by Callie Hart
“No, I think you’re desperate otherwise you wouldn’t have come here. The choice is yours, Mother.”
Mother? My head is spinning. Why the hell would he call her that? It makes no sense. No one else seems to find it strange, though. The Widow Makers surrounding me are all wearing severe expressions, hands resting on their guns, some blatantly holding them out like Shay. I’m the only one who looks lost, I’m sure. Cade shrugs, smiling in a dramatic, all of a sudden way that is totally out of place.
“When you make up your mind, you let me know, okay? Meantime, I’ll be in the clubhouse drinking a cold one.” He begins to turn around, turning his back on the crazed woman on the other side of the gate, but she starts screaming again.
“¡Te odio! usted es un enfermo, el mal hijo de puta!”
Cade faces her again, grinning. “Oh, don’t worry, Mother. I hate you, too.”
There’s pure murder in her eyes when she lowers her gun. “Fine. Just the four of us. But trust me…if you value your life and the lives of your precious Widow Makers, you won’t lay a finger on me or mine.”
Cade draws an ex over his chest. “Cross my heart and hope to die.”
“I’ve hoped you would die many times over already, cabron.”
“Likewise.” Cade stares at her until she loses patience and starts barking at her men in Spanish, presumably telling them to leave. They look unsure at first, and then afraid as she gets angrier and angrier. Eventually seven other men climb into two of the cars, start the engines and leave.
“There. Are you happy now? Rico is dying, motherfucker. Let us inside.”
I have no idea who this Rico guy is, but he sure as hell seems important to Maria Rosa. Cade grunts, still grinning, though the humor has vanished from his face. He looks like he’s grimacing as he slowly strolls to the compound gate and punches a code into the keypad to the left. The metal screeches as the gates swing open and then Maria Rosa is charging into the compound, holding up her gun. She marches straight up to Cade and presses the gleaming metal directly against his heart.
“You’d better fix him,” she spits. “You’d better fix him, or there will be consequences, asshole.”
I’d be curious to see what these consequences are, now that twenty angry Widow Makers surround her. Cade says something, but I don’t really hear it, though. The two of them talk, anger and antagonism lacing their voices, and I stare at Raphael, feeling panic rising in the back of my throat. He’s still being restrained, though the evil motherfucker isn’t struggling anymore. He’s staring right back at me, unblinking, apparently unfazed by the situation he finds himself in. He seems only intent on one thing: me. And the look in his eyes is enough to make the blood run cold in my veins.
“Well? Sophia? Can you do it?”
“Huh?” I tear my gaze from Raphael, shaking, to find that Cade has moved again and he’s standing beside me. His eyebrows are raised in question. “What?” I ask.
“Can you take a look at the guy? You’re studying medicine, right?”
I just look at him blankly. He can’t…he can’t actually be serious. Can he? “What? No! I study psychology.”
Cade laughs like this is the funniest thing ever. He turns around, throwing his hands up in the air. “Well, there you have it. No doctors here, Mother. Sorry.” He doesn’t sound sorry. Not even a little. “I mean,” he continues. “I can pull a slug out of him, but I can’t guarantee I won’t do more damage than good. He looks like he’s on the way out, darlin’.”
Maria Rosa sends him an icy stare. And then she turns it on me. “You’re lying,” she informs me. “You are a doctor.”
“I’m not.” I’m really damn glad none of these people know my father or my sister are actually doctors. They would probably assume I know what I’m doing by association or something. Turns out Maria Rosa doesn’t need such information to make calls like that, though. “Bullshit. You can save him.” She sounds like she’s determined to make this the truth by sheer force of will. She’s mad. I’m convinced of that fact when she turns her gun on me and removes the safety. “Get over here,” she commands. “Get the bullet out of him and sew him up. You can do it.”
“I—” I shake my head, not quite sure what to do. “I have no surgical experience. I’ll kill him.”
“Oh, no, princess. You kill him, and I kill you. I don’t think you want that. You want to die?”
“Of course not.”
“Then get over here and fix him!”
