Chapter 25
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
M y brisk strides down the hallway of my apartment building slows when the vibration of my cell phone shakes in my pocket. I’m not at all surprised when I see it is a call from Ryan. When he discovered who the Audi was registered to, he pleaded for me not to take the issue any further. My consideration of his plea only lasted as long as it took for me to remember the bleak look in Clara’s eyes the night she was mugged.
Ryan’s pleas settled when I promised I was only going to ‘talk’ to Cormack man to man, not have a ‘word’ with him. Considering I left without a single drop of blood being shed, I kept my word. I won’t lie. It was hard. The only thing that stopped me from pounding some sense into Cormack was the look of repentance in his eyes. He was genuinely horrified that Clara had been assaulted. He was so upset, he looked physically ill.
I don’t have any siblings, so I can’t say I comprehend Cormack’s logic of wanting to teach Clara a lesson. But even without siblings, I still think he has gone about it the wrong way. Clara’s life was jeopardized. That is not something I’ll ever be okay with .
Swiping my finger across my phone’s screen, I press it to my ear before throwing open the front door of my apartment. “Not a drop of blood was shed,” I mutter, not bothering to issue a greeting.
“Have you seen Damon?”
I throw the keys for my bike onto the entryway table before answering, “No. I was set to put a couple of hours into his back tattoo later this week, but I canceled my appointments to spend more time with Clara.”
Ryan’s deep sigh sounds down the line.
“Why? What’s up?” My lips purse when my gaze locks in on Damon’s ocean-blue eyes sitting across from Clara. “Ha. You won’t believe this. He’s here. Did you want to talk to him?”
“Damon is at your apartment?” Ryan’s words come out in a hurry.
Even though he can’t see me, I jerk up my chin. “Yeah. He’s here with Clara.”
Feet stomping bellows down the line before Ryan yells, “I’m on my way. Keep him calm,” before he disconnects the call.
A sick feeling spreads across my stomach when I drift my eyes to Clara. She’s nursing the same set of eyes she wore in the alleyway the night she was mugged. Her cheeks are stained with tears, and her face is as white as a ghost.
Hot anger boils my blood. “It was him, wasn’t it? The third man in the alley.”
My stomach winds all the way up to my throat when Clara nods, spilling fresh tears down her cheeks. Her confirmation means only one thing… I am going to kill Damon.
Clara squeals, and my quick charge to Damon comes to a dead stop when he lifts a gun I didn’t notice he had until now and points it at Clara’s head.
Clara freezes, her chest the only thing rising and falling as her massively dilated eyes lock with Damon’s. When I take another step closer, Damon pulls back the hammer on the gun and curls his index finger around the trigger.
“I swear to God if you hurt her…” My words trail off as a wide range of ways I can kill him runs through my mind.
“I told them not to do it. I warned them your crew wouldn’t stop until you found us, but they didn’t listen. None of them listened to me! Why doesn’t anyone listen to me?” His last sentence is only a whisper.
“I’m listening.” I take a step closer. “But pointing a gun at someone to force them to listen won’t get you heard. Put the gun down, then we’ll talk.”
Damon laughs a painful chuckle. “Like the talking your crew gave the other two men? They’ve pissed their pants the last two nights. That’s how fucking scared they are that your crew will come back and finish what they started.”
“This is different. You came to me. That changes everything.”
“I came to see if you had any info on who the third man was. I didn’t expect to have the door opened by the same face that haunts my dreams. Why is she here? You don’t bring girls back to your place!”
“She’s my girl, Damon. That is why she’s here. And if you hurt her, we’re going to have a problem. Is that what you want? Is that why you came back to Ravenshoe? To start trouble?”
Damon runs the back of his spare hand under his nose before using it to reinforce his brace on his gun. His hand is rattling so much, the gun is shaking like a leaf in a hot summer breeze. “I came here to get away from that life, but they followed me here. I didn’t mean to hurt her. I don’t want to hurt her.”
“Then drop the gun.” My voice hints at my wavering constraint. “Drop it before you make another mistake you can’t take back.”
It appears as if Damon didn’t hear a word I spoke .
“How did you know it was me? I was wearing a mask,” he asks with his gaze fixed on Clara.
Clara’s lips quiver as she begins to speak, “I recognized your voice when you greeted Charity.”
Fuck, Charity. I forgot she was here with Clara.
My heart rate climbs into dangerous territory, spurred on by the potent rage of fury blackening my blood. Just as I begin to ask about Charity’s whereabouts, my eyes lock in on a pair of red leather boots sprawled on the floor between Damon and Clara. They’re the same pair Charity has worn every day since she brought them two months ago.
I hold my hands out in front of my body, signaling to Damon that I mean him no harm as I slowly walk to Charity. Fury scorches my veins when I spot the welt on the top of her head. It looks like the mark a person would get when they’re struck with the butt of a gun. I crouch down in front of her to check for a pulse. My heart starts beating again when I discover a pulse—it’s faint, but it is there.
In a hazed blur, the front door of my apartment is kicked open at the same time Damon launches for Clara. He curls his arms around Clara’s chest and plasters his body to her back. While holding his gun to Clara’s right temple, he retreats deeper into my apartment. My fury hits a never-before-reached level when he uses her as a shield to protect himself from Ryan’s gun.
Damon stares into his brother’s eyes while declaring, “Drop your gun, or I’ll shoot her.” His voice is weak and pathetic like the man he is.
“If you don’t let her go, I will shoot you,” Ryan warns. “Don’t make me shoot you, Damon. Don’t put another death on my hands.”
