Page 115 of Pretty Savage: Defy

“He was about to shoot you.”

“I told you to stay behind me.”

“You taught me how to stop someone bigger than me.” Her chest rises and falls. “Also, you’re welcome.”

I stare at her.

She stares back, frightened but stubborn, a loose curl stuck to the damp skin beside her eye.

I taught her those moves so she could escape men like him. I never imagined she would use them to keep one from putting a bullet through my back.

“Next time, get control of the weapon and retreat,” I say.

“Next time?”

Gunfire erupts deeper in the house.

Three shots. A pause. Then two more.

I retrieve the fallen pistol and check the magazine. Four rounds remain.

Laurel looks at the men on the floor. “Those are the servers from the ball.”

“They’re wearing the uniforms.”

“You don’t think they actually work here?”

“No server moves like that.”

I crouch beside the first man. Flesh-colored makeup has smeared along the side of his neck. Under it, black lines curve toward his shoulder.

A tattoo.

I tug his uniform aside, but the design disappears under the fabric before I can make sense of it.

A scream comes from the rear of the mansion.

Laurel turns toward it.

I catch her hand before she can move and place the fallen gun in it.

Her eyes widen. “Carrson.”

“Keep your finger outside the trigger guard until you intend to fire. Stay behind my right shoulder. If I move left, you move left. If I tell you to run, you run.”

“I’m not leaving you.”

“That wasn’t one of the instructions.”

I wipe my dagger against the dead man’s jacket and rise.

Laurel adjusts her grip on the gun. It is too large for her hands, but she holds it the way I told her to.

Ahead, blood marks the marble floor in a broken pattern leading toward the ballroom.

I close my hand around Laurel’s and pull her deeper into the house.

Chapter twenty-eight