“Gidget.” It’s Beast again, and if he’s using my real name and not calling me wife then I’m in trouble and completely out of time. He grabs me by the arm and hauls me to my feet. His expression, when he shows it to me, is not quite as stoic as it normally is. He looks sad, but not for Ms. Briggs—for me.
Because he knows I’m about to learn a very important lesson.
You cannot save everyone, no matter how hard you try.
Beast releases me and then grabs the woman by the back of her sweatshirt, hauling her to her feet.
“Out,” he commands, and then he pushes out the bathroom door, and I follow. There are multiple police officers standing nearby, watching us. They had to know, right? At least some of them. In order for Ms. Briggs to get a gun without setting off the metal detectors, she had to get it from somewhere inside the building.
Someone left it in the bathroom for her, most likely.
Ms. Briggs looks pleadingly at the officers, but not a single one of them steps forward to help her. It’s too late, and they all know it.
Beast shoves her out the front doors of the building before releasing her.
Cat is waiting outside with Crown, Sin, and Grainger next to him, a small group of Daybreakers posed near the row of bikes.
Carol’s mom glances their way just once before taking off down the sidewalk at a quick clip. The way Cat watches her scares the shit out of me. When he stands up and moves after her, that scares the shit out of me even more.
“Follow me,” he says, nodding with his chin in the direction of the fleeing woman.
More than anything in the world, I don’t want to go with him. I don’t want to do this. It’s a nightmare in the making, and even though I know what’s coming, I’m afraid. Please no. Please, please, please. Fuck.
This is why I believe in the devil, but not in God.
Because of moments like this.
“Go,” Beast commands me, and because I know he’s on my side first and foremost, I follow Cat. I trust Beast more than anyone else. Even over the other guys.
We take off down the sidewalk and follow Ms. Briggs for about two blocks, keeping to the shadows so that when she looks over her shoulder, she breathes a sigh of relief. I do the ‘fox walk’ that Beast taught me, just like he does. Just like Cat.
And then we come around the corner of a narrow alley and my father takes the lead, gliding through the darkness like it was designed just for him, like he owns it.
“I’m so sorry, sugar,” Beast murmurs, his voice so low that I know I’m the only person that can hear it. “If you want to run, we can run. But we can’t stay here and not do this.”
I know that.
I know it, and I hate myself for it because I’m not asking to leave. And I saved Cat’s life, even though it might’ve been best if I didn’t.
I should’ve let him die, I think, just before we round another corner and come upon Ms. Briggs and a man that seems vaguely familiar, like someone I might’ve seen in passing before.
I know without knowing that this is Cat’s FBI informant.
Within the span of a single heartbeat, Cat is reaching inside his cut and pulling out his favorite gun—the one he put to my head, coincidentally—the Smith & Wesson Model 29.
“Leroy, wait,” the man starts, holding up both hands, palms out.
But it’s over in an instant.
Cat pulls the trigger, the silencer on the end of his weapon muffling the sound in such a way that the gunshot sounds less like a backfiring car and more like the ping of a movie gun. It echoes in the close confines of the alley anyway, and I feel the blood drain from my face as a hole appears in the forehead of the man with his hands raised in surrender.
Just like with Gaz.
The man drops to the ground as Carol’s mother opens her mouth to scream. No sound escapes. Instead, the second shot hits her in the head and she, too, crumples to the ground beside the first body. There’s blood everywhere, spattered across the ground, across the wall behind the two bodies, sprinkled across the side of a dumpster.
Why did I save him? I think, hating myself and yet knowing with every breath that I made the right decision. If anyone is going to kill Cat, it’s going to be me. Not the mafia. Not Ms. Briggs. Me.
Cat tucks his weapon away and turns around, assessing me with dark eyes. To my credit, I stay standing. I don’t sway. My knees don’t buckle. Even my breathing is regulated, slow, calm. On the inside, I’m raging. I’m screaming.
