Smoke & Metal (New York Crime Kings Book 3) Read Online Free

the shadows. With a swift tug on my arm, Jai pulls me behind a large bin. My thighs scream and burn as I crouch low, resting the majority of my body weight against him. I’m not going to last much longer.
    “Over there.” He whispers, thrusting out a long, thick arm and a finger to match.
    I follow his line of sight to a beat up, pale gray sedan circa nineteen eighty something. Looking at its ratty paint makes me miss the first super-fast, super nice car we stole. This one is the easiest choice, I suppose. The driver’s side window is open a crack, making it all too easy for someone like Jai to break into.
    “Come on.”
    With quick steps, I follow him across the road. I barely have time to peer around his shoulder before he’s unlocked the car and pulled the passenger door open. He slips my bag off his shoulder and tosses it into the back seat. His blue eyes, black in this light, meet mine when he pulls back and straightens his spine.
    “Last leg of the trip. Are you ready?”
    “I’m ready.” I say without hesitation.
    A strange, dense coil of excitement twirls in my chest. Adventure. The unknown—an unknown without Skull. How can I not be ready? We need to rest, recover and re-evaluate our plan. If I’m lucky Jai will come to his senses. If we couldn’t hurt him underground with next to no men, we sure as hell can’t hurt him out here. Not when he has everyone on his side. And, even if his brother is alive…the chances of him making it to the break of dawn after the stunt we pulled is next to none. Skull will kill Joel and when that happens Jai will be unstoppable. He will be a force as destructive and as terrifying as a tornado raging on the precipice of a hurricane. He will be filled with the unrelenting wrath of an erupting volcano.
    And who is going to be able to stop it?
     

 
    The Lake House
     
    Jai
     
    Honnnnk!!
    I jolt awake as my stomach and my heart collide into each other in an attempt to squeeze up my throat. Instinctively, my hands clench the wheel and I jerk it to the side, forcing the car back into its designated lane. Panting, I glance in my side mirror and at the truck travelling in the left lane. The blonde woman behind the wheel flips me off with a shake of her head. I take it like a bitch. Driving when tired is a dangerous game and the amount of micro naps I’ve taken is frightening. Like a game of Russian roulette, it’s only a matter of time before I kill Kitten, myself and a bunch of other innocent people travelling on the same road.
    By my calculations we’re an hour from our destination. George Lake . I stayed there during the summer a few times when I was a kid. It’s been fifteen years since we sold the lake house and we haven’t been back. As we were fleeing from the tunnels, I was driving myself insane trying to think of a place to hide until I’m ready to attack again.
    Then it hit me.
    The lake.
    There are loads of houses out there—most unused outside of summer. Since it’s fall now I’m certain a particular lake house will be abandoned until next summer. It belongs to a man named Mr. Dooney. I knew him growing up. Mr. Dooney was a lonely man, getting on in years, and occupied the lake house down the road from ours. The lake house was a gift from a son that he hated, but his wife adored. He wanted to sell it loads of times, but couldn’t because she loved it so much. When his wife passed away he still couldn’t bring himself to get rid of the place. He even stays in it every summer as a tribute to the late Mrs. Dooney.
    If life has been kind to him, and he’s still alive, his house will be empty, making it a perfect hideout for me and Emily. No one will find us there…if we’re smart.
    Another honk and I jolt awake, unaware that my eyes had closed once again. To my right, a woman thrusts her hand and points to the sleeping child in the back—no older than three. I offer her the best sympathetic look I can muster. It must come off as a scowl because she flips