Dead.

The foreign man hit the ground, my skin and hair getting covered in the splatter of blood and other juices as his head shot back, a bullet hole perfectly between the eyes, Jax’s gun raised just over my shoulder.

As his body hit the floor, there was a brief moment of silence that took over everything.

Then, all hell broke loose.

Black Angels appeared from hiding spots all over, firing off round after round as the girls screamed and leaped for cover. Jax swore violently beside me, leaping out into the fray as Mint and Pretty jumped up from the ground, pulling out guns hidden under the floorboards and under the table and firing off round after round at each unfamiliar face turning on us.

Mallory screamed, and I lunged for her, my body covering hers as we rolled behind one of the couches, my gun clattering on the wood as it slipped from my grasp. Her chest heaved over and over as she floundered beneath my body. I pinned her to the floor, my hand fumbling for the gun as it slipped on my blood-soaked skin.

“Fuck!” I hissed as Mallory’s nail dug into my skin in fear as I helped pushed her up against one of the back of the couches, a bullet bouncing off close to my head.

Mallory’s eyes went wide, and I could only think of the memories this was bringing back for her, but I couldn’t attend to my own psychological state, never mind hers, as all I could think about was survival.

I peered over the edge of the couch, hoping to spot a second redhead, but ducked straight back down as cotton burst from the cushion, the bullet almost breaking through the interior wooden frame, the sound ringing in my ears. What I had seen was a girl lying on the floor, and I immediately recognized her as Sweets.

I didn’t waste a second look to confirm that she was dead. There was no need to with her brains splattered across the floor.

“Fuck!” I heard Jax yell from behind the table he had tipped onto its side as he bashed his gun into the wooden floorboards.

“Jax!” I yelled, catching his eye as he turned, and I slid my gun across the floor toward him. He gave me a grateful nod, discarding his own jammed gun, and began firing off shots into the other side of the room, followed by the sounds of bodies dropping down on the floor.

Their side held the doorway. I counted women hidden and tucked away. I could see Baby next to Pretty, her body covering Georgia and Ember as they both shook with silent tears, their hands covering their ears, flinching with each gunshot. Baby remained impassive as she leaned out and around the tipped-over pool table, clocking where enemies lay, so Pretty could get them without wasting the bullets.

I thanked God the clubhouse was practically empty. After the brothers had headed out to make the deal, anybody not club had left straight away, leaving only the club girls and the old ladies.

I tried to reach for my knife in my boot, but from my awkward position on top of Mallory, my arms bracketing her in as I kept her close against the back of the couch where I knew a thick wooden panel was hidden inside, I couldn’t reach it.

“Mallory,” I said, trying to rouse her brown eyes pinned straight ahead, in this case, at my chest as she fell into her shell-shocked world. “Fuck!” I kept my arm compact, but with all the force I could muster, I slapped her hard across the face.

She let out a yelp, distracting Jax for a second before he turned back to the bullets flying his way. But my hit did the trick as Mallory’s brown eyes leaped up to mine.

“Mallory,” I said, fighting to keep my voice steady and calm, but the second I heard the creak of the floorboard so close it overrode the sound of the gunfire going off all around me, urgency overtook everything. “Knife. Boot. Now!” I screeched, and Mallory lunged for my boot, her finger hooking into the side of it and pulling.

I heard it clatter against the floor just as I saw the pair of dark eyes leap from the side of the couch.

Mallory let out a screech as a gun pointed at her head, but I was faster.

I leaped low against his side, my compact force sending the man stumbling away from us, the gun going off into the ceiling, and both our bodies colliding with the wall. I grunted in pain, my hand and leg bursting with a excrusiating heat as my adrenaline couldn’t beat it down any longer.

The man beside me didn’t stay down for long, however, as his hands wrapped around my shoulders and he rolled as he shoved me beneath him. His hands went around my small throat, their huge, meaty paws closing tight around my esophagus, stopping oxygen from reaching my head.

Dark stars rippled at the corners of my vision as I reached with my nails to gouge the man’s eyes out, but my arms couldn’t reach, and the panic set in as my sight got darker and darker and the floor rocked beneath me.

I patted my hand around for my knife, but fuck, it might as well not have fucking existed, because I couldn’t find it. My limbs grew heavier and heavier, my movements weaker and weaker.

It was only in the last few seconds that I felt the cool touch of metal, and for the life of me, I didn’t know how I moved. How I managed to lift my arm from the ground. How I managed to find the strength to swing it forward.

I breathed first and foremost before I felt the hot wash of thick blood pour over my chest and stomach as I saw the deep gouge sliced across the man’s jugular. Pints and pints of the stuff washed over my rippling chest as I struggled to take in oxygen without drowning in the man’s blood. My eyes closed on instinct, burning as the liquid splashed into them, as the body collapsed down in a heap on top of me, his huge weight crushing my small body.

“Anna!” Mallory yelled, her eyes desperately searching for life as she lay crouched on her hands and knees, ready to lunge forward. I realized she had been the one to throw me the knife as a streak from the already red-stained blade left a trail from her to me where it had skidded across the floor.

I went to open my mouth, to tell her I was fine, but it was at that point that I realized that she hadn’t been calling me in concern. She had been calling me in fear.

I only had seconds to see the metal barrel pointed at my face.

No.

The man opened his mouth to speak, but blood spewed out as his gun dropped from his hands and the man followed after it into a dead pile of the floor.

I looked up, and for a second, my mind screamed Devil.

“Hey, spunky.” Charon’s eye crinkled as he looked down at me, savoring the way I was being slowly crushed to death by a corpse with my knife in its throat as gunfire rained down around him. “Red looks good on you.”

“Charon?” I choked, unable to comprehend the molten gold eyes staring back at me with amusement. “Am I dead?”

Charon laughed before finally reaching to grab the dead Black Jack by the shoulder and roll him off me. The relief of his weight from off my chest sent my head spiraling as my body jolted upward, my stomach heaving across the floor, vomit mixing with the blood into a new vile combination as I was reminded of the reason my stomach was so upset in the first place.

That’s when the adrenaline faded away and panic and clarity sank in. “Doctor,” I gasped, fighting my need to dry heave again as I heard the gunfire silencing around me. My hand pressed against my stomach as it throbbed painfully, my body wanting to double over as my head swam.

I became aware of Jax rushing to my side from the other side of the room.

“I need a doctor! Now!” I repeated, trying to stagger to my feet before dropping back down to my knees.

Charon reached for me, but Jax growled when he got even a step closer.

He scooped me up, wincing at my yelp of pain from my bruised fucking everything. I waited for his warmth to cocoon me, but it never did. A freezing cold ate away at my skin as I knew I was going into a form of shock or panic attack. Jax squeezed his arms ever so slightly tighter around me in an attempt to fight the shivers wracking my body.

“Jax,” I rasped, my teeth chattering as he began moving across the compound, his feet following Charon’s dark figure as it leaped over bodies littering the floor.

“Don’t worry, Anna,” Jax whispered. “You’re going to be fine, darlin’.”

I hoped that was true.