If You Fall

Forty Eight

The other man threw his head back and laughed out loud, sounding genuinely amused. "Whatever do you plan to do with that, you silly boy? You never could stand up for yourself. And who is this lovely thing? Mmm." He looked me up and down and took a step closer.

He stopped when the gun was leveled at his face. 

I was afraid to move or say anything. Time felt suspended, reality skewed. A big dog barked somewhere, over and over, and it echoed around us. Thump, thump-thump came through the wall. I desperately wished for us to be invisible, to be anywhere else.

"Get behind me," Reed said to me in a quiet, barely controlled voice.

I was frozen. "I--"

"Get behind me, Adelaide!" he yelled, too close to my ear, and I did it before I even knew I was moving.

"Adelaide!" the scumbag crooned. "What a perfect name for such an exquisite creature. She's a little old for my tastes, perhaps, but certainly tasty nevertheless." He smirked, amused, trying to rile up Reed. "Going to shoot me, Etienne? Go ahead, son, do it." He held his hands up to show he wasn't going to try to stop him. "Go on."

In my head I pulled my own gun out and shot him, but my purse was in the car and I was shaking so hard my teeth were chattering. I couldn't have hit the side of a fucking barn. I was useless.

Worse than that, I was a distraction, just as Mandy had feared. 

"You will burn in hell for the things you have done," Reed promised him through clenched teeth, his free arm behind him to keep me there. 

The hearty laugh sounded again, and the asshole put his hand over his bulging stomach as he chuckled. "Oh, my, this is hilarious. Tell me, how did you even know I was--"

He stopped as his eyes widened and blood began trickling from a small hole above his left temple, though Reed had not fired. "I was-- I was-- " he stuttered, then dropped to his knees and forward onto his face with a sickening thud. 

A black sedan pulled up and Dane jumped out of the driver's seat. "Hurry," he urged us, and Reed moved to take up the feet of the body, both of them grunting at the effort. "The trunk, Addy!"

I recovered enough to hold the trunk lid up while they heaved and then dumped the dead weight into the yawning space. The bloody head smacked the tire iron inside and then Reed was pushing me into the passenger seat and taking over the steering wheel as Dane got in the back.

I automatically put on my seat belt, stunned at how fast it had all happened. Less than five minutes had passed since I'd arrived with Mandy. She was turning around to follow our car and I held the handle above the door as Reed tore around a corner.

"Slow down, mate," Dane warned calmly from behind him, and unceremoniously kicked my seat.

I looked back at him like what the fuck and he nodded toward Reed with a look like do something.

Oh. I reached to put my hand on his leg, hesitant. He was so tense it was like rock. The radio played some 80s ballad, adding to the surrealness, so I turned it off. 

He glanced down and then over at me, the fury and chaos and wildness on his face softening before he focused on the road again. His hand left the wheel and covered the back of my hand, lacing his fingers through mine. "I'm so sorry I yelled at you. I was afraid," he said simply.

This dear sweet man. "It's okay." I heard a click as Dane lit a cigarette. 

"Was it you?" Reed asked him, patting my hand and then reaching back for the cigarette.