Page 79 of The Bodyguard

“Jonah, please…”

“You should listen to her.”

Jonah looks at me, and I’m silently pleading with him to go. Just go. Get out of here, stay safe, I don’t know what I’d do if something happened to him because of some ridiculous, dangerous game my family seems intent on playing. But he’s stubborn. I should’ve known that, he isn’t going to go anywhere. And I feel that dread in the pit of my stomach multiply, ten-fold.

“Let her go.”

“Nobody’s keeping anyone prisoner.” Novak turns his attention to me, a slow smile spreading across his face that does nothing but make my blood run cold. “All I want is some time with my daughter. A daughter who’s been kept from me her entire life.”

I shake my head and start to back away again. “Not like this,” I whisper, unsure if he can even hear me. “Not like this.”

“Thisis the only way, Lena.”

I glance over at Jonah, and he’s shaking his head too, he doesn’t trust Novak. Neither do I, and my family certainly don’t, so what happens now?

Jonah

Nobody would’ve heard the gunshot. Silencers are a crime boss’s best friend, but quick reflexes also play their part, and mine are quicker than most. I’ve grabbed Lena; pushed her into the living-room, and myself back against the wall, just millimetres away from where the bullet pierced it.

It was meant for me. That bullet was supposed to stop me; kill me; take me out. It was supposed to end me, but Mikkel Nielsen got distracted. He’s had eyes on me, I knew that, but what he didn’t have was eyes on Novak. And that schoolboy error; that monumental lapse in judgement has given me time he didn’t want me to have. He was so consumed by the need to kill me that he didn’t even consider Novak’s movements. And now the two men are facing off in the tiny, narrow hallway of this pretty little cottage and where this ends now is anyone’s guess. But I’m not dying today.

“Lena?”

Nielsen’s voice is deep and tinged with the kind of anger that would terrify most, but I’ve stood up to men more dangerous than him.

“Get out of the house now, Lena!”

I look at her, and I nod, but she shakes her head. I’d forgotten how fucking stubborn she can be at times. And then I look over at Nielsen, but his eyes are very much on Novak, who’s raised his gun and aimed it straight at Nielsen. It’s a dangerous stand-off, one neither man was fully prepared for, because their focus had shifted – Nielsen concerned only with killing me, Novak with finding his daughter. And I’m in the middle, unarmed, but not scared. Right now, I don’t matter.

“Get her out of here.”

Nielsen’s looking at me now, but his gun is aimed at Novak.

“Get her the fuck out of here!”

I reach an arm back behind me, and wait for Lena to take my hand, which she does in a heartbeat, curling her fingers around mine, and I drag her through the hall and into the kitchen; out into the back yard, leaving the door open. I need to hear what’s going on in there.

“He’s going to kill you,” she gasps, trying to catch her breath. “You should go. Run. Please, Jonah, just go.”

“Not without you.”

“Jesus, Jonah, and you callmestubborn!”

“Come with me.”

“It’ll only make things worse. He won’t give up, if he knows – if he eventhinksI’m with you, he won’t leave you alone. He’ll hunt you down, Ollie will hunt you down, you’ll never be safe. If I stay, I can persuade him to let it go. To leave you alone. I can do that, I can try, I won’t let him hurt you.”

“I’m not going without…”

Something stops me from finishing that sentence, and I look back towards the house. I heard a noise. A sound. I don’t know what, but something doesn’t feel right. And then I remember their guns have silencers…

“Stay here.”

“Jonah? What are you doing?”

“Just stay here! Don’t move!”

I run back inside, and the smell hits me immediately, and my stomach rolls over but I swallow down the nausea.

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