Total pages in book: 33
Estimated words: 29744 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 149(@200wpm)___ 119(@250wpm)___ 99(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 29744 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 149(@200wpm)___ 119(@250wpm)___ 99(@300wpm)
Her mom's confidence waivers.
"He isn't a man of God," Winter says, her voice soft. "You just don't want to admit it because you don't want to admit that you've been misled all these years. But you have been misled. He uses you and everyone else in the congregation for his own purposes. He always has. He manipulates and controls and deceives you, and you let him because he tells you that it's what you're meant to do. But you know deep down that he's wrong. I know you do. You wouldn't be here now if you didn't."
Indecision parades across her mother's face, aging her beyond her years.
"He tried to shoot your daughter," I say, twisting the knife a little deeper. It's cruel, but sometimes, cruelty is the best kind of mercy. It's the only kind that severs the chains dragging you under. "He shot an innocent man and allowed dozens of others to be trampled. And then he sent your daughter a letter threatening to kill her. Does that sound like a man of God to you?"
"He sent a letter?" she asks Winter.
"Psalm 94," Winter confirms, grimacing. "He twisted it all up, Mama. He said the pit had been dug, and said I had to repent or dwell in the silence of death." She shivers. "He thinks he's God."
"Oh, Winter," her mom whispers, tears welling in her eyes. "What have I done?"
I lower my gun as Winter flings her arms around her mom, pulling her into a hug. "You didn't know, Mama," she says fiercely. "You didn't know."
Her mom weeps silently, clinging to her daughter.
I shove my gun into my pocket, reaching for my phone to call Anderson.
"No!" Winter screams suddenly.
I glance up to see her horror-filled gaze trained over my shoulder. I drop my phone, grasping for my gun as I spin, putting myself between her and whoever the fuck is behind me. I already know I'm not going to get to my gun in time to save my own life, but at least I'll give her a chance to run. I'll give her a chance to save her own.
My life before hers. I can live with that.
My fingers close around my gun as my gaze lands on the man standing a few car lengths away, pointing a weapon at me. He's dressed in all black, a mask pulled down over his face. He doesn't move as he aims at me. Maybe it's the mask. Maybe he just doesn't give a shit. But he thumbs back the trigger as if he's done it a thousand times, his eyes completely cold and devoid of anything resembling remorse or emotion.
I love you, songbird. Close your eyes. I love you.
A gunshot rings out.
Winter screams, a haunted, painful sound.
I don't breathe, waiting for the pain to come. Except it doesn't.
What the fuck?
Brother Gibbs staggers forward a step, the gun falling from his hand. He collapses to his knees as the gun hits the ground at his feet. A wet spot blooms across his chest, spreading rapidly.
I rush forward, kicking the gun out of his reach before I spin toward Winter and her mom.
Her mom is holding a gun, her face contorted in grief.
Oh, fuck me. She shot him.
"Mama," Winter whispers. "Oh, Mama."
"I had to," her mom mumbles. "I had to. I had to."
I rush forward, prying the gun from her hands as shouts ring out in the distance, help finally coming. Far too late to help Brother Gibbs, I think. Not that I'm going to weep for the motherfucker.
"I decided something," Winter says hours later, curling up on my lap on the couch. She never managed to make it down the runway. Once Anderson arrived, we had ten thousand questions to answer. We only just got home a little while ago.
I have a feeling tomorrow will be a whole new shitshow. Once the press gets the story, they're going to lose their collective minds. Winter's childhood pastor tried to kill her, only to be shot by her mother. There will be no stopping that story. But for tonight, at least, Anderson and Riley are doing their best to keep it under wraps to give us one more night of peace.
I'm ready for whatever comes next. Bring it on. So long as Winter is by my side, I'm ready to face anything. I thought I was going to lose her today. Hell, I thought I lost myself today. But somewhere between arriving at that damn show and leaving, I found something I didn't expect. Forgiveness. Hope. Peace.
I couldn't save my team, and it's haunted me every day since. I've relived it over and over in my dreams, trying to will a different outcome into existence. But I can't change what happened. Part of me will probably always feel responsible simply because I survived. Because I wasn't fast enough to get there in time to warn them. But today, for the first time, their ghosts fell silent.