Chapter 18 What The Fuck
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
WHAT THE FUCK
Devon
Ibarely saw it.
The glint far across the lake on the side of the mountain. It was buried deep in the evergreens almost to the peak.
Metal reflecting off the sun.
Trained directly where Harlow was standing.
Two lone sirens sound in the distance. This isn’t London, D.C., or even a mid-size American town.
It’s Winslet. There’s a volunteer fire department, and the last I heard when Carl was talking about it at The Combover, only two of them are trained EMTs since one moved a state over to live near his grandkids.
What Winslet is not prepared for is a shooting, let alone a sharpshooter planted deep in the woods aiming at my property.
Three shots, but only one connected.
“What happened? What happened? Oh my God, did I do that with the tennis ball? I didn’t mean to.
I swear! How could that have happened with a tennis ball?
” Rob’s panicked chants won’t stop. He’s bent over with his hands on his knees in a fit of desperation where Roman Malloy and Harlow are lying at the baseline.
I’ve already called 9-1-1. It’s all I can do to fight my instincts and not pick up Harlow and race her back to my suite, or better yet, my office with no windows, and lock her up.
I drag my hand away from Harlow’s neck where I was checking her pulse and reach up and grab Rob by the sleeve of his tennis polo to get his attention.
I give him a shake to drag him out of his dramatic panic.
“Listen to me. Call Felicity and tell her we’re in a code red.
All guests need to be moved inside. She’ll know what to do.
Hell, you should know what to do. I need you to focus, Rob. ”
Rob is no tennis pro. His CV was the best I had to choose from at the time we opened.
He played tennis all four years at Winslet High School and two years at the local junior college.
Golf and sailing were hobbies, but like most other positions here other than the chef, my pool of candidates was slim.
But the locals have risen to the challenge.
Other than losing it in the face of an emergency.
Note taken for a much, much more boring time—Rob is shit when it comes to crises. I need to add extensive training to my list of shit to do for the general manager that I’ve yet to hire.
I give Rob’s shoulder one more shake. “Call Felicity and then get to the beach and clear the area. But get it together and try not to freak the guests out too much. Do you understand?”
Harlow starts to stir. She pulls her hand to her temple and mutters, “What happened?”
“She’s alive! I didn’t kill her.” Rob stands straight and drags his fingers through his hair. Rob’s wide eyes move from Harlow to Roman. “But what about him? I only shot one ball. How did this happen? Two birds with one stone is not possible with a tennis ball!”
Rob is right. This didn’t happen with one tennis ball.
Sirens ring louder and get closer by the moment. I put my hand to Harlow’s chest to keep her low to the ground. I’m hovering over her with my back to the lake and mountain. I look back to Rob. “You know what to do.”
Rob’s anguished eyes shift from Roman to me. He nods in quick succession, pulls his cell from his pocket, and finally races from the courts toward the shore.
Harlow drags her eyes open far enough to squint up at me through the bright sun. “Devon?”
Fuck. She opened her eyes.
“Baby, EMS will be here soon, but I need to get you out of here. Can you move?”
“EMS?”
She frowns up at me for a heavy moment. I see it in her eyes when reality seeps in. Her head rolls to the side far enough to glance at the man she was talking to before it all went down.
Her body jolts. “What happened?”
I’m forced to press her shoulders to the ground to keep her where she is. “You hit your head when you fell. I need to get you the hell out of here.”
She pushes my hands away. Since I don’t want to wrestle her to the court and risk hurting her further, I pull her up and tuck her to my chest instead. We may be out in the open, but I’ve got my back to the mountains.
Three shots. I saw the whole thing go down and know the exact spot they came from.
Her death grip on my arm feels like she’s searching for a lifeline. She can’t get close enough as her body convulses with emotion. “He was shot?”
I put my lips to her ear. “He’s got a pulse. It’s weak but you’re my priority. The shots came from the mountains. I need to get you inside. Can you move or should I carry you?”
She tries to push into my chest closer if that was possible. “Gunshots?”
“From the mountains across the lake.” I climb to my feet and bring her with me, wishing I could shield her body from every angle.
It’s taken guests a minute to figure out what’s going on, but Rob must have kicked it into gear.
My staff is doing their best to calmly usher guests toward the main building. But the calm won’t last long.
