Total pages in book: 109
Estimated words: 103620 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 518(@200wpm)___ 414(@250wpm)___ 345(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 103620 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 518(@200wpm)___ 414(@250wpm)___ 345(@300wpm)
It doesn’t ultimately matter because what’s happening here and now is the only thing that’s real, but it would be cool if I had some kind of assurance that what’s happening here and now won’t be the end.
Fuck it.
Only one way to turn a dream into reality. And that’s to fucking annihilate everyone and everything who stands between you and the tomorrow you want to see.
Or, in my case I guess, half-see.
Liam points ahead and says, “They were just around here.”
But when we turn the corner to “just around here,” we are not met by a precocious two-year-old and her uncle but by a hail of gunfire.
Two more uniformed guard dudes stand in the middle of the hallway, firing on us the second we poke our heads out. One of the bullets wings Liam, who is in the lead. He falls back into me and Alec and I retreat quickly, pulling Liam with us.
One might think that after realizing they had hit one of their own, they would stop firing so recklessly. One would be wrong.
Liam screams, in my opinion, entirely too loudly for having only been popped in the shoulder. He’s probably more scared than hurt, but I need him to pipe down.
“Shut up, bro!” I yell at him as I wipe blood from my one good eye and hazard a peek to see if I can spy more than just the two.
More gunfire. And just behind the two shooters, Zander releases the third guy he was hauling with him and ducks through a door. I pull my head back. “How many more of you fucks are there? Where does that door lead?”
“What?”
“Liam, focus up, dude! How many more guys? Total?”
“I don’t know. I think that’s it. There were ten of us? How many—?”
I do the quick math. I saw ten before, that much is true. We dropped six back with Christine, Liam and the one Zander ran off with make eight, two more… ten. If Liam’s right and/or not lying, that means that if we can dispatch these remaining two, nothing stands between us and getting Andra back. Except Zander. And whatever other surprises I’m not accounting for. But whatever. Gotta start somewhere.
“And where does the door lead?”
“Which door?” Liam whines.
“The door. The fucking—I just saw Zander run through a door down there. You say you know this place. Where does it lead, man?”
“I’m not… I think that’s where he’s holding the little girl and her uncle.”
He thinks. He doesn’t know. Or, at least, he’s not saying. I’m so annoyed right now.
“I’ll go,” I tell Alec.
“What, bru?”
“I’m going. I’ll handle these two. Sit tight for a sec.”
I start to stand so I can swing around the corner and open fire on the (we hope) only remaining two gunmen, but as I’m rising to my feet…
“No, man. I’ll do it.” Alec pulls me back.
“No. I got it.” I start to stand again.
“No, bru, I got it.” He pulls me back again.
I feel like I’m in a goddamn action-comedy from the 1980s or some shit. “Alec, fuckin’ let me go. I got this.”
“It should be me, bru.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re going to be a father.”
It’s a weird thing to hear. It’s an untimely thing to hear. It’s a sobering thing to hear. And in the middle of all this bullshit, it lands like an anvil.
“Fuck that,” I spit, tossing it off along with any consideration I have of the truth and gravity of what he’s saying. “It’s fine. You’re already a father. So don’t start—”
“Fokken listen to me, man. I ain’t no father. And I wouldn’t know how to be if my very life depended on it. You may have noticed that I don’t have particularly stellar modeling in that regard.”
“Eliza’s not going to make it.” It’s harsh, but it’s also the facts and he needs to hear me. “You’re the only parent Andra has left.”
“She has her uncles.”
“It’s not the same.”
“I’m going.”
“I’m fucking going.”
“I won’t let you.”
“You can’t stop me.”
We’ve gone from dopey action-comedy to a fuckin’ Laurel and Hardy routine.
Just as I’m about to knock him off me and do what the fuck I want, like the goddamn adult human person I am, I hear a sound coming from the other side of us.
Footfalls. Pounding down the hall. With intention.
I jerk my head to look and through a nightmarish Vaseline lens of gauzy red distortion, I make out Christine, coming fast, raising her weapon.
“What happened with—?” I start to ask about Eliza, even though I already know the answer. Christine doesn’t look at me and Alec, just keeps her eyes on a wounded Liam as she thunders toward us.
Then, as she’s just upon where we remain crouched, she shifts her gaze to Alec and then me, and that’s when I realize she’s not slowing down. She’s not skidding to a halt to reconnoiter with us and find out what’s waiting down the hall. She’s going to hit her next unknown full tilt, guns blazing. With my bad eye, I can see the fury in hers. She’s non-negotiable.