Darkest Before Dawn

She crashed into the unsuspecting man, and the adrenaline surge that had spiked through her veins gave her much more strength than she thought she possessed. Conrad went sprawling just as a volley of bullets peppered the area right where Conrad had been standing a fraction of a second earlier.

Tensing, expecting pain from one of the bullets that had surely struck her, she hunched in on herself even as she dropped like a rock. Which was stupid because she and Conrad both needed to be on their feet so they could make their escape. But self-preservation ruled and she acted instinctively to prevent herself from getting killed. Even though she hadn’t been the intended target.

Vicious curses from more than one location blistered the air, and Honor suddenly found herself roughly dragged to her feet, thrown over a shoulder and flopping like a fish out of water as Hancock sprinted toward the waiting vehicle.

Conrad had already regained his footing and was two steps ahead of Hancock and Honor. Hancock forcibly threw Honor into the backseat before he and Conrad dove inside. Their doors weren’t even shut yet when the vehicle lurched forward, tires spinning momentarily as the driver floored it.

“Goddamn it. Goddamn it!” Hancock bellowed.

But it was Conrad’s expression that sent Honor’s heart into her throat. He was coldly furious. Rage simmered over and through his body, his face and eyes so black that she shivered. His jaw bulged from clenching his teeth together so tightly.

Everyone was pissed. At her. And she was utterly baffled. Genuinely puzzled. She’d saved Conrad’s life. Didn’t that get her off the hook for “drawing undue attention”?

“What the fuck did you think you were doing?” Conrad roared. “What about ‘do not draw attention to yourself’ did you not understand? Women here would never do such a thing. Swear to God, you must have a death wish.”

“Bullshit,” Honor snapped, pissed that the man wasn’t the least bit grateful that she’d prevented someone from making Swiss cheese out of him. “You forget I work in villages like this. I see mothers protecting their children. Their loved ones. Every bit as fiercely as the males.”

Hancock huffed out a breath that suggested he was hanging on to his patience—and temper—by a thread.

“Not in this village,” he said through clenched teeth. “Women here are rarely seen and never heard. They do not interfere. Worse, you brought dishonor to the assassin because you, a lowly woman, thwarted his objective and the entire village bore witness to it. This is an outlaw town and the only rules are the ones enforced by the people who have the power to back them up.”

“Good,” Honor snarled. “I hope he kills himself over the humiliation of it all. One less asshole in the world, though if I hadn’t interfered, then there’d be two less assholes in the world.”

She stared pointedly at Conrad, her expression frigid.

“More likely he’ll kill you,” Hancock said grimly. “It doesn’t matter if he knows you’re wanted or if he’s your enemy’s friend. He would seek your death for no other reason than the insult you handed him.”

“It’s customary to thank someone when they save your life,” she snapped. “Not tell them they’re a fucking idiot who can’t follow simple instructions.”

“If the shoe fits,” Conrad muttered.

“If you want to die so bad, I’ll gladly oblige you,” she seethed. “I’ll shoot you myself, but you can be sure I’ll be creative with the shot placements.”

“Bad mojo,” Mojo muttered, glancing over his shoulder at Honor with something that looked suspiciously like a glimmer of respect.

“It’s over and done with,” Hancock said by way of halting the back-and-forth. “Just get us the hell out of here, Viper, and don’t let up on the accelerator. And damn sure keep an eye out for a tail or an RPG attack.”

Honor sank against the seat, pain and intense heat bathing her side. She must have fallen on something when she hit the ground so fast. But over her dead body would she ever let these assholes know that she’d sustained another injury while saving their ungrateful ass of a teammate. They could all fuck off as far as she was concerned. Just when she began to tell herself that she misunderstood Hancock and his men and that they weren’t really flaming assholes, they just as quickly dissuaded her of that notion by proving yet again just what jackasses they were.

The demon inside her, the very pissed-off outraged demon, wouldn’t simply let it go as Hancock had commanded. She turned her head so she faced Conrad and stared him down unflinchingly, not giving a shit that he could snap her like a twig with two fingers.

“So you would have preferred I just stand there like some hapless twit and let you get killed? Really? Does your life mean so little to you?”

She couldn’t keep the derision or scorn from her voice.

Conrad’s scowl deepened and his features grew even blacker, if such a thing were possible. He looked like an angry storm cloud in spring tornado season. His brow was so furrowed that his eyebrows bunched together to form one continuous line of hair over both eyes. And those eyes glittered with fury.

“Ungrateful ass,” she muttered, before refusing to look at him a second longer.

Instead she leaned back, tilting her head against the seat even though the rough terrain made it impossible for her skull not to endure battering from all the holes and bumps in their path.

She closed her eyes, shutting them all out. If she was lucky, she could fall asleep and they could just wake her up when they got to wherever they were stopping and she could be a good little hapless maiden and go sit on her hands while the big bad alpha males got their balls shot off.