So I ran, using crates for cover and checking that the coast was clear before making my way to the next one, doing this making a mental note actually to add the line in my contract doubling my hourly rate if I had to wear heels.

This and escape were my thoughts when I was caught around the chest and hauled back into a man’s body.

Fuck.

Before I could begin to execute maneuvers to get free, my heart stopped beating, my stomach plummeted and my world rocked when Creed appeared in front of me, gun raised just as I felt the muzzle of a gun against my temple.

Fuck!

One second after that, Creed’s gun discharged, the arm around my chest loosened and the gun at my head went away as the man behind me shouted in pain when the bullet ripped through his thigh.

One second after that, I cleared him and started running to Creed.

And one second after that, my world exploded.

This was because two shots were fired not from the man Creed brought down but from another one who hit our scene from behind. They whizzed by me and hit Creed. Blood sprayed in a hideous cloud from his neck and his chest jerked back before he fell back, landing heavy without even attempting to break his fall.

“No!” I shrieked, still running toward him.

More bullets flew and I dropped to the side of my hip, sliding toward Creed like I was stealing a base. I yanked the gun out of his motionless hand, twisted, lifted, aimed and fired two kill shots. One directly in the face of the man who shot Creed, one through the throat of the man who grabbed me and was on the ground, recovering and aiming his weapon at me.

Two lives extinguished, two more lives taken by me.

I didn’t give it a thought.

I turned, pulled myself up on my knees, dropped the gun with a clatter and bent over Creed.

My Creed. My beautiful, beautiful Creed, on his back, eyes closed, not breathing, blood pooling from the wound in his neck.

I covered the wound, put pressure on and shouted, my voice a piercing screech, “Man down! Man down! Man down!”

I stopped screaming and bent over Creed, my face in his face, my hand not engaged in putting pressure on his neck running over his chest, searching for another wound as my heart pounded in my chest, my pulse beating so hard in my neck, it felt like it would tear through, my throat burning, my world ending.

“Tonight’s not my night to lose you, partner,” I told him. “Tomorrow’s not my day to lose you, either.” I lifted my hand from his chest and brought it down in a fist over his heart, my voice now shouting, “Never, never, never again will there be a time when it’s my time to lose you!”

Creed said nothing and his blood flowed warm against my hand.

Fuck me, fuck me, fuck me.

I knew that feeling. I’d seen it before. That blood, all that blood.

Richard bled out in minutes. I watched. It seemed his life flashed, then gone.

Not Creed.

Not Creed.

That was not going to happen to my Creed.

Fuck, God, please don’t take Creed away from me. Not again. Not again.

Not ever again.

I bent over him, my hand leaving his chest, I held the pressure to his neck with my other as I vaguely heard the gunfire die out, running feet around us and I put my lips to his ear.

“Come back to me,” I whispered. “Come back to me.” Tears hit my eyes, spilling over instantly as Creed didn’t move. “Goddamn it, Creed, come back to me!”

“Jesus, baby, calm down,” he wheezed and I blinked.

Then I jerked up and looked down into his opened, beautiful, stunning, amazing, beloved blue eyes.

He sucked in another breath and knifed up to sitting. Automatically I sat back on my calves to give him room and my hand dropped from his neck as his hands went to his chest. He tore open his awesome shirt, buttons flying everywhere then reached in and yanked. I heard Velcro tear as he unstrapped his stealth-fit bulletproof vest.

When had he put on a vest?

And how had I not felt it?

“Fuckin’ hell, that hurts like a goddamned mother,” he bitched breathlessly.

I stared.

He sucked in another breath then another one before he lifted up his hand, put it to his neck, took it away and stared at the blood.

His eyes came to me. “Flesh wound.”

Before I told my hand to do it, and, mark me, if I had my head together, I still would have told my hand to do it, I lifted it and slammed it, hand flat, into his chest. I ignored Creed’s pained grunt and jumped to my feet.

Pointing down at him, I screeched, “You’re getting a job as an accountant!”

Creed blinked then grinned.

Blood roared in my ears.

“Fuck, thank God Gwen isn’t a badass,” I heard Hawk mutter, referring to his wife. “I would not tolerate shit like that on a job.”

“I hear you, brother,” Jorge muttered.