I can see that the man on the ground by the gate, Rico, is beyond saving. His lips and eyelids are blue, which I’m educated enough to know means he stopped breathing some time ago. I’m betting that if I walk over there and place my fingertips against his neck, I’m not going to find a pulse. I’m also betting Maria Rosa does not want to hear that, though. She seems like she’s on the brink of a complete meltdown.
“I don’t have any equipment. I’d need a sterile room, and surgical tools. I—I don’t even have a needle and thread, let alone forceps. You do know what a psychologist is, right?”
Maria Rosa doesn’t answer. She moves in a flash of tight Versace and highly impractical Manolos, and suddenly she has me by the hair. Both Cade and Shay move at the same time, trying to put themselves in between me and the woman, but Maria Rosa has a firm grip on me; my hair feels like it’s about to be torn out at the roots.
“For fuck’s sake,” Cade groans under his breath. “If you really wanna piss Rebel off, you’re doing a stellar job.”
“Do I look like I give a fuck about Rebel?” Maria Rosa spits. “I only care about Rico.” She proceeds to drag me toward Rico’s body, jabbing me every few paces with what I’m assuming it the barrel of her gun. Raphael starts laughing in that rattling, weird, unnerving way of his. His cackling bounces around the compound courtyard like a mocking bird call. He stops laughing as I pass him to say, “I hope you’re ready, slut. I’ll be skull fucking you before the end of the night.”
Anger rolls through me. I want to punch this woman in the ribcage for handling me like I’m shit, for bring that man in such close proximity of me, but I know she won’t hesitate to shoot if I piss her off.
The Widow Makers all move in unison, crowding in around, all just as angry as I am. They may not know me or like me, but they love Rebel. As far as they are concerned, I am his property and Maria Rosa should not be interfering with me in any way.
Cade is beginning to look seriously worried. Maria Rosa shoves me forward roughly, and I fall to my knees beside Rico. My heart is charging so hard, I can hear my blood pumping in my own ears. The sound becomes a deafening roar when I feel the muzzle of the gun pressing into the back of my head.
This is not good. This is not good at all. I have no way of saving this man. I have no clue what I’m doing. Now that I’m closer I can see the bullet hole in his stomach, though, can see that someone has ineffectually tried to stem the flow of blood by ramming a black silk scarf into the wound. Right into it, like that was the best option available to them. Even I know that was a bad idea. That scarf has got all kinds of bacteria all over it, and now that bacteria is happily breeding away inside the torn up vital organs of a dying man.
“Begin,” Maria Rosa commands.
“I told you, I don’t have any instruments.”
She crouches down beside me, craning her face into mine, baring her teeth so that she’s showing gum. “Use. Your. Fingers.”
“I am not sticking my fingers inside his body. No way!”
Pain comes, then—a sharp, piercing pain at the back of my head. My vision dances, pinpricks of light bursting everywhere, but I don’t lose consciousness. I do fall forward, though—my hands land right on Rico’s torso. The man’s eyes flicker open, and he gasps soundlessly for oxygen once, twice, and then his eyes roll back in his head. He starts to convulse, pink foam pouring out of his mouth.
“Ahhhh, Mother, the bitch killed him,” Raphael laughs. “She’s trouble. I told you, no?”
Maria Rosa lets ou
t an anguished squeal. I look up, and see that she’s hitting herself in the side of the head with her gun, pulling on her own hair. Tears tremble on the ends of her eyelashes, ready to fall any second. “He’s not dead. You check him. Check his pulse,” she growls.
I do check his pulse. It’s thready and weak, but I can feel the irregular twitch of his heart beneath the pads of my fingers. Thank fuck for that. “He’s not dead,” I say. I hate how my voice shakes. I hate that I’m afraid right now, but it can’t be helped. I keep finding myself in these situations. If I don’t get shot in the back of the head in a couple of minutes and my brains aren’t splattered all over Rico and the dirt and everywhere else in between, maybe I’ll be less frightened the next time this happens. Maybe.
Maria Rosa grinds her teeth together, repositioning her gun in her hands again. “Okay. Now you get that bullet out of him, bitch, or I’m going put three in you. Do you hear me?” she screams.
