Page 26 of Protect Me

He dies instead of me.

/Marco/

[audio transcript]

Mom, I’m so happy.

eleven

I fully expect the bullets to keep falling on his dead body until they reach me underneath, or someone to pull him away just so they can shoot me in the head. I brace myself for it, I tell myself it’s only going to hurt for a second and then it will be all over.

I tell myself I won’t have to deal with the pain of having Marco die next to me, the pain of having lost him. I tell myself it will be better than having to live with the memories of this night. I tell myself—

It’s still terrifying when it happens.

Suddenly, hands are there, lifting Marco’ lifeless body off me, and grabbing me around the waist. I’m lifted in the air, my body cold, numb, unresponsive, and wait for the shot that will end everything.

What’s taking it so long?

Now that the moment has arrived, I just want to get it over with. I don’t open my eyes, better to not see it coming. I won’t die like a coward, crying and shaking in fear. I’ll just take the bullet and that will be that. I have no interest in seeing who is holding me. I have no interest in what is going on around me, or how long I stayed trapped under Marco’s dead body, how long I have been—

“Liv! Liv!” Hector’s voice is calling.

My eyes fly open, but I can’t see anything. Everything has gone numb and it takes a huge effort to concentrate on the blurry shape that’s bending over me. For some reason, I’m imagining Hector’s voice.

“What…?” My tongue won’t work.

The blurry shape swears, and it sounds so much like Hector, I’m just going to call it Hector. Hector wraps his arms around my body and lifts me closer to his chest. Then he begins barking orders left and right, as he presses my face into his vest—it smells of fire and rain—and carries me out of the barn. He doesn’t even let me take one last look at Marco, which is just as well.

“I’m here now,” Hector keeps whispering down at me in-between the order he’s barking left and right.

Is it really him?

It can’t be.

How is he here? I try to look up at his face, but he’s running so fast and everything is so hard.

I can see one thing: whoever he is, his clothes are covered in blood—we both are.

“I’m here,” he keeps saying it over and over, at first to me, then to himself. Then to me again. “I’m here, I’m here, Liv. You’re safe.”

/we the rotten royals/

{voice mail left on Crown Princess Olivia’s phone}

“We’re coming to get you, O. Please be ok. Help is on the way. I know you probably will never hear this, but I just needed to say it on the off chance. You’re not alone. You never will be. I swear it, O. Just be alive. I’ll be there in under half an hour, but the others are almost there. Just hold on until then, ok? Just… Hold on with everything you’ve got.”

{message undelivered, reason: number unavailable}

twelve

Hector bundles me inside a car, and it immediately takes off, before he’s closed the door. I’m still in his arms, he hasn’t let go for a second. Hector sits at the back seat, with me on his lap, and through the haze, my brain registers that there’s someone already there.

I blink, try to clear my vision.

A figure that looks like a matchstick, tall, thin and black, blurs to my left. I blink some more, and suddenly the figure clears. I see the leather seats of the car, the specks of blood on my sleeve, the dark blue of Hector’s sleeve as he holds me. I look up and yeah, it’s Hector. I’d know his voice anywhere. His grip.

And the figure seated next to us?

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