Hitman's Secret Baby: A Bad Boy Romance (15 page)

Kieran was still babbling, and Monroe was telling his guy to check it out. The whole operation had stopped moving, everyone with their fucking guns drawn now. If they found me, I’d be riddled with holes before I could get off a couple shots of my own.

My heart pounded so hard I couldn’t imagine how they didn’t hear it. I was in that awful tortured no-man’s land between the moment of caution and the moment of attack.

I gripped my silenced weapon tightly, ready to use it as the door swung open. Monroe’s man came out weapon first, his movements well-practiced and his finger on the trigger.

If he saw me, I’d have only a second to react. These men were trained to a fault.

I couldn’t breathe for fear of making a sound. Spit flooded in my mouth, fight or flight response trying to kick in and make me
do
something. I remembered, with a seizing horror, that I hadn’t erased Taryn’s messages on my phone, nor the call from last night.

No doubt they’d search my corpse and find my cell, and then it would only be a matter of time before they found her.

And then something miraculous happened. Something brushed my leg in the thicket of bushes and I kicked out.

That asshole possum.

With my boot up its ass, it shot out of the bushes and right past the merc, who jumped and yelped hysterically. At that exact moment, Kieran ran past him and out across the fields in a bandy-legged sprint.

It was so absurd, and I was so relieved, I almost laughed out loud.

“It was a fucking possum,” the guy yelled back inside. “Goddamn wildlife.”

“Yeah, goddamn that wildlife, living out here in the wild,” someone inside drawled.

“That fucking druggie’s run off, too!”

Someone else piped up. “I told you the product was good. The kid probably thinks he’s a gazelle or something.”

The merc was right next to me now, his voice so loud. “Should I chase him down?”

“Leave him,” Monroe called outside. “He’ll come around again when he’s dry.”

The merc went back inside, shutting the door, and I could finally move away, hurrying back up to the top of the hill to man the rifle.

I was trembling all over from the near miss, but I checked on Kieran with my sights, still running away, and it made me chuckle.

I knew, now, that I could go back to my family with my conscious on the mend. When Taryn called me a good man, I could start to believe it.

The deal went off without a hitch after that. Thornes’ people got back in their trucks and filed out of the loading bay, one by one. I trailed them up the road, well into the distance, and focused back on Monroe and his guys as they got to packing the drugs into their own trucks.

There was just so damn much of it. When the police inevitably came to check out this location, it would be pretty obvious this was some kind of deal gone awry.

I’d have to find Kieran after this and calm him down, explain he had to keep his mouth shut. It’d be the last loose end to tie up before I went home to my family.

As I put my finger on the C4 trigger, I thought of them.

That little girl who’d been without her daddy for so long. Taryn who’d missed me and loved me and worked so hard to forgive me. Anna who just wanted her big brother back. And even Ethan, my brother-in-law, whose life I had risked my own to save.

I saw them, one by one, in my head. I held them there, letting the knowledge of their safety penetrate my heart.

Through my binoculars, I took one last look at that scumbag Monroe.

And then I flipped the switch.

The sound was low and deep, an earth-shaking rumble that cut right into my chest and stole my breath away.

The enormity of it seemed to affect time, and the walls of the building seemed to come apart in slow motion, breaking and tumbling, the little glass still left over from the old days flying outwards in twinkling shards like raindrops.

The roof collapsed. The doorways caved. The fuel drums went up, the fire rising and rising and
rising
. Smoke piled up in huge roiling clouds and I could smell it already. By morning, they’d smell it for miles.

Thornes’ guys would see this. Would they turn around and drive back? It wouldn’t matter; they were twenty minutes away by now and I’d be gone by the time they got close.

I just needed to make sure everyone was dead. I couldn’t see how anyone could survive the carnage I’d created, but I still scoped out every inch of what was left of the building.

Bodies stuck out from under the rubble. I saw blood on the bricks. I felt the weight of taking so much life in one go, but it was nothing compared to what I would have lost if I hadn’t.

It was done. I had to get the hell out of here.

Adrenaline spiked through me. I fumbled as I packed up my shit, swinging the duffle over my shoulder and breaking into a run down the hill. I hit the road, figuring I’d have a solid fifteen minutes at least before the trucks came back—if they even were—and hurried along, heading for my rental.

I’d fucking
done
it!

I couldn’t believe it was over, that I was free. I wanted nothing more than to call Taryn right now and whoop and holler down the phone at her, hear her bright voice tell me how happy she was.

Suddenly, amongst the after-shocks of the explosion ringing in my ears, I swore I heard a noise on the road.

I was about to turn when a bullet whooshed right past my face.

“Fuck!”

I hit the ground, flat, my knees scraping raw on the asphalt through my jeans.

“Piece of shit,” a voice—
Monroe’s
voice came from behind me. “You fucking asshole.”

Faster than I could even begin to react, another bullet went right through my shoulder. In and out, through the back and exploding into the road under me—a clean shot. Agony screamed through my bones and I threw myself over into a roll, jarring the fresh wound, as another bullet smashed right into the place I’d just been lying.

I whipped out my own gun, sprawled half on my back with it pointed right into Monroe’s face.

“Mason Baldwin,” he sneered, blood and ash streaking him, his fine suit ripped. He was favoring his right leg—so he’d been injured in the blast, but he’d still caught up to me.

I gasped for breath, gritting my teeth around the pain. “This wasn’t personal, Monroe.”

“Then what the fuck was it?”

I racked my brain, trying to push out the searing sting of my shoulder to better concentrate. The initial intensity of it was fading, but in its wake was a horrible bone-deep ache that stole my breath away.