The moment they see Roman Malloy bleeding onto the tennis court, panic ensues. Half the guests race up the hill, and the other half are in shock not knowing what to do. It’s the ones recording the entire incident on their phones that make me realize this moment will plague me until the end of time.
“I’m getting you the hell out of here.” I turn Harlow in my arms when her body wracks with sobs. Holding her to my chest with one arm, I bend far enough to scoop her up under her knees with the other.
Even though she’s fisting my open dress shirt at the neck and trembling in my arms, she says on a shaky breath, “I can walk.”
My hold on her tightens. “I’ll put you down in my office where I can lock you up. There’s no way I’m giving the shooter an open target.”
She hiccups another sob. “That was meant for me.”
We’re almost to the atrium doors when Police Chief Dean Moretti surges from the building but stops to hold the door for me.
He’s wearing an intense frown and sweaty workout clothes holding his comm in one hand and his duty weapon in the other. His gaze shifts from me to Harlow and back to me. “What the fuck happened?”
I met Moretti the second day I was an official resident of Winslet. I called the city for help on another crime, the sort I was not prepared to deal with on my own without instigating mass murder.
A family of racoons made the greenhouse their home, and since I planned to turn the space into a five-star restaurant, I needed them out. That was when I learned that small town police don’t just work fender benders, write speeding tickets, or read to second graders once a week.
They also moonlight as animal control.
A sharpshooter and gunshot victim isn’t something they deal with often. Or ever. At least not since I moved here.
I move aside to allow guests to file in and set Harlow on her feet but don’t let go of her. She doesn’t argue and presses into my chest.
“Three shots came from the mountains. I’ll tell you exactly where it came from after I get Harlow to my office. One was hit—he’s on the courts. He caught a bullet to the gut.”
Dean glances out the windows at the mess that’s currently ensuing on my property. “Three? That doesn’t sound like a hunter.”
I put my hand to the back of Harlow’s head and hold her to me. “It was no stray bullet, Dean. This was targeted.”
“My men are on the way. I’ll send them across the lake to canvass the area.”
Harlow shifts, pulling her face from where it was pressed against the skin of my neck and turns to Dean. “It was meant for me. I know it was.”
Dean’s frown deepens, but I don’t give him the chance to question her. “Let me get her settled. I’ll find you and tell you everything I know.”
Dean lifts his chin once, pushes through the atrium doors, and disappears against the flow of guests being ushered into the building.
“You’ll be okay.” I lean down and press my lips to her forehead. She tips her head back to stare up at me through anxious, dark eyes. But I see it in her expression. She doesn’t believe me.
I’ll prove it to her. There’s no fucking way I can lose anyone else.
Harlow
Devon brought me straight to his office, inspected the bump on my temple, and checked my pupils for dilation. When he was convinced I’d still be alive upon his return, he kissed me so deeply, I felt it down to my toes.
And that’s saying something since my emotions are numb from shock.
Then he looked me in the eyes and made me promise not to leave the safety of his office.
He didn’t have to ask me twice.
The threat of my nightmare almost became reality. Not going through with the I do made me think I was safe, but it was obviously a false sense of security.
I left my cell at the tennis courts and have no idea how to get hold of him should I need anything since his number is saved in my phone.
But Chrissie’s number is etched in my brain. I can at least check on my dad, let her know what happened, and that I’m okay.
I figure out how to dial an outside line from Devon’s office phone. On the fourth ring, I worry it’s going to go to voice mail, and I’ll have to spam her with call after call, because being shot at necessitates being just that annoying, but she finally picks up.
“This is Christine.”
“Chrissie? It’s me. I’m calling from the office line at the manor.”
“Damn, Harlow. You know I hate to answer unknown numbers.” Like normal, she just keeps talking. “It’s official—I will do anything for you, answer unknown calls and deal with the step-monster. Janie is all up in my ass about you calling off the wedding.”
My voice cracks. “Chrissie—”
But she doesn’t let me get a word in. “I told her since she put the brakes on my being in the wedding, this is the last thing I’m helping with. She should go ask her country club friends for help.”
I try again. “Chris—"
“I thought you had a tennis match. You were looking forward to it. I told you I was going to update you on your dad later today.”
I fall into Devon’s office chair, cradle my head in my hand, and say nothing. Just listening to Chrissie’s endless chatter helps me breathe.