Total pages in book: 59
Estimated words: 58727 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 294(@200wpm)___ 235(@250wpm)___ 196(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 58727 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 294(@200wpm)___ 235(@250wpm)___ 196(@300wpm)
My heart plummets to my stomach. God, no. Not my Sadie.
I grab Rainey by her shoulders. “It sounds like it came from a basement or something. Underneath here. Where the fuck are they?”
Rainey chokes out a sob in her gravelly voice and points to a door right off the kitchen. “Basement.”
I don’t think. I only react. I race down the creaking wooden stairs to the basement, nearly losing my footing several times, but nothing will keep me from Sadie.
“Sadie? Baby! I’m coming!”
I reach the concrete floor of the basement, let my eyes adjust to the darkness.
Oh, God…
Blood seeps toward me on the ground.
No. God, please, no! Not Sadie, not my Sadie. I take a step, and—
In a flash, Sadie’s in my arms, her small body hitting mine.
In my arms—warm, safe, sobbing.
My Sadie.
I kiss her wet cheeks. Her lips. The top of her head. I hold her so tight that she pulls away from me finally, gasping.
“My God, baby.” I kiss her tear-stained cheeks. “What happened here?”
Then in the corner, I see. Curt Hopkins lies unconscious on the gray concrete floor.
“Is he—”
She shakes her head. “No. No. He’s just unconscious. But he does need an ambulance. I shot him in the leg, and when he fell he hit his head on the floor.”
“Fuck, baby. I thought—” I gulp in a breath. Then another. “I thought I had lost you. I thought I had lost the woman I love.”
Her eyes widen, and she sniffs back another sob. “What?”
“I love you, Sadie Hopkins. I never thought love was possible for me, but I fucking love you.” I pull her hard against my body. “Don’t you ever scare me like this again.”
She melts into me, her body sinking into mine, and murmurs something into my shoulder.
I hope she’s telling me she loves me too, but in this moment? It doesn’t even matter. All that matters is that she’s safe. Safe in my arms.
The uniformed police officers stomp down the steps, their guns drawn.
“What’s going on down here?” one of them asks. “Is everything okay?”
“I’d say everything’s not okay.” The other blue points to Curt bleeding and unconscious in the corner.
Sadie pulls away from me then, her face swollen and tear stained. “He’s my father. He was holding a gun on me. I shot him in self-defense.”
An officer raises his weapon and points it at Sadie. “Put down the gun!” he shouts.
“For fuck’s sake!” I shield Sadie with my body, snag it from her hand, and five it to the officer. “Here.”
“I told you what was going on, that I couldn’t find her. Obviously the woman upstairs is a big fucking liar.” I point at Sadie. “She’s a cop, for God’s sake.”
The blue lowers his weapon. “This true?”
“Yeah. Detective Sadie Hopkins out of Bayfield. My badge is in my purse. It’s probably still up in the living room. The injured party is my father, Curt Hopkins. He brought me down here at gunpoint.”
“And the gun that shot him?”
“His own.” She lifts the flared part of her jeans. “This is mine.”
“You were able to overpower your father?” the first officer asks.
“Yeah. I’ve got the same training you guys have. It wasn’t easy, but I managed. Plus, he’s drunk.”
“He’s alive.” The second officer goes over and holds his hand to Curt’s neck. “The bleeding doesn’t look life threatening yet, but he needs an ambulance.”
“Already called,” another blue says, walking down the stairway. They must have called in shots fired or something, getting backup. “I’ve got the other lady in custody.”
Good. That woman needed to go to fucking jail. Jesus, she stood in the kitchen smoking a fucking cigarette while Sadie was down here defending herself from her gun-toting father.
“You work with Bryant?” the officer asks Sadie. “He’s a good man.”
Sadie nods. “He is.”
“Detective, I’m sorry you had to go through all of this. Jones here will stay on the scene until the ambulance comes for your father. I’m going to need you to come down to the station and answer some questions.”
I pull Sadie back into my body. “Whatever you need. But my woman isn’t going anywhere without me. Ever again.”
28
SADIE
* * *
“He was stumbling a little, obviously drunk,” I say, as the intake officer, Luis Reyes, makes his report. “I’m trained to read people, as you know, so I took a chance. As soon as I saw him waver, I clutched his wrist quickly, twisted it, and forced the gun out of his hand. He lunged at me, but I was able to grab the gun off the floor. He continued advancing toward me, so I had no choice but to shoot him.”
“You're a good shot, Detective,” Officer Reyes says. “You knew just where to hit him so you wouldn’t do any lasting damage.”
“It was tempting,” I say, “but he is my father. And I don’t want a dead body on my conscience, for sure.”