“All money,” I lied.

“Who put you up to this!?” Monroe screamed, sounding deranged. He seemed wild, and as much as I hated him, I could hardly blame him.

“You know I’m no snitch.”

Suddenly, a look of realization came over his face. “Ethan Foster. I heard he was banging your sister. And I heard you took the job.”

“No—”

Monroe took several steps forward. Neither of us were, realistically, going to shoot, not at the risk of getting shot ourselves, but he was a severe threat nonetheless and the closer he got, the more likely I’d end up getting my ass beat.

He was bigger than me, broader and taller. He had excess fat and plenty of muscle mass and I had a fucking bullet hole in my shoulder.

As I calculated the best way to get out of this, I felt my phone buzz, and in the silence,
of course
it was fucking audible.

I hadn’t silenced it—I was such a fucking idiot!

In the split-second of panic, Monroe kicked my gun out of my hand. But, even injured, I was quick, and I threw myself into him, knocking him off his feet and sending us rolling into a scuffle on the ground.

Punches and kicks flew. I headbutted Monroe hard right between the eyes and he came back with a right hook to my jaw that left me seeing stars. I tore a chunk out of his face with my fingernails, aiming for the eyes and falling short, and he slammed a fist into my gunshot wound, making me seize and scream.

I kneed him hard in the back but I was weak from my shoulder, my whole arm going dead.

Monroe took his advantage and suddenly my whole vision was blacked out, my head slammed off the asphalt.

I heard him moving. I was floating in darkness, senses askew. I saw a shadowy shape: Taryn, Daisy, Anna, all three of them now. I waved my arm, trying to send them away, tell them they were going to die,
I
was going to die—

“Who the fuck is Taryn, then?” Monroe asked, and I remembered him; that son of a bitch who’d just slammed my head into the floor.

Unconsciousness pulled at me with tempting fingers and I fought it. I knew I had to, for
them.

When my vision returned, the bastard was knelt beside me, my phone in his hand. I realized what had happened. He’d found the texts.

I could hardly make my limbs move, sluggishly reaching out while he easily slapped me away.

“Home, eh?” Monroe went on, a sick glee on his gnarled features. I felt rage, blind and zealous, growing in me. Impotent, too, because I couldn’t move for shit.

He stood, phone in hand, and started back up the road.

He was heading for the Jeep, I realized, and made a renewed effort to pull myself together, straining until I was sweating to roll onto all fours. My head
screamed
. My shoulder ached something fierce. I took several gulps of air, trying to stand and stumbling.

In the distance, I heard the rumble of an engine, and then I was bathed in twin headlights, the Jeep crawling by with Monroe hollering out the open window.

“Killing you won’t make you suffer, Baldwin, but now I know how to make you pay!”

The car sped away, tires screeching and kicking up dust in my face.

Fuck
.

For a second, I was beyond sense. Frozen, half-knelt in the middle of the road, I stared after Monroe, crippled with grief and failure.

Failure meant—Taryn was dead, Anna was dead, my daughter—

No!

I struggled to my feet and lurched up the road, fumbling with the car door to climb into the second Jeep. The key was still in the ignition, thank God, and I turned it.

Driving in this half-beaten state was maybe the dumbest thing I’d ever done, up to and including faking my own death, but I had no choice. If Monroe got beyond my ability to chase him, we would feel the wrath of his entire organization rain down on us.

I hit the gas, hard, and the car spun into motion. In seconds I was speeding after Monroe, catching him by surprise just long enough to get him in my sights.

The road was winding and surrounded by trees, and our headlights were the only source of light out here. Pedal to the floor, I gained on him, my sheer desperation driving me recklessly onwards while Monroe was attempting more sense.

If I died doing this, it wouldn’t matter as long as I took him with me. The thought drove me ruthlessly onwards, and his desire for revenge paled in comparison to me desire to stop him at
any
cost.

I smashed the Jeep into his with a tormented shriek, angling to run him off the road.

He put in some extra speed, gaining a few inches on me, but I went in again, smashing the cars together, feeling the wheel struggle to fly out of control under my hands.

Crash after crash, I dented the whole of Monroe’s back bumper and half the side of the car. The pain in my shoulder was bleeding numbness down into my arm, my joints starting to seize up, but I kept on him until he lost it and went skidding into a slide.

I had him. I didn’t brake, going well over a hundred, and rammed the entire side of Monroe’s Jeep with the front of mine.

Both vehicles flipped, crashing onto their sides some distance apart.

And then there was blackness. Blackness and burning and pain.

I lay in agony on my side, not knowing which way was up. I coughed my lungs clean, reaching up to grip the car’s roof handle and groaning with the way it pulled on my abused muscles.

Outside, I heard the sound of struggling.

My pain didn’t matter; only Monroe mattered.

I kicked open my crushed driver door, climbing upwards to get out of the car. Monroe, I saw amongst the crash, was doing the same, stumbling to the ground and coming towards me with his features twisted in apoplectic rage. There was no sense to be had between us then, no words that could be spoken to diffuse any of this.

I was going to kill him with my bare hands if I had to.

I mirrored him, the Earth under me lurching like a seesaw. My ears were ringing but Monroe was talking—he never did shut the fuck up.

“Is she pretty, Baldwin? Your Taryn. What’s her body like? Maybe I could enjoy her before I
broke
her.”

Instinctively, I let out a half-scream, half-growl—a wholly inhuman sound. I broke into a sprint and slammed my palms into Monroe’s chest, throwing him to the ground where he belonged.