Page 120 of Long Way Down

“Daniel,go,” she barked.

He stood, hands fluttering by his head. “What? Where? What’s–”

“Go! Go get my partner, now!”

She was dimly aware of him moving, her gaze pinned on Doug as he whirled on her again, eyes wild and white-rimmed, lower lip shiny with spit.

She thumbed the strap on her weapon and pulled it in one smooth, practiced draw; aimed the muzzle right at his center of mass. “Stop right there, Doug. Hands up where I can see them. Get down on your knees.”

He lifted his hands – empty, thankfully – but tilted toward her.

“I saidget on your knees. Now! Get down!”

He didn’t. He advanced.

Melissa had a split second to choose between shooting, or, given that he was unarmed, pursuing other means. Crowded building full of civilians; unclear sightlines.

“Fuck,” she muttered, and clambered back, up, and over the bench where he’d been sitting moments before, when she hadn’t thought him a person of interest – much less someone actively coming after her. “Doug, listen to me,” she said, backing, backing, gun still trained on him, “this isn’t going to end well for you if you don’t stop right now and get down on your knees. I don’t want to have to shoot you.”

He grinned, wide and manic. “Too fucking bad.” Then he lunged for her.

All his stooping and shuffling and yawning and dead-eyed spaciness had, it turned out, concealed the very real fact that he was young, taller than he’d appeared, strong, and quick. Not as coordinated as an athlete or someone who’d been trained to fight, but his reach was far longer than hers. She sidestepped his initial headlong rush, moving quick to put additional space between them. They were in the middle of the hall, then, an open stretch yawning behind him, and behind her. She saw people stepping out of classrooms, students and professors alike, gaping curiously. Shoes squeaked on the floors and she heard a jumble of voices; hopefully Daniel had reached the classroom, and Contreras.

Doug’s face shone with sweat – an unnatural amount. He had taken something, and sweat poured down his forehead, into his eyes until he was blinking furiously. His face was red, vein standing out in his forehead. He breathed in harsh, gasping draws that heaved his chest beneath the oversized hoodie he wore.

Melissa could feel her own sweat, hot and tickling between her breasts and down her back, gathering beneath her arms. Her heart slammed against her ribs, but she kept her voice steady, as lightning flashed outside the windows again, blue-white in his overlarge pupils.

“Doug, this is your last warning. Get down on your knees, hands behind your head.” She didn’t dare take her gaze from his, but lifted one hand off the gun to wave, sharp motions on either side. “Everyone, get back!” she called. “Get back in your classrooms!” There were so many people in the hall, flooding out into it as word went around that there was a woman holding a gun on a student out here. She was aware of the swelling numbers as blurs of motion and color at her periphery, her eyes stinging with the need to blink as they remained fixed on Doug Waxman’s distorted, red face. He was so flooded with emotion, so twisted-up by whatever he’d taken to combat that emotion, that he barely looked human at this point.

Privately, she wasn’t sure hewasall that human, given what he’d done.

“Get down on the–” she started again.

“You’re all the same!” he shouted, flecks of spit flying off his lip. “You’re all thefuckingsame!”

He charged.

She saw the wink of metal in his hand the same moment a familiar voice shouted, “Dixie!” behind her.

Pongo was here. What the fuck, she thought, numbly, as she ducked, and drove her elbow hard into Doug’s stomach.

There were far too many people around to risk a shot, and so she’d done the brave, possibly stupid thing and tried to subdue him without her weapon, even though she’d seen the glimmer of his knife. She wasnotgoing to be one of those cops who emptied a mag in someone and found out later it had only been a pen in his hand. No one would care if she was hurt, even killed; what did she have to lose? The media teardown wasn’t worth it, she thought, as she caught him just under the ribs and heard hisoofof expelled breath.

But there were two things she hadn’t counted on.

One: whatever he was high on must have dulled his pain receptors, and given him an added boost of strength to boot.

And two: Pongo. That shout. That split-second distraction. Her aim was off, and though her elbow connected, the hit was too far outside; had landed on less-tender organs and tissue, and once it landed, her elbow slipped, her momentum carrying her forward, off balance.

Doug’s arm slapped around her, an iron band, and his hand found her throat with instant, unerring accuracy.

“Shit,” she hissed, before the hand tightened and he used his grip to haul her back against him and spin her around so she faced away from him. A cold kiss of steel at her temple, just beside her eye, froze her in place save the frantic working of her lungs, and the ceaseless gallop of her heart.

Pongo stood a dozen yards down the hall, in his Lean Dogs cut for all the world to see, gun drawn, blue eyes huge and fixed on her. He was trembling faintly, all over; she could see the damp curls on his forehead shivering over his freckles, betraying his adrenaline rush.

A man she’d never met before stood beside him in dark, nondescript clothes, a hat pulled low over his face, obscuring his eyes. He wasn’t wearing a cut, she noticed; it was funny all the little inconsequential things you noticed when you thought you might die. Like the spider tidily bundling up a fly in the corner of the window above your dead cousin. She’d watched that spider, all those years ago, while Pastor Keith breathed on her neck, and Ivy lay so very dead, and she realized she might not see her seventh birthday.

In this moment, she felt the serrated tip of the knife and wondered if it was the same one that had carved a message in April’s back. She saw the pulse throbbing visibly at the base of Pongo’s throat, and wondered why someone as woefully pretty as him had ever tolerated her shitty attitude. She really was awful to him, most of the time.

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