Page 41 of Obey

“I’m going after him,” I said simply. “He needs to know what’s going on, and this is the only way to make sure he gets the message. I’m not going to let him fight this fight alone, and I’m not going to leave him out there to die.”

I didn’t know what I expected them to say. Would they argue with me, try to stop me? Forbid me from going?

Never.

They loved Knight nearly as much as I did, and they wanted to see him home safe. So instead of arguing, Gemini nodded once and tossed me the gun from his belt. I caught it easily, some distant part of my mind realizing that I’d suddenly gotten better at handling a gun, and shoved it into my waistband.

“He’d want you to stay here,” he said quietly. “He’d want you to be safe.”

I gave him the cockiest grin I could muster. “Luckily for me, he’s not here to cast a vote. And I’m not willing to stay here and do nothing.”

His answering grin was overshadowed by Mandy stepping forward, her hands tightening her belt and her eyes hard.

“If you’re going, so am I,” she said firmly.

“What?” Gemini and I said together.

“You heard me,” she said quickly. “Knight’s my friend and brother, and I’m not going to leave him out there to fight this without enough men. I’m coming with you. Gem, keys.”

He looked like he was going to argue with her, and for a moment I thought about doing the same thing. Then I saw the determined slant of her lips, the cold, hard anger in her eyes. And I realized that arguing would be pointless. She’d watched Tinker be killed by Devil’s games, and had gone to prison herself because of her tricks. She knew what Devil’s men had done to Gemini himself.

Knight was one of her oldest friends, and Devil was now trying to kill him. And Devil had hurt her long before he’d started hurting me.

She had just as much right to this vengeance as I did.

Gemini must have come to the same conclusion, because he took one look at his girlfriend, bit his lip, and then pulled his keys out of his pocket. He held them up, though, refusing to toss them to her, and said, “I would go with you if I could.”

“Boy, you’re too banged up to be of any use to anyone,” she said, marching up to him and grabbing the keys, then planting a kiss on his lips. “Stay here and make sure we’ve got a safe place to come home to. We’ll be back when we’ve got the rest of our crew.”

She turned without saying anything else, and when she reached my side, I turned with her to march through the door and into the driveway.

We might not be the reinforcements Knight was expecting, but we were what he had, and when it came down to it, he couldn’t have asked for people more committed to his cause. I wanted to see Knight home safely. I wanted my man back in my bed.

And I wanted Devil dead. I wanted to see him squirming and bleeding at my feet. He might not think I could do it, but he was wrong.

I’d shot to kill him once before.

And I could damn well do it again.

CHAPTER 19

KNIGHT

WE WERE OUTMANNED, and we were losing.

I didn’t think we’d lost any men yet—a quick scan of the area didn’t show any of our cuts on the ground—but we were being pushed back with every step.

I ducked down, barely eluding the knife someone was slashing at me, and shuffled back several steps. I came to a hard stop up against a cactus and realized that I had to make a stand right here—with a fucking cactus at my back.

Not the way anyone wants to fight.

The guy in front of me was smaller than I was, though, and that was going to make all the difference. I recognized the face, though I couldn’t put a name to it, and he looked three times cockier than the last time I’d seen him out and about.

They were so convinced they were going to win that they were already starting to count it as a victory. And that was going to be the death of them.

I yanked the switchblade out of my back pocket, flipped it to bring the blade out, and slashed it in his direction, going left and right and then forward and taking him by surprise. He hissed and stepped back a single step, then came in again with his own knife held over head.

Like I was just going to stand there and let him bring it down in my chest or something.