Page 252 of Bossy Hero

Robbie dares to meet my eyes, his chin wobbling. “He had a gun.”

“Who did?”

“Your brother. He pulled a gun on my friend. He was gonna shoot. Your brother had a gun. And now...”

“No,” I mutter, thoughts jumbling through my mind. “Dad has a handgun in the safe, but Daniel doesn’t have the combination to open it.”

The safe. In my father’s study.

Where I stood earlier tonight and felt my gut riot in warning.

A warning I didn’t heed.

“My friend broke into the safe, Alan.” Robbie points at the phone, words clambering out in an incoherent rush. “That’s why he went. For the money. He opened the safe. Nobody was supposed to be home. Your brother wasn’t supposed to be there. I’m so fucking sorry. Nobody was supposed to get hurt.Oh my god. Why is this happening? Alan, I’m so sorry. He wasn’t supposed to be there.”

Inconsolable now, Robbie sobs into his hands. The phone clatters to the ground.

Through mournful wails, he keeps ranting, “He’s dead, man. Your brother got the gun from the safe after my friend left the room, and he followed him upstairs. He was raving and saying crazy shit, and it spooked my friend. He was saying that it doesn’t matter if he shoots the gun because it isn’t real. It freaked my friend out, and they fought. And your brother got shot, man. Your brother got shot.” A braying sob shakes its way out of him. “He wasn’t supposed to be there. We just wanted the money.”

Everything around me fades, putting me at one end of a long tunnel. Robbie’s tear-soaked face is at the other. His words are lost to the echoes of silence surrounding me.

The rioting tension lancing my body has long since vanished, replaced with bitter numbness.

Because the danger is gone.

And so is my brother.

Time goes by in a blur. I’m unsure what’s happening from one moment to the next.

Someone must have called the cops when they saw me choking Robbie. They’re here now. I don’t care.

I’m unable to speak to defend myself, so they cuff me and put me into the back of a squad car.

Through raining tears, Robbie tells the cops what happened.

The truth, I think. I hear but don’t process it.

They don’t handcuff him.

Although I watch through the window, I somehow see nothing.

None of this matters. Nothing matters anymore.

I didn’t listen to my instincts. I had every chance to stop this from happening when I was at home with Daniel. Warning bells were firing right and left, and I walked out the door like it was nothing.

That’s what I’m left with—nothing.

Eventually, the cops attempt to cuff Robbie.

They must not have expected him to fight since he’s been a bawling mess this entire time. He flings himself away from them, falling a few steps toward me.

His splayed palms smack against the squad car window a few inches in front of my face, and they linger there.

With his mouth open wide, he bellows in anguish. “Alan, I’m so sorry, man. Nobody was supposed to get hurt. I didn’t want this. I’m so sorry. Please forgive me, Alan.Please. I didn’t mean for this to happen. Alan, please.”

I don’t answer. Don’t even flinch.

As the cops drag him off the car, his hands gradually pull away from the window. “Alan, please forgive me.”

---