Page 3 of Us Defiant Few

“Have you lost your fucking mind?” Brock snapped, keeping his voice low to not attract attention, but the words sliced her apart. “He tried to kill you!”

“No, you don’t understand. He’s not himself,” she argued, meeting their incredulous stares. “The Dealers did something to his memory. We have to help him.”

“Khalani…” Adan hedged. “Maybe we should talk about this.”

“There’s nothing to talk about!” she roared. Her face was pale, the whites of her eyes showing, like a cornered creature lashing out.

But she didn’t care who was standing against her. She’d die before leaving him again.

Brock clenched his jaw, about to argue some more, when the back door to the Black Heart flung open. Jack stormed out with a murderous expression on his blood-smeared face as he supported Ryder’s waist.

Ryder’s pale cheeks were streaked with dirt as he heaved in ragged breaths, one bloody hand pressed tightly against his ribs. Raziel and Spade followed close behind, their black clothing disheveled and splattered with specks of red.

A couple other men staggered behind them, gripping their weapons with frantic gazes. Khalani’s mouth flew open when the last figure to stumble out was Elise. Her blond hair hung in disheveled knots, her expression completely lost and shell-shocked as she hobbled down the stairs, nothing like the fiery girl Khalani had met in the prison camp.

When she hit the ground, Spade slammed the door to the Black Heart shut. His chest heaved, and he braced his back against the wood, like he could somehow contain the violence left behind the walls.

“We need to get out of here,” Jack ordered, tightening his hold around the injured Ryder. “He needs a doctor.”

“Fucking Dealer stabbed me,” Ryder hissed, blood seeping deeper pools into his gray shirt.

“What happened to the other Dealers?” Brock asked.

“Dead,” Raziel stated unforgivingly, wiping a bloodied arm across his nose, clutching a handgun close to his side. “I counted seven in the raid, but more will come when they don’t report back.”

“And the rest of the Aces?”

Jack and Spade exchanged grim looks. Raziel muttered expletives too deadly to list under his tongue. Khalani careened at the silent answer.

Elise swayed side to side, her gaze glassy, looking like she’d keel over at any moment.

“Still don’t know how the hell they found us.” Spade banged a heavy fist against the door.

“Someone must’ve talked.”

“We don’t know that yet,” Jack snapped, scanning the alley, but his murderous gaze landed on Takeshi.

He froze, his mouth opening and closing multiple times, like he couldn’t quite believe what he was seeing.

Jack was with them when Takeshi was shot. He’d witnessed the tunnels sealing off his escape.

He, like everyone else, had thought Takeshi was dead.

“How is he alive?”

None of them spoke. Not even Brock.

Raziel was perceptive, though. He took in the discarded knife on the ground, their lowered eyes, and the thin line of blood trickling down Khalani’s neck.

In the next millisecond, he cocked his gun and aimed it at Takeshi.

“NO!”

Khalani didn’t think.

Pure instinct overrode her as she dove over Takeshi, shielding his body with her own.

“Get off him,” Raziel hissed.