Resisting Ruby Rose (The Ruby Rose Series) by Jessie Humphries Page A

door and threw Chase in as if he were a sack of potatoes, not a teenage guy bleeding to death. I got into the backseat with Chase and shut the door just as a bullet ricocheted off the frame six inches from my head.
    Quinn was in the driver’s bucket seat before I could blink, and in seconds we were doing sixty miles per hour on a road meant for off-road vehicles, not a sedan. The LED digital dashboard was the only light I had to ascertain Chase’s condition. He was limp in my lap, and I still had no idea where h e’d been shot. There was too much blood.
    “Check his pulse,” Quinn said, shifting gears to turn onto a paved road.
    I placed my fingers on Chase’s neck and closed my eyes to concentrate. Between the movement of the car and my own heartbeat pounding in my fingertips, I couldn’t tell at first. But then I found his pulse, slow and weak.
    “He’s alive, but where was he shot?” I asked, frantic.
    “His head,” Alana whimpered, her face in her hands. Her bloody hands covering her bloody face.
    “What?” I fumbled for the cell phone in my pocket to turn the flashlight light app on. I had to wipe the blood off my hands for the screen to work. When the light came on, I saw the wound. It was more than a superficial graze, but less critical than it could have been. He was unconscious, most likely due to the shock and loss of blood. If we got him to the hospital soon enough, though, I thought he could live. “How far to the nearest hospital?” I asked.
    “An hour, but let’s get out of Sherwood Forest first,” Quinn said, adjusting his rearview mirror and taking the speed up to 90, even though we had a switchback coming. This wasn’t just any ordinary sedan, I noticed. It was an Audi RS 7. How did a teenager own one of the most beautiful—not to mention one of the fastest—vehicles in the known world?
    I craned my neck to see what Quinn was looking at behind us: another car. A black SUV. It looked just like Big Black, and my heart soared with hope that Liam and Sofia had gotten away, too. But when a shot rang out and cracked against our rear window, I dropped down, and so did my heart.
    “You have bulletproof windows?” I couldn’t believe it. Glass should have shattered in my face just now.
    “Can you shoot back?” Quinn asked, downshifting to take the curve.
    “I think so.” I moved Chase’s head from my lap, not wanting to jostle him. I took my hoodie off and wrapped it around his wound as tightly as I could to help stop the bleeding. After delicately placing his head on the seat, I rolled down the window and leaned out to take aim. Quinn’s driving steadied while I put the most important parts of my body out of a dangerously fast-moving car. Wind whipped against my face as I pulled the trigger over and over. The SUV jerked and lost control as one of the tires exploded.
    I had a few more rounds in my clip, but I dipped back into the Audi to let Quinn speed away. Just as I breathed a sigh of relief that I had stopped them without taking any lives, the SUV skidded off the road, completely out of control, and rolled down a steep shoulder. Metal crunched, glass exploded, and I knew there was little to no chance that anyone in that vehicle would make it out alive.
    And just like all the other times that I’d taken someone’s life, a part of my soul cringed. It didn’t matter that they were trying to kill us; the suffocating sensation physically took my breath away.
    “Well done, partner ,” Quinn said. “Now let’s get the hell out of here.”
    The velocity of the vehicle’s increasing speed sent me back against the seat. As I lifted Chase’s head into my lap, I wondered if h e’d make it to the hospital. And if Liam had even made it out of the driveway.

CHAPTER 10
    Quinn couldn’t be serious. He absolutely wasn’t taking all the circumstances into account. The consequences, the legal ramifications, and the fallout would be disastrous. Not to mention how disloyal and coldhearted it