Page 129 of Fire Fight

“He was a loose end just like your girl and her mother.” Arnold’s eyes dart to the pair but with the rain coming down in torrents, they’re hidden from sight. “This is your fault. The damn bottle of codeine. Do you think I’m too dumb to remember what the label looked like as I force-fed your mother every pill in the bottle?”

His laugh is harsh, jagged, like he’s coming apart at the edges.

“All of you conspired in a lie with those painkillers. If you hadn’t gone to the pharmacist, I might have let myself be fooled into thinking it was over. But you couldn’t resist rubbing your knowledge in my face, could you?”

I scarcely remember what he’s talking about.

My head had ached worse than ever before, then Cadence helped me. She put aside all the bullshit between us and cared for me like I mattered to her.

Showing me again exactly who she is.

The lie about painkillers had barely registered. She was just trying to stop my father yelling at me while I was in pain.

I stop.

The knife I used to cut Cadence and her mother free is my only weapon and Arnold’s too far away to use it. I need him to come closer, but he circles me at a distance.

When lightning cracks across the heavens, I see the knowing expression in his face.

If I want to kill him, I’ll have to rush him.

The moment I do, he’ll fire the shotgun in my face.

Soon, Arnold has walked far enough to grasp the iron railing; the only support offered in the middle of the thunderstorm.

The next lightning strike silhouettes him against the raging sky.

“She never wanted you,” he says, rain obscuring his expression. “Your mother. She wanted to go to a doctor and scrape you out. You owe your life to me.”

“After she invested another seventeen years in raising me? Nah, old man. I don’t think so. That’s not how parenthood works.”

“I should have let her.”

He’s so absorbed in seeing how his insults land, I dart another few inches closer. There’s two metres between us now. One more lunge and I could have him.

“She begged me,” he continues. “At the end. She got on her knees and begged for her life. It was pathetic.”

A haze of anger blindfolds me for a second. It’s only when he fires, the blast singeing me as it skims just above my shoulder,that I stop. “One shell left. If that’s your aim, I don’t rate your chances.”

I hold the knife out to my side, planting my feet to form a staunch base, readying myself for one final effort to rid the world of his menace.

Or die trying.

“She even let me fuck her one last time, begging for mercy.”

I hurl myself at him.

He swings the shotgun.

My shoulder catches the barrel, hard enough the knife jolts from my hand while momentum carries me forward.

And he fires again at point blank range.

CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

DRAKE

The air whooshes outof me as I hit the ground, flat on my back, staring at the heavens as lightning streaks across the tumultuous sky. My brain issues messages. My body ignores them.

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