Page 56 of Surviving Midnight

“Sofie!”

“Sammy!” she yells from somewhere to my right. “Sammy, I’m here!”

She’s close to me, closer than anyone else I think, and this surge of adrenaline rockets through my body and sends me to my feet.

I can get to her.

Sofie is close to me and if I can get to her then I can make sure she’s safe.

I crouch as I run. “Sofie?!”Oh, please respond. It’s so loud in here; the men are yelling, I can hear Zak yelling my name, Jackal and Brick barking orders. The women are still screaming and there are still so many bullets flying through the air, the little pieces of metal destroying everything they touch at a deafening volume.

“Sofie!” Prez sounds further away now and no less panicked. “Sofie, Cookie, where—fuck!”

“Sammy!”

The smoke begins to clear just a little and I can see the couches we were sitting on earlier, a few bodies in front of the one I had shared with Sofie and Harlow just an hour ago. Despite the intense fear, the terror pulsing in my head, I keep going, squint and search, and that’s when I see the beautiful bride wedged between two beams trying like hell to protect herself and her unborn baby girl.

Thank God the clubhouse was at one point an industrial warehouse. All the windows are a definite issue right now but the place where Sofie has barricaded herself is pretty safe for the time being, but she’s totally exposed from the front.

“Sofie!” I shout, ducking as what sounds like a bullet whiz by my head. “Sofie.”

“Theo?” She squints in my direction and when she finally sees me, Sofie takes a deep breath and glances around. “Theo, where’s—“

The window to her left explodes and I can feel the tiny shards of glass slice and bounce off my skin. I don’t stop moving though, just keep advancing toward Sofie with my only focus on getting her to safety.

“I’m coming, babe!” I jump over a broken chair, rush the last few feet and use my tiny body to block her not very much bigger one. “Are you hurt? Are you ok?”

Sofie nods and hugs her baby bump tight. “I’m ok. I was here when everything happened, so I’ve been pretty much hidden.”

The window to her right explodes, therat-a-tat-tatof a fucking machine gun making itself known.

This is completely insane.

I can’t believe this is happening right now, on a day where people should only be happy and feel love, and somewhere in the back of my mind, I can’t help but feel like it’s my fault.

If only I’d have told Zak sooner, pulled him aside and shared what I overheard as soon as I left the bathroom. If I’d done that, maybe we would have been able to get everyone out in time. Maybe we would have been able to protect everyone better.

I cup Sofie’s cheeks, look over her tear-stained face and make sure she really isn’t hurt. “I’m gonna find something for you to hide behind. I’m going to—“

We both scream as a man comes flying through the broken window, totally crazed and wielding some sort of weapon. Not a gun thankfully, but that doesn’t matter right now because he’s way too close to my friend and looks batshit enough not to care about laying a hand on a woman, let alone a pregnant one.

“Come on!” I grab her hands and start pulling her back toward the hall, the safest place that I know of at this point because it’s only brick and steel, no windows or doors save for one that goes upstairs and the bathroom.

More men start climbing through the windows and between that and the broken glass and debris all over the floor, Sofie and I have to weave through an evil maze just to get a few feet away.

I can hear Zak and Prez still shouting for us, hear what sounds like close range gunshots from smaller weapons, more things breaking and possibly some hand-to-hand combat, but I don’t answer and encourage Sofie to do the same. The most important thing right now is making sure she’s safe and once she is, that’s when I’ll go back and help my man.

“Sofie! Theo!”

I look right just in time to see Harlow pop up over the side of a flipped table, her blue eyes wide as they dart toward us. Thank God she’s ok but when she yells again I realize she wasn’t simply making herself known. Nope, she was warning me of the overgrown gorilla barreling toward us with a two by four.

“Shit!” I push Sofie out of the way, pray she doesn’t get hurt when I do, then search the floor at my feet.

Ah hah!

There’s a broken table leg just to my left and that’s gonna have to be good enough right now because I got nothing when it comes to throwing punches.

I will definitely be asking Zak to teach me all sorts of self-defense after this.

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