Page 56 of Meet Me In The Dark

“No!” Conor roared, jumping in front of her.

Chris was still on the ground, holding a gun aimed at her. A gun that had gone off.

So then why wasn’t she bleeding? Why wasn’t she in pain? Why?—

Conor fell to his knees, the thud echoing through the long hall.

He’d taken the bullet for her.

“Conor!” she dropped to her knees beside him, barely aware of Luke disarming a cackling Chris, while Micah tried to staunch Conor’s blood with his shirt. She attempted to help, but there was just so much of it, welling from his chest.

“Hit an artery,” Micah muttered. “Fuck. Fuck!”

Kara stood, fumbling with her jumpsuit’s zipper and stripping out of it before kneeling back down on the cement ground and pressing the fabric against the bullet wound.

Beneath them, Conor groaned.

“Don’t you dare die on me,” she ordered.

“Wouldn’t dream of it, baby girl,” he said, choking on a laugh. “My brave girl. I love you. You know that, right?”

“Conor,” she warned.

“He’s bleeding too much,” Micah said, and Luke was there, gently pushing her to the side.

“Kara, sweetheart, let me work on him.”

She shifted over, lifting Conor’s head into her lap and stroking his hair.

“I love you,” she told him. “But I’m not kidding, don’t fucking die or I willfollowyou wherever you go and beat the shit out of you for leaving me.”

He groaned, his words so faint she could barely hear him.

“Worth it.”

“What?”

“All of this. Worth it. Just to hear you say you love me. Live for me, good girl,” he said on a sigh, his eyes closing.

“Conor?”

No answer.

“He’s gone into shock,” Luke was saying to Micah. “I think we need to...”

Boots pounded behind them.

“Drop your weapons!” a gruff voice in camo and swat gear commanded.

“Aha,” said Christopher. “The cavalry has arrived.”

Kara ignored him. Ignored the fact that they were surrounded by Christopher’s backup team, that apparently Christopherhada backup team, that Luke and Micah were lowering their guns to the ground and raising their hands, that they were doing that because there was a gun pushing against her left ear, that somehow Christopher had gotten the upper hand back. At the moment, she only cared about one thing.

“Conor!” she screamed.

Conor didn’t reply.

18

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