Total pages in book: 88
Estimated words: 86629 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 433(@200wpm)___ 347(@250wpm)___ 289(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 86629 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 433(@200wpm)___ 347(@250wpm)___ 289(@300wpm)
Fergus Gallagher.
The eldest of the three brothers.
His broad chest shakes as he laughs at something. Hate boils in my guts. He takes a cigar from his back pocket and lights it, chewing the end, puffing away.
“What are you doing?” Marcus asks urgently.
I didn’t realize I was drifting toward him, but now my feet are moving, and I can’t stop it. “Stay here.”
“Connor, stop,” he hisses. “You’re outnumbered seven to one. You’re dead if you keep going.”
“He hurt my family.” Rage guides me. A strange calmness descends, a clarity I’ve rarely felt in my life. “And now I have to hurt him.”
It’s odd, these moments, how they seem to happen from a distance. I’ve been in fights before. Been in life-or-death struggles. And always it’s like I saw everything play out from fifty feet above my head, like I was working a doll in a vast theater. My body is flooded with purpose, a righteous, cold hate, and there are only two thoughts in my head.
Kill Fergus.
Save Angie.
I raise my gun and fire.
A guard’s head explodes. He drops, spraying blood. I fire again, hit another guard, two more times, another guard, two more, another. That’s four dead, three standing, but now they’re reacting. Fergus remains rooted, cigar dangling from his teeth comically, as his men raise their weapons at me.
Marcus squeezes off several rounds. He hits the guard on the left, spinning him sideways, knocking his ally off balance. I kill the wounded man as he falls, leaving one more. I aim, squeeze, but my gun’s out of ammo.
The last Gallagher soldier grins as he aims, but Marcus blows his jaw off. He gags, tongue flailing, choking on blood.
I barrel past the corpses and slam into Fergus.
It’s like hitting a brick wall. The eldest Gallagher is a physical monster. He’s thicker and heavier than me, but I’m in better shape. I bash him in the face with my gun, smacking his skull, kneeing, punching, kicking. He fights back, jabbing the end of his cigar into my neck. I roar, skin hissing and burning, and I shove the barrel of my gun into his mouth.
I’m out of bullets, but I keep pushing. I shove, harder, until the cigar falls away, but I still don’t stop. I grab his hair, jamming the gun deeper into his throat. He gags, choking, and I drive a thumb into his eye. I rip and hook, gouging it out, blood spraying as I savage him. I knee him over and over, tearing at his hair, forcing the gun so deep it shreds his esophagus. Blood wells up around the barrel, choking him, and Fergus flails at me. I hit him more, beating him, pummeling him with both fists now, until his body goes still.
I kneel on top of the corpse, breathing hard, covered in blood. I’m drenched in it from hair to toes.
“You should reload,” Marcus says, picking up a rifle. One of the dead men dropped it. “There’s still fighting inside.” He tosses me the gun.
I catch it and stand. Blood drips from my clothes. “We go in through the back. Kill everyone. My family is the priority.”
I stalk forward into hell.
Angie
The stink of smoke slips in from somewhere in the house. Mom’s barely conscious. Rowan’s leaning against Danielle, eyes fixed on nothing. Cathal can’t seem to sit still.
“Don’t worry, we have our own air,” he says, trying to smile at me, but he doesn’t seem comforted. “We’ll be safe unless the Gallaghers have a nuke.”
He doesn’t sound sure at all and I don’t have the energy to argue.
The gunfire slows but doesn’t stop. Somewhere in the house, people are still fighting. Where is Connor? How did this happen? I close my eyes and see Colm’s head explode. I have his blood all over me. I’m slick with it. Slick with poor Colm’s gore. I cover my mouth to keep from retching and sit with my hand on my belly, worried for my family, for my baby. Afraid for my husband.
What if he’s dead already? What if he rushed home only to get ambushed?
Nobody talks for what feels like an hour, but it can’t be more than a few minutes. There’s a banging from outside the doors and Rowan whimpers, gripping tighter to Danielle. Something clicks, beeps, and the door disengages.
“Stay behind me,” Cathal says, facing the room.
Thin smoke billows in.
Deck is standing alone in the closet, a gun resting on his shoulder. “Everyone alive in here?”
“Thank fuck, Deck.” Cathal steps forward. “Are you alright? Where’s Connor? Are the Gallaghers still fighting?”
Deck holds a hand out to stop him. “You’d better stay in there, Cathal. It’s not safe out here.”
“Then why the fuck are you opening the door?”
Deck’s eyes settle on me. And I know, deep in my bones, that something is wrong. Something is very wrong.