I looked to cargo pants, boots, skintight Under Armour wearing, dark haired, intense black eyed, hot guy commando Hawk Delgado, got a load of his two phenomenal dimples telling me eloquently he found me amusing and I spat, “Shut your fucking trap, Hawk.”

He lifted his hands in surrender but, I noted, his dimples didn’t go away.

Fuck me.

It was time to save face.

As Creed pushed to his feet, I looked around and asked sarcastically, “Is everyone enjoying the show? Or is anyone thinking maybe now’s a good time to rescue the two dozen women locked in a wooden freight crate? Or is that just me?”

“The DPD and Feds are seein’ to the girls,” Hawk informed me.

“Well, that’s good,” I returned.

“And seriously, Sylvie, you got great aim, babe, but you make a mess,” he continued, indicating the dead men scattered around.

I didn’t look at them, refused to look at them. They had ceased to exist until I got back to my therapist.

But I did shrug.

Hawk grinned.

Then he finished, “And, just FYI, personally, I’m enjoying the show.”

I glared at him.

“Me too,” Mo, who was also standing around and watching, added.

Someone kill me.

Creed threw an arm around my shoulders.

I stepped sharply away from it and jerked my head back to look up at him. “I’m not talking to you and you’re not touching me until I’m not pissed at you anymore.”

His brows shot together. “Beautiful, why the fuck are you pissed at me? I didn’t shoot me.”

“Grab the wrist, yank it out, head butt to the chin, spike heel into his foot, Creed,” I snapped. “I know how to get away from being held at gunpoint. You didn’t need to open fire.”

“I had on a vest and I got fuckin’ good aim,” Creed shot back.

“You also had another shooter on the approach,” I returned.

“You think I didn’t see him?” Creed asked, sounding insulted.

“I think I didn’t see him since my back was to him and I had other things occupying my attention like, say, the gun being held to my head,” I retorted.

“And I think I got a partner who knows what the fuck she’s doin’ so even though he nailed me, Sylvie, clue in, two dead guys are lyin’ on the floor ten feet away, one with his face blown off. I knew, I covered you, you’d cover me and I was right. I covered you, you covered me.”

Wow, that was nice.

I didn’t say that.

I said, “You might want to use your words like, say, calling, ‘Shooter!’ You think? Maybe?”

“I reckoned, when he shot me, you’d get there was a shooter.”

Oh my God!

Really?

“When did Grandpa turn into Take His and My Life in His Hands Maverick Hot Guy?” I asked.

“When I took my first job, and Sylvie, warning, another Grandpa crack and your bare ass feels my hand.”

Shit, that got a tingle.

I ignored the tingle and snapped, “Get shot again and you won’t see me naked for a week.”

“Baby, it was under control,” he replied.

I pointed at the blood dripping into his suit coat and shirt. “Yeah? Really?” I asked mockingly then went on to inform him, “This I know, I’m not taking that to the dry cleaners and I do not sew buttons back onto shirts.”

“Seriously?” he asked back. “Are we having this conversation?”

“Yes, we seriously are,” I clipped my answer.

“Yo, Bogey and Bacall, it may be a flesh wound but it’s still bleeding so will you two wind up this bullshit bickering and maybe we can get our man some medical attention?” Hawk asked fake politely and I turned my scowl to him.

Hawk withstood my scowl with no apparent effort so I gave up, crouched down, unbuckled one shoe, stood up, slipped it off and threw it overhand into the warehouse. I repeated this maneuver with the other shoe but grabbed Creed’s gun on the way up.

Then I cut a frown through all the men and started to stomp away.

As I stomped away, I heard Creed say, “Favor, Delgado, send a man after those shoes. I’m gonna need them later.”

To which I heard Hawk reply, “I hear you, man. Consider it done.”

Which meant, as I stomped away, I did it rolling my eyes.

But I also did it thinking Creed would probably get creative, me in those shoes and, on my back or knees, they probably wouldn’t hurt too much. Or, alternately, me lying over his thighs getting my first spanking.

Then again, if any of those scenarios occurred, I’d be feeling other things so my mind wouldn’t be on those fucking shoes.

This meant, my thoughts having turned pleasantly, when I exited the warehouse at the same time I felt Creed’s big, warm hand catch mine and hold tight, I wasn’t pissed anymore.