Page 87 of Fool Me Twice

He closed his eyes and hung his head, breathing hard.

Cane didn’t know what it was that tipped him off in that moment. Just an instinct. A sense of something not being quite right anymore.

Something in the air had changed.

He cut his eyes to the doorway sharply.

He wasn’t alone anymore.

He strained his ears to hear over the drumming of water on the shower floor, catching the snick of a gun being cocked.

Cane smiled grimly at his reflection.

He wouldn’t go back to that gutter.

He pushed off the sink and took stock of himself. He kept a gun in every room—he wasn’t braindead—so he reached for the one on top of the cabinet. He double-checked that the magazine was loaded before slipping the pistol into the back of his jeans.

Next, Cane opened the drawer to the left of the sink and fished out his brass knuckles, slipping them onto his fingers and clenching his fist. His name was engraved into the top, raised and sharp over each ring. They had been a present to himself.

One he enjoyed sharing with other people.

Armed, he slipped quietly out of the bathroom and to his bedroom doorway, pressing his ear to the wood to listen for any other indicator about where the intruder was.

A creak to the right told him they’d stepped on the loose board in the guest room.

Hart’s room.

Hart had only stayed there a single night, but his stuff was still in there, and the mere idea of whoever it was creeping into a room Hart could have potentially been in if circumstances were different set him the fuck off.

He took the opportunity to open the door and slip from the room and down the hall. The door to the guest room was open where it hadn’t been before, but he could hear muffled whispers coming from farther down toward the living room.

More than one then.

Whoever wanted him dead really didn’t want to take any chances.

He clenched his jaw and poked his head around the doorframe. He saw a single figure by the bed. He was wide in the shoulders and dressed all in black, a bandanna tied around the bottom half of his face. He was also going through Hart’s bag like it belonged to him.

Looting before the job was done.

Incompetent.

But it worked in Cane’s favor. He took one last glance down the hall before slipping inside behind the guy. He skipped over the loose floorboard and crept closer, sure he could just get a grip around the idiot’s neck and squeeze.

The guy turned at the last minute and his eyes widened.

He managed to get out a muffled shout of “He’s here!” before Cane’s fist plowed into his face, leaving an imprint of his name in the middle of his forehead. He dropped to the floor like a sack of shit, unconscious.

“Motherfucker,” Cane spat at him.

More footsteps sounded, stealth out the window, and then bullets started flying.

Cane hit the floor as the lead broke through the walls and flew over his head. Shit started getting ripped, plaster from the walls filling the air with white and parts of the furniture splintering off. But even through the chaos, the shots themselves were muffled by what had to be a suppressor, to try and avoid unwanted attention.

Not that anyone in this building gave a shit or would call it in. It was why he’d chosen it in the first place.

He stashed his knuckles and pulled out his gun, crawling toward the door so he could get eyes on where those fuckers were. The moment he poked his head around, a bullet whizzed past his ear, nicking the ridge of his cheekbone with a slice of pain before he could pull back. Blood poured and he swiped it away carelessly.

“Right there. Okay,” he muttered.