Justice Mine: a Base Branch Novel by Megan Mitcham

Magdalena hoped he’d stay silent. She could diffuse the situation, if he didn't get all macho on her.
    “Thank you,” she nodded. “Just don't hurt my friend. He has nothing to do with this.”
    Davis’ forehead crinkled. “Looks pretty invested from where I’m standin’. Just come over here, so he doesn’t get hurt.”
    Before she could raise a foot over the high metal edge, Law’s voice scraped its way through the tension-thick air and into her ear. “Magdalena. Do. Not. Move.” The simple demand given in such a brutal tone knocked her senses for a loop. Never one for orders, her body and mind bent to his will. Something in that grave timbre told her, of the two men about to bust heads, Law would come away the victor.
    Make that three.
    A bloke she’d never seen rounded the corner with a nasty growl. As wide as Davis’ carriage was, this guy’s nearly doubled his, but got cut short in the legs assembly. “She’s fuckin’ dead,” he yelled. “You,” he roared. His sausage-like finger stabbed the air between him and Law. “You killed Aaron. Burned my brother bloody alive.” The guy’s voice cracked with emotion and he screamed. “Both of you are corpses. Standing corpses.”
    Dread and anxiety grabbed Magdalena’s intestines with both hands and played double-dutch. If she could move, she’d fall on the floor in a worthless heap. As luck would have it, she stood paralyzed.
    Having digested the news, tears streaked Davis’ stern face. He let loose a battle cry and ran for Law, as she’d done to the guy at the media building’s entrance earlier. Presumably, that had been the dead guy, Aaron. His back hunched and his battering ram shoulder tucked forward.
    Law stayed perfectly still until Davis got nearly atop him then he crouched low. His arms wrapped around Davis’ shins and he stood, tossing the giant over his shoulder. Davis landed head first on the floor. The defending sound of cracking bone reverberated in the room. The man’s body collapsed like jam onto the wood.
    Magdalena’s stomach vibrated and rocked. She heaved as the scene replayed itself over and again in her mind. Her hand slapped over her mouth, but there was nothing for her gut to expel. That didn’t stop it from trying. She might have stayed there all night in a standing hunch if Mike didn’t pull a big-ass blade from his back. Her stomached settled out of necessity, but her hand did not move. Instead it stifled her ghastly moan.
    Law stood impassive at all the shit going on around them. His posture appeared as relaxed as if he were going to play a few rounds of tennis with a friend, but his gaze never veered from Mike as the man moved down the steps. Mike’s gaze darted from Davis to her and back to Law in a whirly-bird of confusion.
    Mike stepped in, raking the serrated metal across the air. Law pivoted, moving just out of reach of the deathblow, and countered with a fist to the bloke’s fat face. The bulldog looking man stumbled a couple of steps, but shook off the hit with a roll of his shoulders. He circled Law right then left, but her champion outmaneuvered Mike, not allowing him past mid-point, closer to her.
    She watched, the air choking in her lungs, as Mike sliced at Law’s middle, missing by a few inches, then arching high to strike at his face. When she expected him to step back he moved in, plastering his body to Mike’s. Law’s left arm coiled around Mike’s knife hand and clinched it under his arm. Mike slashed the knife wildly, catching Law’s shoulder. Crimson pearled from his tanned skin and coursed down his tricep. Before the droplet of blood reached his elbow, a familiar crack of bone wrought the air and Mike hit the floor in a heap, the knife preceding his descent by a blink.
    Law collapsed on his knees next to the body, his hand searching Mike’s neck. “Dammit,” he ground. His fists clenched and pressed against the ground on either side of his thighs.
    Her broken sob turned his head and he