Queen of Quarantine (Brutal Boys of Everlake Prep #4) - Caroline Peckham Page 0,28

to batter it down.

In the next breath, Saint was gone, climbing up into the dark elevator shaft behind Monroe, and Blake and I raised our guns. He tossed a couple more pink smoke grenades to fill the rest of the room as we readied to fight for our damn lives.

"For her," he said in a fierce voice and I smiled the only true smile that had crossed my lips since she’d been taken. Because this might be a form of insanity and I could be looking my death in the eyes right now, but so long as it was in aid of that girl, I knew that I’d die with this smile on my face. Though I was seriously hoping it wouldn’t come to that and I’d have her in my arms before the night was up. Either way, I was all in and I knew the others were too.

"For her."

I was wheeled outside onto the roof and the cold night air swirled around us as the crescent moon smiled a crooked smile at me.

I was working on my right leg which felt the loosest of all my limbs, trying to tug it free of the binds even though it wouldn’t do me much good. But I wasn’t just going to lay down and accept this fate. The Night Keepers were so close. They had to make it to me. Maybe I could buy them a little extra time if nothing else.

“Where the fuck is it?” Jonas barked and I craned my neck to see that the helipad was empty.

Hope sparked in me like fireworks and I screamed once more, the sound echoing everywhere. They had to hear me. They couldn’t be far behind now. My skin prickled like I could actually feel them drawing closer and I was certain that if I could buy us even a few more seconds that would be all it took for them to reach me.

“Would someone shut her up?” the doctor snapped, but the guards seemed reluctant to touch me despite the masks covering their faces.

One of them lifted their handgun, aiming it at my forehead.

“Quiet,” he growled, but as terrifying as that dark barrel was, I knew my death didn’t await me in it.

They weren’t going to kill me when they were taking so many measures to get me the hell out of here. So I screamed louder and cried my Night Keepers’ names into the wind, praying it would carry my voice to their ears.

“For fuck’s sake.” A fist cracked against my face and my lip busted as Jonas stood over me, blocking out the light of the moon, his shoulders rising and falling as he glowered at me. My head rang and blood wet my mouth as I glared up at this asshole, silently promising him an agonising death. “Quiet.”

The thumping sound of a helicopter approaching somewhere off in the sky reached us and Jonas gripped my throat to keep me from screaming again, squeezing tight enough to make my ears pop.

The world grew loud as the helicopter circled overhead and came down to land on the helipad, the wind whipping wildly around us and blowing my hair across my face so that it was hard for me to see what the people surrounding me were doing.

I continued to jerk my leg back and forth to try and get it free, my heart rioting in my chest as time seemed to move too fast. They weren’t here. Why weren’t they here? Had something happened to them? Were they in trouble right now, needing me just as much as I needed them? I’d never felt so fucking helpless as I did right now, strapped to this goddamn bed and immobilised by the weakness in my body just as much as the men surrounding me. I was a goddamn fighter and I needed to fight. I refused to give up, no matter how hopeless it might have seemed.

Jonas released my throat as he wheeled me toward the helicopter, one of the guards yanking the door open as I was rolled beneath the propellers.

I screamed once more, but the sound of the helicopter stole my voice away and panic ripped through my core. I’m running out of time.

The guards collapsed the legs of the hospital gurney so it flattened down beneath me then they lifted me into the back of the helicopter while my heart raced with panic and I thrashed uselessly against my bonds. They all poured in after me and fear