Total pages in book: 68
Estimated words: 68538 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 343(@200wpm)___ 274(@250wpm)___ 228(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68538 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 343(@200wpm)___ 274(@250wpm)___ 228(@300wpm)
But the burning pain that accompanied the bullet tearing into my face?
No, I never would’ve expected that kind of pain.
I fell backwards, twisting my body awkwardly, as the sound of the bullet leaving the gun sent a shockwave through my ears.
My eyes couldn’t focus, and there was ringing in my ears.
Dizziness started to overtake me, and it took all I had to keep rolling out of Scott’s line of sight.
I could feel warm blood leaking down my face, and my adrenaline was spiking so fast inside of me that I couldn’t think straight.
“Lucky,” Scott drawled. “I was hoping you’d take that one right to the eyeball.”
I gritted my teeth and rolled some more until I was behind the couch.
I heard the door to my place get pushed open wider and cursed my stupidity.
There I was worried about Maven this morning, and I should’ve been just as worried about myself.
“What do you want, Austin?” I snarled, army-crawling on the ground, hoping beyond hope that I could make a mad dash for my kitchen without him catching me.
“I want a little… oh,” he said. “Look who it is. My non-sister.”
Stomach clenching in knots, I army-crawled farther so that I could see his face between the couch and the recliner and saw him smiling down at his boots.
Now or never…
I went up on my toes, keeping crouched low, and ran.
I didn’t hear whatever else he said to her on the phone.
However, it was as I got to my room and realized I didn’t have my phone that I understood what I’d done.
This morning, I’d had my phone in my hand.
I’d dropped it on the floor next to the entryway.
Goddammit.
I picked up my gun, checked to see if it was loaded, and whirled around to the door, moving until I was in a more fortified position.
Heart in my throat, I waited.
And waited.
And waited.
And waited.
Just when I was about to lose my patience, I heard the footsteps.
“Don’t shoot me,” I heard an unfamiliar male voice say. “I incapacitated him.”
I froze.
“My name is Shasha Semyonov. I’m gonna slide my ID down the length of the hallway to you.”
He did just that, right into a puddle of my blood.
“Shit,” I said as I came out of my room, gun still slightly raised.
I saw him standing in the mouth of the hallway, hands up.
I dropped the weapon and said, “Not that I’m not happy to see you, man, but…”
“Why am I here?” he asked. “I found out we had located our sister yesterday. I’ve been looking for her for what feels like my entire life. Of course, I’m going to come down the moment I hear she’s alive.”
He had a point.
“I thought you were going to wait for her to come to you?” I asked.
“We were gonna,” I heard a female voice say. “But you know, Semyonov’s patience is atrocious.”
“I have to get some pants on,” I said. “Can you call 911?”
I came out five minutes later, fully dressed, with a hastily slapped 4X4 gauze pad on my face—I hadn’t had the courage to look at the wound. I was scared of what I’d find.
“Could’ve lost your eye,” Shasha Semyonov said.
“Feels like I kind of did,” I admitted, offering him my semi-clean hand.
“It’s your chin,” he said. “Nowhere near your eye.”
“It’s my cheek,” I removed the pad. “Along my cheekbone.”
“Bluster. Looks worse than it is,” he said.
My brows rose. “How would you know that?”
“Because I’ve been shot a time or two in my life,” he replied cryptically.
“Let me up, motherfucker,” Scott fumed.
“Absolutely not,” a different female voice from earlier said. “You’re about to experience hell.”
Older.
Much older.
Maven’s grandmother, Jessa.
“Grandma,” the female voice from earlier said. “How about we introduce ourselves before we offer any more violence?”
“Oh, my manners are atrocious, aren’t they?” she said in the frailest voice I’d ever heard. “I’m Jessa Semyonov. This one is Shasha Semyonov, my eldest grandson. And this beautiful girl here is my granddaughter Milena. Nastya and Dima are at the bakery. We decided to divide and conquer so we could find her faster.” She held out that frail hand, and I took it gingerly, scared I would hurt her with just a forceful breath.
“It’s nice to meet you,” I said. “Though I wish it’d been under different circumstances.”
Jessa’s brows rose. “I know who you are, because we had our private investigator look into you in the twenty or so hours we gave him upon hearing about Mar… Maven being alive. But how about you do the introduction thing anyway, just for propriety’s sake.”
I liked her a lot.
“You remind me of her,” I let her hand drop. “I’m Auden Carter, and your granddaughter is the love of my life.”
Maven’s grandmother beamed. “I only pass my best traits down to my grandchildren.”
Shasha scoffed. “What about that drinking gene that Nastya likes to blame on you at least once a week?”