Page 86 of Take Me Back
Vander lifts one hand above his head, the other still cupping his nuts. “Oh, little Kat, you’re a feisty one. But can you really kill a man?”
I don’t blink. I pull the trigger.
It clicks, but nothing happens. When I squeeze it again, Vander’s laugh fills the hallway.
“Safety first, Kat.”
He pounces at me, and I kick upward as hard as I can, catching him in the jaw. His head snaps back, and he lands on my legs as deadweight.
Oh my God. Did I kill him?
Sounds of more yelling and gunshots come from above. They’re getting closer.
I pull myself along the floor and out from under Vander. As I rise to my feet, a man dressed all in black bursts into the hallway. He stops when he sees me.
“Kat.”
My fingers are still curled around the gun. I don’t know where the safety is, but if he’s a bad guy, I’ll find it and shoot him.
“Lower the weapon. I’m with the good guys. DC will be fucking happy to see you.”
“How do I know?”
My entire body is shaking, and the barrel of the gun bounces in the air between us.
“I’m Rome. I was at your wedding.”
My brain spins, trying to remember, but it’s too much. “No one was at our wedding. We eloped.” My thumb feels around the side of the gun for a button or switch or something.
“He didn’t want us to meet you, but we couldn’t let our brother take the plunge without us there. You wore a short white dress, and when you tripped on a step about two feet from him, he caught you.”
Oh my God. He couldn’t know that unless ...
The memory of the random hot, ripped guys who had been hanging around the resort about the time of the ceremony filters into my head.
“You were there.”
He nods. “We gotta go. Give me the gun.”
I pray to God I’m making the right choice as I lower the gun and hand it to him.
He shoves it in his pants. “Now come on, follow me.” To someone else, or maybe into a radio, he says, “Package acquired. Moving out. Let’s wrap this shit up and go home.”
“Not yet!”
Vander’s voice comes from behind us as hot pain slices along the side of my thigh.
We both turn, and I’m confused because instead of running toward us, Vander is running down the hallway away from us.
“Fuck. Cover your ears!”
I do what Rome says, and he unloads bullets in the direction of a fleeing Vander.
“Come on, let’s move.”
Even covering my ears, they still ring from the noise. I look down, and there’s a tear in my pants and blood soaking the white material. Vander’s knife is embedded in the hallway floor two feet ahead of me.
Rome follows my gaze. “Fuck! Can you walk?”
