Page 42 of Hacker Salvation

Governor Jackson sat in the office chair next to me. “It won’t work. You know who she is. She doesn’t need money.”

“Why are you defending her? You’re my husband.”

The governor slowly pulled his phone out of his pocket. He didn’t look down as he pressed a couple buttons. “Yes, I’m your husband. But if that test is right, she is my daughter. There is nothing you can do about this.”

She stopped pacing, grabbed her glass off the desk, and threw it across the room. It shattered when it hit the wall. “When I proved to Trina you cheated on her, I never thought I would have to deal with the bitch again. Now I have to deal with her daughter.”

“I never cheated on Trina.”

The dumb bitch rolled her eyes. “You were always too stupid. I knew you wanted to get into politics. She wouldn’t have been right for you, so I made her go away.”

“Who else have you made go away?” His voice turned hard. “My mother didn’t die in an accident, did she?”

“The stupid old lady found out I had an abortion and was going to tell you. I had to take care of her. You never saw what I had to sacrifice for us to get here.”

The governor’s arm was still bleeding, and his face was becoming ashen. I kept working at the ropes around my hands. I could feel the blood trickle down my wrist. But I needed to do something quickly, or we both might die.

I worked the rope back and forth, trying not to move too much. My dad’s head started to bob.

“I can’t go to jail,” the crazy lady stated to the room.

I needed to keep her talking so I could buy us some more time. I needed to save us. There was no way John would figure out where I was.

My hand slipped a little through the ropes. I was getting close to getting them loose. “Isabella, you have to do something, or he’s going to die. He’s lost too much blood.”

Her hair was no longer perfect. Strands stuck everywhere. She looked to where my dad was slumped over in the chair. Instead of coming over and trying to help him, she yanked the top desk drawer open and pulled out a gun.

“Killing us will not save you. My friends will know I didn’t come here to kill him. I was taken off the set of a movie. They will search until they find answers.”

“I will kill everyone who comes after me. I will not go to prison for that ungrateful bastard. He’s in office because of me.” She waved the gun around the room as she spoke.

My right hand came free. Isabella wasn’t paying attention to me as I reached across and untied my other hand. My fingers tingled from finally getting circulation back into them. I had to fight through the pain. I didn’t know if my dad was going to make it.

Isabella turned from looking out the window to see my hands untied. “No,” she screamed, aiming the gun at my dad. “I will be the poor widow. I will make it look like you committed suicide. I will not go down for murder. I always win.” Her finger went to the trigger.

I lurched my body from the chair to cover my father’s. He couldn’t die. I heard my name screamed from the doorway at the same time I felt the searing pain in my side. Chaos broke out. I heard two more gunshots. I waited for the pain to register, but nothing happened.

Someone grabbed me and tried to drag me off my dad. I hugged him tighter and screamed for the person to let me go.

“Beautiful, it’s me. I need to look at you.”

At the sound of John’s voice, I let go, and Gabriel rushed to my dad’s side.

John held me in his arms and pressed his hand to my wound. I screamed in pain. “I need to keep pressure on it. The doctor will be here in a second.”

“Save my dad,” I whispered before the room went dark.

18

John

“Any changes?” Governor Paul Jackson asked. He had demanded to see his daughter the second he’d woken up in the ER. Instead of trying to argue with him, they’d let him up to her room. The hospital had wanted to run a couple of tests before they would release him, and he’d just finished his last test.

“No change,” I said. “Has the doctor agreed to release you?”

He sat down in the chair next to Annabella’s bed. His arm was in a sling from where he’d been stabbed. Annabella looked like she had gone ten rounds in a boxing match. Her right eye was swollen shut. Her pretty pink lips were puffy and swollen.

The governor reached over and grasped Annabella’s hand. “I can go. I still can’t believe she didn’t tell me we had a daughter back in college. Annabella’s mother was the love of my life. One day, she dumped me and said it was over.” The older man glanced out the window and wiped his eyes.

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