Page 114 of Too Late

“Again!” she yells in desperation. “Shoot him again!”

Asa is lying on the floor with his hand against his neck. Blood is rushing through his fingers, spilling down his arm. His chest is heaving up and down as he struggles to drag in breath. I aim the gun at him. His eyes are wide and he glances around, looking for Sloan.

She’s standing behind me now, gripping the back of my shirt in fear. His eyes land on her. “Fucking whore,” he manages to mutter. “I lied. I hate your fucking lasagna.”

I pull the trigger.

Sloan screams and buries her face against my back.

I turn around and pull her against me. She’s crying, holding on to me with all the strength she has.

I can’t stand up anymore.

I grip the bar and lower us both to the floor. I pull her onto my lap, and she curls up against me. I try to ignore the pain in my arm as I hold her. I press my face into her hair, and I breathe her in. “Are you okay?”

She’s sobbing, but she manages to nod.

“Are you hurt?” I’m trying to inspect her, but she looks okay. I put my hand on her stomach and I close my eyes and exhale. “I’m so sorry, Sloan. I’m so sorry.” I feel like I failed her. I did everything I could to protect her and he somehow still got to her.

She wraps her arms tightly around my neck and I can feel her shaking her head. “Thank you.” She’s holding me as tight as she possibly can. “Thank you, thank you, thank you, Luke.”

The sirens are directly outside now.

Someone is beating on the door.

Ryan climbs through the window and assesses the situation, then walks to the front door and unlocks it. Several uniformed officers file in, yelling orders at each other. One of them tries to address Sloan and me, but Ryan pushes him aside. “Give them a minute. Goddamn.”

They do. They give us several. I hold her until the medics come inside. I hold her while they check Asa’s pulse. I’m still holding her when one of them announces his time of death.

I’m still holding her when Ryan slides to the floor next to us.

“I saw your car,” he says, referring to the wreck. “You okay?”

I nod. “Did anyone get hurt?”

He shakes his head. “Just you, it looks like.”

Sloan pulls back and looks at me closely for the first time, noticing my injuries from the wreck. “Oh my God, Luke.” She presses her palm against my head. “He’s hurt! Someone help him!”

She crawls off my lap and a medic rushes over. He looks at my head for a brief second. “We need to get you to the hospital.”

Ryan helps the medic lift me up off the floor. I grab Sloan’s hand as I’m passing her and she holds it with both of hers. She’s in front of me now, walking backward as she looks at me, frantic. “Are you okay? What happened?”

I wink at her. “Just a little fender bender. You can’t drown in Fred water if the cruise ship is full of salmon tacos.”

Sloan smiles and squeezes my hand.

Ryan groans and looks at one of the medics. “You need to check him for a concussion. He did this last time he was injured. Just started saying random stuff that didn’t make any sense.”

They put me in the back of the ambulance, but I’m still holding Sloan’s hand, so she climbs in and sits next to me. I see worry in her eyes, but I also see a sense of relief that has never been present in her. I squeeze her hand. “It’s over, Sloan. He can’t hurt you anymore.”

EPILOGUE

It’s been seven months since Asa died but Sloan still doesn’t talk about what happened with him in the last hours she was trapped in that apartment with him. As much as I hope she can open up and tell me about it one day, I don’t push her. I know what Asa was capable of and I don’t even like to think about what she might have had to endure. She’s been going to therapy, and it really does seem to help, so that’s all I can ask of her. I just want her to continue to do what she can to help herself move past the situation, at whatever pace she needs to do it.

The day I was released from the hospital, there was a funeral planned for Asa. Sloan and I were at the apartment that morning packing a few belongings when Ryan called to let me know about it. I relayed the information to her but knew that she wouldn’t want to attend his funeral after all he’d put her through.

Later that morning, Sloan told me she wanted to go to the funeral. Naturally, I tried to talk her out of it. I was even a little upset that she would want to subject herself to that, but I had to remind myself that she knew him better than anyone. Even though she was terrified of him, she was one of the few people who meant something to him. As fucked-up as he was in showing it.

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