Rules of Honour Read Free Page A

continued his turn and tried to grapple for the gun. Rink hit him again, a sweeping elbow strike that made contact with Chaney’s face and knocked him back a few steps. Rink followed him, bringing up the Glock he’d liberated to point it directly at Chaney’s forehead.
    Time I did something.
    I hit the button and the door swept open.
    As I entered the carriage my view of Rink was slightly obscured by Chaney’s thick body. I had a horrible feeling that Rink would shoot, and the bullet would go directly through Chaney’s skull and hit me. I sidestepped, placing myself in the open next to the exit doors. Rink was taller than Chaney, and I knew he’d seen me from the slight narrowing of his eyes. That was all the notice he gave me, though, because his attention was on the man he was about to kill.
    I brought up my SIG SAUER P226 and pointed it at Chaney’s back. My other hand I held open to Rink.
    ‘Don’t do this, brother,’ I said to him. ‘Chaney’s a piece of shit, but he doesn’t deserve this.’
    Rink didn’t even look at me. Nausea squirmed a passage through my gut.
    ‘Don’t,’ I said again.
    ‘What’re you going to do, Hunter?’ Rink’s eyes never left Chaney. ‘Shoot me?’
    ‘I don’t want to,’ I said.
    ‘That’s something, at least.’ Rink ignored me then and took a step nearer Chaney.
    The enforcer reared back on his heels, bringing up his hands in a placating motion. ‘Whoa! What’s this all about?’
    ‘I’m about to kill you,’ my friend snarled.
    ‘Rink. Don’t do it.’ I hurried towards him. ‘Don’t cross the line, brother.’
    ‘It’s too late for that, Joe.’
    I knew then that there was less than a heartbeat to spare.
    I fired.

Chapter 3
    Rink is more than a friend to me. He is like a brother, and I love him as such. When he’s thinking straight he’d die for me, as I would for him. There’s no way on earth that I’d shoot him and he knew it. So I did the first thing that came to mind. I shot Sean Chaney instead.
    I shot him to save his life.
    My bullet struck him in his left thigh and he dropped like an ox in a slaughterhouse. He bellowed like one too, his hands going to the wound in his leg. The speed at which he’d collapsed saved him the bullet that Rink was about to put in his skull. My friend blinked over the top of the writhing man at me.
    ‘What the hell’d you do that for?’
    ‘To save you from making a big mistake.’
    ‘There’s no mistake.’ Rink turned the gun on the fallen enforcer, but I could see a flicker of doubt passing across his features.
    By now I was alongside my friend and I put my hand on his wrist.
    ‘Trust me,’ I said.
    He continued to train the gun on Chaney, but I could feel the doubt in his body now, and finally he allowed me to press the gun down.
    ‘It wasn’t Chaney,’ I said. ‘It wasn’t him or any of his guys.’
    ‘And you know that how?’
    I flicked a cautionary nod. ‘Later, OK?’
    At our feet the enforcer was sitting with his back against one of the bench seats. His jaw was set in a grimace of agony as he grasped at his wounded leg, and his eyes were brimming with fear as he watched us. He made the mistake of opening his mouth.
    ‘Who the fuck are you? Do you realise who you’re messing with?’
    Rink rounded on him.
    ‘You’ve just got a goddamn reprieve, punk. Now shut your hole!’
    Chaney looked at me. ‘You shot me, you bastard. You should’ve let your buddy kill me, ’cause I’m gonna . . .’
    ‘Going to what?’ I glared down at him. ‘I barely scratched you. You’re an ungrateful piece of crap; I’ve just saved your life.’
    ‘Says who?’ Chaney struggled to get up, leaning on the bench with a blood-slicked hand. ‘The way I see it your buddy is too much of a pussy to shoot. If he was gonna do it, he’d have goddamn done it. Just wait ’til I get up and—’
    I kicked his support arm from under him. Chaney went down on his backside with a solid bump. Anger flared in him, shame