Page 48 of No Saint

My lips still burned from the kiss, I could still taste him on my tongue.

With Lincoln in my arms, I carry him to the den, placing him on the floor and surrounding him with toys from a bucket placed next to the arm of the couch. While he’s distracted, I help myself to the bar set up next to the large bay windows that look out into the front courtyard. There was a mini fridge and several bottles of expensive looking spirits on the shelf, but I just grab water.

Nate was around here somewhere, I saw him after I’d left the room, but it was Colt who had followed us down and was currently stood at the door, his back to me.

I wondered if I could overpower him, attempt escape again but something stopped that train of thought. I told myself it was because I didn’t want anything bad to happen to Colt. Regardless of who he worked for and how he has been forced to babysit me, I didn’t want him to suffer any consequences. Gabriel appeared reasonable – kidnap and imprisonment aside – but there was a reason his name alone could make someone piss their pants.

With Lincoln busy on the floor, I curl up onto the couch, my fashion book on my lap. The offer Gabriel had given was on a constant loop inside my head. I’d told him I’d think about it, I made a deal with him but then I hadn’t bargained for what he had said. For what he had called me and seen in me.

Brave? I wasn’t brave. I wasn’t courageous.

What was courage if I was too afraid to even accept a genuine offer that couldhelpme. Maybe it was because it came from him? I don’t know.

I was right though. Being near him, accepting things from him, it was a losing game.

There was no way I’d come out a victor.

I sigh and open the book, running my hand over the familiar pages I’d read front to back so many times I’d lost count.

The familiar words and images settle that space inside me, the part of my soul I’d given over to drawing and fashion design all those years ago. The whole thing made my hands itch with the need to pick up my pencil again, to draw some more, even after picking it up for the first time in years only last night.

“Hey Colt?” I call.

He turns to me but almost immediately, his eyes snap to the window behind me and widen, “Get down!” He yells.

He lunges for me, my body going stiff just as a loudpopsounds and glass shatters.

Next to me, Lincoln screams just as Colt lands in a heap atop my body. A warm wetness seeps into my t-shirt immediately.

“Colt?” I squeak.

He does not respond.

“Colt!?” I try again, pushing at him. There's a buzzing inside my head, panic and fear driving the need to get him off so I can get to my son. He groans.

“Colt!” I yell, shaking.

I push at his shoulders just as the sound of gravel crunching under foot sounds from outside the broken window.

Slowly, he pushes himself up, eyes not turning to me but to the window first before they meet my own. He didn’t look afraid but angry. Pain crumpled his features, but he didn’t react.

“Run,” he croaked, “Hide, Amelia.”

“What is it?”

I was too afraid to turn around and the moment he managed to sluggishly push himself off, I was moving.

Anotherpopechoes into the den. The bullet lands in the wall, followed by several more. Colt is hit again and this time he screams, the bullet ripping through his thigh.

I curl around Lincoln and then drag us both into the corner of the room, tucking us both behind a bookshelf.

I meet Colt’s eyes. I couldn’t just leave him. I couldn’t…

His blood seeped from his wound, staining the couch but he just stared at me, “Hide.”

“Colt…” I breathe, fear holding my voice hostage.

“Go, Amelia.”

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