Page 138 of I Promise You
It sends Ms. Salem to the floor, and my hand riddles from the power of the gun.
She falls to the floor, and I don’t know where I shot her. But it worked because Danny looks behind him.
“Oh, my God. I killed her!” I drop the gun from my hand, and another anxiety attack ensues.
She was going to kill Danny if I hadn’t pulled the trigger.
“Oh my God...she’s dead, isn’t she? What have I done?” I start stuttering over my words as Danny grabs my face with both of his hands as a panic attack holds me captive. I’m a murderer. I took someone’s life.
“Baby, look at me!” He attempts to snap me out of my disarray. He plants a kiss on my forehead through his mask.
“Danny! I killed her! I shot her!”
I had to, right?
But still, I can’t help but feel immediate and immense guilt. She’s not facing me, she’s on her side, but I can see her back.
“Ari, look at me!” he begs again in a deep, husky voice.
I finally look away from Ms. Salem, and through the blurry vision, I search for him.
“You’re okay, Ari. It’s okay.” He holds my face tighter in his hand, and then he embraces me into a hold. “Are you hurt?”
I hug him back, crying into his chest.
“I’m freezing,” I shiver through crying whispers, and he holds me tighter. “I’m thirsty…so thirsty.”
I’m still in my red dress from the ball. It doesn’t cover anything. I haven’t had any type of warmth or coat since the dance. I’m getting hypothermic.
“I’ll get you warmed up right now, baby.”
“Danny, I killed her!”
Then he lets me go tactically fast, and I hear a loud grunt from a woman’s voice behind him.
It’s Ms. Salem.
She isn’t dead even though I shot her.
She charges at him, screaming as if she has nothing to lose. Blood drips down her mouth, and she’s stumbling while she runs at him. She is holding a knife over her shoulder with bulging dark eyes of revenge.
Everything happens in a split second.
Danny turns around, and he grabs a pistol from his belt. He shoots her in the forehead, and she goes down again.
“No, I killed her.” He watches Ms. Salem for a few seconds longer. He reaches over and feels for a pulse. He bends down and then retracts his hand. I watch him nervously, looking around to see five dead bodies around us. Then he makes his way back to me.
He removes his top, leaving him only in a vest and camouflage top.
He throws it over my shoulder, and I slip my cold, frozen arms into the sleeves.
My teeth chatter, my feet burn, and I feel like I might become a human icicle.
I look into his light blue iris. The way he wears his disguise; he looks like the actual Grim Reaper with his mask on. A scythe symbol covers his mouth, and my wide-eyed man stares into my soul, so intimidatingly gorgeous.
“Danny, you’re alive…you found me,” I sob through chattering teeth. My shaky palm reaches to touch his face. I’m covered in blood and so is he. The blood is splattered all over his disguise and eyelids.
“You were never lost...” he breathes. “I told you, there’s nowhere you could go where I couldn’t find you.” He lets me go, and I stumble back into a tree.