I look from her to Cade and back again. Cade has his gun in his hands pointing it at Maria Rosa, but he looks torn. “I could shoot her if you want, Soph. I can’t guarantee she won’t shoot you first, though. It’s your call. What do you want me to do?”
“God, don’t shoot her.”
“All right. Well, you’d better get your hands inside Rico then, before the bastard dies.” He doesn’t look at me while he talks. He stares intently at Maria Rosa, unwavering, hands steady. I think about changing my mind, about telling him to shoot her, but would he be able to do it before she killed me? Probably not.
So there’s nothing left for it. My hands are covered in blood and dirt from when I toppled forward a minute ago. I scrub them against my jeans, doing what I can to get them clean, and then I lean over the ghostly white body in front of me and I do something neither my father nor Sloane have probably ever done: I stick my bare, filthy dirty fingers inside an open stomach wound. It feels innately wrong, and, worryingly, it feels cool. Should he really be this cold? The human body should sit at an average 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit, but the inside of Rico’s stomach feels a lot cooler. This could be normal, though. I’m not a doctor. I know shit about trauma and what happens when someone goes into shock.
“Can you feel it?” Maria Rosa asks.
“No.” All I can feel is intestines and a whole lot of blood that I’m assuming is not meant to be there. I twist my fingers around inside the wound, attempting to locate anything metallic, hard or sharp, but my fingers feel like they’re tearing through wet paper. It definitely doesn’t feel right. I think I’m killing him even quicker. My suspicions are confirmed when Rico starts convulsing even harder.
“What are you doing? What did you do?” Maria Rosa screams.
I pull my hand out of Rico, choking on panic, readying myself for the sound of the gunshot that will end my life. Do bullets travel faster than the speed of sound? I think they do. At least I won’t have to hear the herald of my own demise. I guess that’s something.
My heart nearly explodes out of my chest when I do hear the gunshot, though. I feel instantly numb. My breath fires in and out of my lungs in impossibly short blasts, and I flinch, waiting for the pain to kick in.
It doesn’t happen.
Through the high-pitched buzzing in my ears, I can hear someone roaring in anger, and someone else screaming at the top of their lungs. That’s what I should sound like. I should sound like I’m in agony, like the person screaming, and yet I feel nothing.
Hands are on me next, pulling at me, patting me down.
Rebel. Rebel’s scooping me up in his arms, lifting me to my feet. Hold me to him, swearing over and over again in my ear.
“Fuck, Soph. Fuck. Fucking hell. Are you okay?”
I look down, and Maria Rosa is on her side, clawing at Rico’s very dead body. She’s bleeding from her shoulder, blood everywhere, all over my white tennis shoes. Her black mascara has bled all down her face too, now. She’s the one who’s screaming, the one who got shot. Not me. I’m okay. I’m okay. I’m okay.
“Soph! Tell me you’re not hurt!” Rebel shakes me, trying to get a response.
“Yes! Yeah, I’m fine. I’m not hurt.”
Rebel lets me go then. I think I might fall, but I somehow manage to keep myself upright. I watch him as he stalks around the compound, glaring into the faces of the Widow Makers who are still standing around us with their guns in their hands.
“I had to do that?” he hollers. “You’re all standing here with your dicks in your hands? I had to get here and do that, and none of you acted?” He stops in front of Cade, his face less than an inch away from his vice president’s, his chest rising and falling so fast. He looks crazy. He looks like he’s about to straight up murder Cade. “What the fuck were you thinking?” he grinds out.
“I was thinking that the crazy bitch had a gun pressed against the base of Sophia’s skull and I wouldn’t be able to take her out without something really terrible happening. What would you have done if I’d taken the shot and Soph had been killed, you fucking asshole?” Cade shoves him. I’ve never seen anyone do something so risky. If anyone’s going to get away with it, it’s Cade, but Rebel doesn’t look very happy right now. He looks like he’s about to go supernova. I hold my breath, waiting for him to do something crazy, for him to smash his fist into his best friends face or pull his gun on him, but he doesn’t. He glares at Cade for another few seconds, and then turns away from him, facing me again.
