doves released from cages.

As he turned back to Selena, he braced himself, trying to think of a way to reassure her— Au contraire.

Selena was alive with excitement, her fangs flashing thanks to a huge smile, a giggling laugh bubbling out of her as she hung on to the door.

“Faster!” she yelled at Fritz. “Let’s go even faster!”

“As you wish, mistress!”

A fresh roar from that massive piece of German engineering under the hood sent them careening not just down the sidewalk, but right up to the very edge of the laws of physics.

Selena looked over at him. “This is the best night ever!”

“Okay, time to pull out.”

Rhage nodded at Manny. “I wonder what they had for dinner.” He checked his phone again and wished he had actually gone to that steakhouse. He’d only flown that shit to put Trez at ease. “He said nothing about the entrée or dessert. I mean, come on, he could have given a few deets. We only got eight letters from the guy.”

“Actually, it was five.”

“That’s what I said.”

The Doritos had worn off an hour ago. Then again, sometimes he could say that about three-course meals.

Manny put the RV in drive and started off, the ambulance trundling over a pothole, then gathering speed. “I’d better get a move on. Fritz has a heavy foot.”

“Like, did they have the roast beef? I saw a picture of the way they do it up there in a magazine—”

Boom!

Just as they came to a four-way juncture of alleys, something big flashed out in front of them and bounced off the hood. As Manny slammed on the brakes, the massive weight rolled off.

“Jesus Christ, was that a deer?” the doctor hollered.

“Try moose.”

Rhage palmed both his guns and was about to jump out when the bullet shower started. High-pitched metallic pings ricocheted off the RV and spiderwebbed the thick glass.