The gun sounded and thankfully the bullet missed us. I scrambled to my feet and closed the distance to the front door. Yanking it open, I ducked to avoid the fist coming my way. And then another gun sounded, confusing the hell out of me because it wasn’t either of these two guys, and it sounded like it came from behind us.

“Get the fuck out of my apartment!” Scarlett yelled, and tension punched through me at the thought of her getting caught up in this.

“Jesus, Scott, she’s got a fucking gun!” Wilder roared.

He wasn’t telling me anything I didn’t know, and while I wanted to go to her and rip that gun from her hands and tell her to get the fuck back, I was dealing with more pressing matters – one guy trying to knock me out and another waving a gun around.

As I straightened, I punched the guy in his stomach.

“Motherfucker,” he yelled, stumbling backwards.

Aiming my gun at both of them, I thundered, “Who the fuck are you?” I didn’t recognise either of them, cementing my belief they were from Julio’s crew, but I needed confirmation.

“It doesn’t matter who we are, all that matters is why we’re here,” the guy with the gun snarled as he raised it at me.

“ Why you’re here is pretty fuckin’ clear,” I snapped. My brain worked overtime trying to figure out how the fuck this was going to go down.

He smirked. “Nothing’s ever as it seems.”

What the hell?

My finger twitched on the trigger of the gun, but I refrained from pulling it. I needed to confirm who they were. However, before I could do that, Scarlett pulled the trigger on her gun, and all hell broke loose.

She shot at the roof, but it spooked the two guys and the one with the gun also fired his. Thank fuck my reflexes were quick – I ducked in time to avoid being shot.

“Fuck, Wilder, can you restrain her?” I yelled.

“I’m already on it,” he threw back and I blocked out their arguing as I did my best to defend all three of us.

I lifted my leg and kicked the guy in front of me as hard as I could in the stomach, which pushed him backwards into the one with the gun. He dropped the gun, so before either had a chance to recover, I moved to kick it out of reach. They were scrambling to get to their feet, and the panic I read on their faces put my mind at ease. It looked like I was about to get to the bottom of who sent them.

Standing over them, I aimed my gun again, and demanded, “Tell me who the fuck you work for or - ” I directed my gun at one of the guy’s dicks, “ – shit’s about to get real fuckin’ messy.”

Fear sliced across his face and he held his hands up. “Stop! It’s Julio…he sent us.”

“Why?” I asked, keeping my gun aimed at his dick.

He opened his mouth to speak, but his mate silenced him by slitting his throat from behind with a knife I’d never seen coming. As the guy slumped back with blood oozing from his throat, his mate shoved his body to the side so he could stand. Everything happened so fast – one minute I had the situation under control, and the next the tables had been turned.

I did the only thing I could in that moment – I shot him.

As his breath was stolen from him, so too was our chance at gaining new information about Julio.

I raked my fingers through my hair and turned to face Wilder. He held Scarlett around her waist, but now that the threat had been erased, he let her go.

“You good?” I asked her.

“Yeah, but damn that’s a mess,” she said, nodding at the dead men and blood on the floor of her apartment.

Wilder stepped over the bodies and closed the front door. Eyeing me, he said, “We need to get this shit cleaned up before any cops turn up.”

I called Griff. “We need some help here, brother,” I said when he answered.

After I filled him in on what had happened and he told me J and Nash were on their way, he said, “This complicates shit.”

“Yeah.”

“We need to start calling in favours, Scott. Once Julio figures this out, we’re gonna need our backs covered.”

Fuck.

Not the way I wanted shit to go down.

12

Scott

I stood at the end of our bed and watched as Harlow slid her dress over her head. Something was different about her, but I hadn’t been able to put my finger on it. After I’d dealt with the mess at Scarlett’s home last night, I’d headed straight back to Trilogy and she’d been beside herself with worry. I’d never seen her so consumed with fear before, but hadn’t been able to convince her to share those fears with me.

As she smoothed her dress, she looked over at me. “How long do you think Scarlett will have to stay here with us?”

I’d made the decision to bring Scarlett with us when we left her apartment last night. No way was she safe in her own place. Not until we dealt with Julio. “Hopefully not long.” I hadn’t shared with her the events of last night except to let her know Scarlett wasn’t safe.

She watched me for another couple of moments before finally nodding and saying, “Okay.”

I moved to where she stood and wrapped my hand around her wrist, halting her as she took a step away from me. “Are you pissed off with me for bringing her here?” I couldn’t read her and it frustrated me.

“No.” She tried to pull her wrist free, but I gripped it tighter.

Christ.

Why won’t she talk to me?

Pulling her close, I ran my free hand through her hair. “Harlow, what’s going on? You’ve been off ever since I got back from Scarlett’s last night.”