Maria Rosa writhes on the ground, swearing angrily in Spanish. She’s bleeding pretty heavily, her blood mixing into the dirt with Rico’s. Rebel ignores her, stepping over her body like she’s a mild inconvenience, unworthy of his attention. He stands in front of me, his shoulders hitching up and down, a frantic energy still pouring off him in waves. “Come with me,” he says.
He holds out his hand and I’m too stunned by the events of the past few minutes to object or refuse him. I take it, my legs feeling unstable as he guides me across the compound toward the clubhouse. As we pass Cade, Rebel growls under his breath. “Get a prospect to clear that shit up, man. And get her and Dela Vega out of sight, will you? Make sure they’re…comfortable.”
A shiver runs up my spine at the tone in his voice. When he says comfortable, I know he means something else entirely. He opens the door to the clubhouse, muttering under his breath when he surveys the place and finds it void of all life. We weave between tables and abandoned chairs, making our way toward the bar at the back of the room. Once there, Rebel opens another door into a back room. The small, dusty space is filled with torn-open boxes containing bottled beer, empty milk crates and cleaning equipment. The shelves on the right hand wall are a jumbled mess of spirits and…and guns. Guns, just sitting there like casual objects that don’t hurt, maim, kill. Rebel lets go of my hand and picks up a small, silver handgun, sliding it into the waistband of his jeans at the base of his spine. “Come here,” he tells me, gesturing me close. I move to his side, not sure what he could possibly want to show me in here aside from the weaponry and liquor. “Look,” he says. “Pay attention. There’s a small catch up here, right in the corner.” His hand moves to the very top corner of the wall by the shelves. Sure enough, I see what he’s referring to—a small, black switch in the shadows. I would never have noticed it if he hadn’t pointed it out.
“See if you can reach it,” he tells me.
He’s much taller than me, but I’m still tall. I have to stand on my tiptoes but I can just about graze the smooth metal with my fingertips.
“Press it,” he says.
When I was kid, my favorite thing to do on a rainy Sunday afternoon once we got home from church was to watch Indiana Jones with my father. I have awful images of some terrible booby trap springing into action if I do what I’m told and hit this switch, but I know that’s ridiculous. Rebel wouldn’t be telling me to do it if it would be bad for me. My nerve endings still crackle when I press my fingers against the catch, though. A loud clicking noise cuts through the tense silence, making me jump. I jump e
ven more when the wall—what I thought was the wall—swings back to reveal yet another door. This one is made of steel, looks reinforced, and has no visible handle or keyhole. To the left, a narrow keypad sits on the wall, glowing softly in the darkness.
“Watch,” Rebel tells me. “The code is One Seven Six Three.” He punches the code into the keypad as I observe, my arms wrapped around my body. I’m starting to feel really shaky. Maria Rosa’s arrival and Raphael’s presence is catching up with me. I feel like the world is crashing down on my head and I have no means of stopping it, of holding back the tide.
The keypad is silent as Rebel presses the keys. He hits the green enter button and the door chunks and releases. Rebel doesn’t allow it to open properly, though. He closes it and holds his hand palm-up to the keypad, giving me a tight-lipped smile that holds absolutely no humor. “Now you,” he says. “Show me you remember the code. I need to know you can open this door.”
He’s incredibly intense. He’s clearly so stressed he’s not really functioning, and yet at the same time there’s an eerie calm resting over him. It’s way more frightening than if he were simply raging mad. I slowly punch in the access code to the door and hit the green button afterward, just as he did, and the door swings open.
“Okay. Good. Follow me.” Rebel moves through the door into the pitch-black darkness beyond. I hesitate a second, but then follow behind him, unwilling to push him even a little while he’s in this state. The heavy steel door closes behind us, and suddenly I feel like I’m trapped in a tomb. A dark, impenetrable tomb that I have no way out of. My chest tightens ever so slightly, the first strains of panic setting in, my heartbeat noticeably quickening.
“Rebel?”
His arms are immediately around me, his chest up against mine, his lips pressing against my forehead. He holds me in the dark and breathes. I can feel the impossible speed of his own heart beating against mine, and I know he’s having trouble holding himself together. So strange. He always seems so unflappable, like a bomb could go off right next to his head and he’d still be able to think straight.
