Page 64 of Break for Me

“No.”

Something inside me stung a little when she hesitated, like she was genuinely weighing the options between that motherfucker from her past and me. I didn’t even wait for her to respond after that. I pushed the fucking door open myself to look around. This level was full of parked vehicles, but there wasn’t anyone walking up here.

“Cameras up here, Memphis?” I whispered. “Can you tell me anything?”

“One,” she said. “I can see the front driver’s side tire of your car from it.”

“You can’t make it move? Magically will it into Terminator mode or some shit so you can look around?”

“Do you know anything about technology?” She asked.

“No need to as long as I’m keeping you around, angel.”

“Can you maybe focus?” Trista asked from behind me.

“Oh, I’m sorry. Am I making you uncomfortable in my efforts to keep you alive?”

“Everything about you makes me uncomfortable.”

“I think I like her a little more every time we have these talks,” Memphis said in my ear.

“Alright, that’s enough out of you,” I said.

“Me?” Both fucking women asked at the same fucking time.

“Jesus Christ.”

The single most deafening gunshot I’d ever heard rang out the moment that I had Trista walking next to me through that garage. I didn’t stop to find out if it hit either of us. I grabbed her hand and started to run. The second shot was every bit as painful to the ears but I still didn’t feel it anywhere else. He couldn’t aim for shit if his target was moving.

“Keep running!” I said and shoved her ahead of me when we got closer to Seph. “Don’t stop until you get to the car!”

“You’re not coming?” She screamed.

“I said fucking run!”

She didn’t wait around any longer. I hadn’t been hit. She wasn’t bleeding from anywhere. I stopped cold behind one of the massive support beams while she kept running.

“Jersey?” Memphis asked in my ear almost the second that I’d stopped moving.

I was already leaning back around the opposite side of the beam to watch as much of the garage as I could see for the few seconds that it would take Trista to make it to the car. The flash of light that went with the next ear-shattering blast showed me that our shooter was laying on the fucking ground with a rifle just at the front wheels of a jeep all the way on the other side of the building. I looked back to Seph in time to see Trista fucking baseball slide across the ground to get down behind the passenger’s side.

Teeny tiny Rambo, indeed.

“Jersey?!” Memphis asked another time. I realized then that I hadn’t spoken, and the little dot that usually showed her my movement wasn’t actually moving after that last shot. She thought I was dead.

I started moving again though. I didn’t have much of a chance at hitting him from this distance, but I was willing to bet that if I just got close enough, it’d scare him enough to want to relocate. All I needed was a few extra seconds to get into the car. His next shot wasn’t even directed at me as I walked from the beam toward Trista and Seph. The horrible fucking ping of metal piercing metal was like sending a stake straight through my heart.

“What are you doing?” Trista screamed when I froze right where I was. “Jersey! Keep moving!”

I didn’t remember exactly what happened. I heard more shots. I heard more of them striking metal. Striking Persephone. I heard screams. I wasn’t entirely aware of what was happening again until I felt myself being pulled backward; and then I was suddenly aware of everything all at once. Memphis was screaming in my ear about behaving like a psycho and something about cops. Trista had both her hands wrapped around my left bicep and was trying with every muscle in her body to pull me in the other direction. I looked at my own hands to see them swapping out the clips in the gun. I’d managed to fire every round without remembering it. I glanced back at Trista and her open palm connected with my cheek as I was turning.

“Fucking snap out of it, Jersey! Please!” She screamed. Her face was one of pure terror by the time my eyes focused on her.

“Get to the fucking car, Jersey. Now,” Memphis said.

I looked over Trista’s head to the motherfucking bullet holes in Persephone’s driver’s side doors and shook my head rather violently to try to prevent myself from blacking out in sheer rage another time. I didn’t even look back toward the shooter or the Jeep. I pushed Trista toward Seph and followed right behind her that time. She picked up the duffel bag that I’d apparently abandoned in my moment of madness and made it to the car first. Trista waited until I was opening my own door before she sat in the car, like she was concerned that I might turn right back around and leave her here again. There wasn’t a lot of space in the parking garage to be driving the way that I was. Lighting up the back tires off of every turn was a good way to send us crashing into other parked vehicles, the support beams, the walls, the people who were sprinting for cover on the lower levels because of the sounds of gunfire.

Then having to maneuver through downtown Louisville traffic to get out of the city was asking for another disaster. I felt Trista’s hand on mine on the gear shift.

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