Clara’s entire body shakes as her wide, horrified eyes drift between Ryan and me. New tears fill her eyes before spilling down her cheeks.
“Look at me, Princess. Keep your eyes on me,” I request, my voice scratchy as a range of emotions surge through me. “You’re okay. No one will hurt you.”
I take a step closer to her as Ryan and Damon continue with their negotiations. I don’t hear a word they’re saying, I’m too fixated on calming Clara solely by using my eyes.
My ploy seems to be working as the shivers racking her body simmer to a dull vibration. She keeps her tear-filled eyes planted on me while Damon’s remain glued on Ryan.
Using his distraction to my advantage, I charge for Damon. A gun being fired momentarily startles me, but it doesn’t stop my pursuit. Ignoring the thick stench of fear plaguing the air surrounding me, I yank Clara out of Damon’s grasp with one hand while striking his unprotected face with my other.
A bone cracking is barely audible over the deep “oomph” expelled from Clara’s mouth when she lands on her backside with a sickening thud. Damon’s eyes roll to the back of his head before he plummets to the concrete, his body crashing lifelessly to the floor, knocked out by one punch.
Bullets from the cylinder of his gun fall to my feet when I disarm it before sliding it into the back of my jeans. A massive surge of adrenaline pumps through my veins as I stoop down onto my knees to gather Clara into my arms. My pulse pounds into my ears as my eyes assess every inch of her. She’s alarmed and highly distressed but uninjured. Thank fuck.
My gratefulness doesn’t last long when Clara gasps, “Ryan!”
When I swing my eyes to the entryway of my apartment, a heaviness slams into my chest when I see a pool of blood seeping into Ryan’s crisp white business shirt. His eyes lock with mine—they’re lifeless and tormented. His gasps are wheezy and uncontrollable as he battles to secure a full breath. He mumbles the quickest apology, spraying his lips with droplets of vibrant red blood before he crumbles to the ground.
I scramble across the floor, ripping my shirt off in the process. Dropping to my knees, I wrap my shirt around my fist and apply pressure to the bullet wound in Ryan’s stomach. “Stay with me, Ryan,” I beg into his desolate eyes. He stares straight ahead, not blinking, not moving, not making a fucking sound. “Don’t you fucking quit, Ryan. Don’t you give up.”
After using my cell phone I left on the floor to call for an ambulance, Clara falls to her knees next to Ryan. “What can I do?” she asks, her voice breaking into a sob.
“Hold this.”
I release my hands from applying pressure to Ryan’s wound and replace them with Clara’s. The rattle of her hands is felt all the way up her arms, but she maintains enough pressure to slow the gushes of blood pouring from Ryan’s stomach.
Fear grips my heart when I move my hand to Ryan’s neck to check for a pulse and fail to find one. Acting purely on instinct, I begin the CPR resuscitation technique Ryder made all the Inked employees train in last year. I’ve never been more grateful for Ryder’s analness for protocol as I am right now.
I continue to pump Ryan’s chest when a brunette female wearing a sleek pantsuit enters my apartment. She has a government-issued gun drawn in front of her chest, and her dark brown eyes are scanning the room. When she discovers Damon sprawled unconscious on the floor, she balks and takes a step backward. “Ryan?”
“That is his brother, Damon.” My words come out garbled as a range of emotions smack into me. “He shot Ryan. He shot his own fucking brother.”
The brunette’s eyes snap down to mine. She takes a few seconds to absorb the scene before she calls in a command over the police radio strapped to her shoulder. “We have a 10-71 at 1314 Coulson Avenue. Officer down. I repeat, officer down.”
She moves over to check on Charity, who is slowly coming to while I continue pumping Ryan’s chest. My heart is smashing my ribs, and tears are swamping my eyes, but I don’t stop. I can’t.
After helping Charity sit on one of my couches, the brunette drops to the floor next to me. “How long has he been unresponsive?”
“Five minutes,” Clara responds on my behalf.
The brunette’s eyes rocket to Clara, the shock on her face intensifying.
“Can you call Isaac? He will get the surgical team at Ravenshoe Private on standby,” Clara requests to the unnamed police officer. “They may be Ryan’s only chance.”
The brunette curtly nods as her hand delves into the pocket of her black pants to retrieve her phone. Just as she begins talking into her cell, feet stomping booms through my ears, closely followed by the sight of two first responders.
“Thanks, we can take it from here,” one officer advises me, replacing my hands pumping Ryan’s chest with his own.
I take a stumbling step backward, landing on my ass a foot from Ryan. As the paramedics work on his lifeless body, the realization of why Ryan feels guilt for Chris’s death smashes into me. Ryan was the one who discovered Chris. He worked on him for over thirty minutes while waiting for the paramedics to arrive. Even after they officially pronounced Chris deceased, Ryan wouldn’t give up. He only stopped pounding his chest when I dragged him away kicking and screaming. He didn’t want to give up on Chris just like I don’t want to give up on him.
Crawling across the small space between us, I bang my enclosed fist on Ryan’s chest. “Come on, Ryan, fucking fight!” I roar, pounding on his chest over and over again. “You’ve never given up before, so don’t start now!”
I pound, and pound, and pound his chest until I have nothing left to give. The stranglehold on my heart is crippling me, and my lungs refuse to secure an entire breath.
Feeling defeated, I slump to the floor, my heart beyond broken, my eyes full of tears.
I gave it my all, and I still failed.
Just as the first lot of tears escape my eyes, a ragged gasp booms through my ears. I run the back of my hand across my cheeks before lifting my eyes. Ryan’s blue eyes are open and staring directly at me. They’re haunted and brimmed with worry, but they’re open, and that is the only thing that fucking matters.