Page 50 of Archer (Dirty Misfits MC 3)
I swallowed hard, trying to abate my fears. “You don’t scare me.”
He cocked his head. “Oh, really? Then, tell me, why are your eyes watering right now?”
I cleared my throat. “My head hurts.”
He chuckled. “Want to know what I think?”
“Not really.”
He loomed over me. “I think you’re going to die tonight.”
Then, Summer yelled at me again. “Josie! Catch!”
I heard something sliding across the ground, but Chops was quicker than me. He kicked the object off to the side, and it wasn’t until a small speck of light from the flickering hallway ceiling lamps caught the gun metal that I realized what it was. In the blink of an eye, I lunged for it. I threw my entire body into reaching that gun as Summer continued fighting the shadow man in the background.
But Chops was quicker. “Oh, no you don’t.”
I slid across the ground and barely had the fucking thing in my hand before he ripped it out. And after he pressed his boot against my chest, he cocked the gun and aimed it at my face.
“No!” Summer shouted.
“Say goodnight, bitch,” Chops glowered.
“Pineapple!”
Gunshots rang out as Summer scurried over to me. Chops pivoted and pulled the trigger on my gun as she helped me to my feet. Cole’s voice echoed off the hallway walls and relief flooded my veins.
I wanted to know what the hell had happened to him, but I took solace in the fact that he had finally showed up.
“Cole!” I exclaimed.
He shot me a look as he reloaded his gun. “Run, Josie. Both of you, run!”
Summer tugged me along. “Come on, girl. He’s got this.”
“No! Cole!”
Chops charged him, taking him to the ground as he continued to yell. “Just go!”
Summer pulled me around the corner and the two of us took off. As we held hands, racing down the hallway, gunshots continued to ring out behind us. I heard people screaming somewhere, probably the main room. And as we blazed a trail by the back door of the dressing room, I saw a couple of new dancers—girls I still didn’t recognize—running for the back door.
“All of you, follow me now!” Summer roared.
My mind spun in twenty different directions. Where the hell had Chops been? Was he all right? Was Chops dead? What happened to that shadow man that had pinned my wrists to the wall? And where the fuck had Summer come from?
Archer.
“I have to call Archer,” I said.
Summer tugged me outside. “Girls, follow me. We have to get out of here.”
I wrenched away from her. “I have to call Archer! I can’t leave Cole!”
I turned around and ran back for the door as Summer yelled at me. “Bitch, are you crazy!? We gotta go!”
I waved at her as I pulled out my cell phone from my tits. “You take the girls and get out of here. I have to find Cole and Archer first. I can’t leave them behind!”
And as I raced back inside, tearing up the carpet with my heels as I rushed back into the dressing room, I rifled through the girl’s things. Trying to find anything I could use to defend myself.
Before I reached for a baseball bat that sat off in a corner.
“This will have to do,” I murmured.
Then, I hunkered down in a corner and scrolled through my phone, finding Archer’s number so I could call him.
I had to warn him.
I had to let him know what the hell was going on.
If anything, so he didn’t get here and take a bullet to the chest out of sheer misinformation.
Twenty-Three
Archer
“Right here, let me out,” I commanded.
The driver pulled off to the side. “Are you sure? The club is still—”
I tossed some money at him. “Thank you for getting here so quickly.”
I threw the taxi door open and took off down the back alley that ran right behind the strip joint. I booked it as quickly as I could, pumping air in through my nose and exhaling through my mouth. It was a technique Hyde had taught me when I was just beginning to get myself in shape after becoming a prospect. He instilled into me a respect for one’s body and how that respect translated to not only the club, but the city we protected.
I heard his voice echoing in my head as I quickly approached that back door.
Respect first starts with respect for yourself.
I was about a block and a half away when I spotted Josie rushing out hand-in-hand with another girl. Probably one of the dancers at the club. I saw three girls rushing out behind them, and they all seemed to be trying to talk about each other, but I had no clue what they were saying. I tried to draw in breath to yell out Josie’s name, but every time I opened my mouth all my lungs wanted to do was draw in more air.
