Chapter 1 #2
Dave and Sara slip past them with the ease of people used to this kind of PDA. I can’t help laughing when I take in their outfits. Dave’s in a fuzzy white sweater with the Abominable Snowman’s face plastered across it, and Sara dressed as a sexy reindeer. Rudolph, obviously.
“Stop,” Sara says when she spots me. “You look so cute!”
I give a small twirl, letting the pink gingham skirt flare around my legs.
“Thank you. Now, let’s get this party started!”
Dave lifts a bottle triumphantly. “I brought Fireball! Let’s do a shot!”
The party hits its stride fast after that.
Music blares from Sienna’s Bluetooth speaker as Mariah Carey gives it her all while laughter and conversation fill every inch of the apartment.
The living room is packed now, our tiny space straining under the weight of too many bodies and the scent of cinnamon, perfume, and cheap booze.
Someone turns on the string lights I hung last week, and the whole room glows like the inside of a snow globe.
More people pour in. Friends of friends, mostly.
A couple of guys from Sienna’s art class, a neighbor from down the hall, and a girl I only know as “someone’s cousin.
” Beer cans clink, someone spills Fireball on the counter, and I can’t stop smiling.
For once, it feels like the holidays aren’t something I’m just surviving but something I’m part of.
Sienna’s on Mikel’s lap, laughing at something he says, and I’m half-listening to Sara explain why reindeer antlers and her new make-up pallet should count as a tax deduction when a knock cuts through the music.
“Probably more guests,” Mikel says, setting his drink down. He pushes up from the couch and heads for the door like he lives here.
The knock comes again, harder this time.
“Hold on!” he calls, still laughing as he twists the knob.
The door swings open.
Two men shove their way inside. I barely register the black hoodies and the glint of metal before the first shot cracks through the air.
Mikel jerks backward, a red bloom spreading across his chest. Sienna screams. The music keeps playing—All I Want for Christmas Is You—as chaos explodes around us.
For a second, I can’t move. My brain refuses to catch up.
Then someone knocks into me, and the beer can in my hand smashes against the floor, spilling everywhere.
Everything that had felt warm and bright seconds ago turns to ice.
The man who shot Mikel scans the room, his gun still raised. His gaze lands on Sienna.
“That’s her.” His accent is thick. Italian, maybe.
Then his words register and I don’t think. I just move.
I lunge at Sienna, shoving her backward as another shot cracks through the air. Pain tears through my arm, hot and blinding. For a heartbeat, I don’t even realize I’ve been hit. Then it burns—God, it burns. I cry out in pain. Not that it does any good.
Sienna grabs me hard and her fingers are slick with something I pray is beer and not blood as we scramble across the floor.
We’re slipping on broken ornaments and crushed pine needles from where someone knocked over the Christmas tree.
There’s glass everywhere, glittering like ice in the dim light.
For one absurd, irrational heartbeat, all I can think about is my aunt’s ornaments.
How they were special, how she’d mailed them to me before she passed and how my first instinct is to try to save them.
But then another gunshot cracks through the air, and that thought shatters with everything else.
My ears are ringing so loud it’s like the world is underwater. My heart is a drum slamming against my ribs, too fast and definitely too frantic. Each breath feels sharp and thin, like the air has been cut in half.
I think I’m trying to go into shock.
Sienna’s still pulling me, her black dress streaked with something dark, her breath coming in panicked bursts. The music is still playing somewhere in the apartment, warped and skipping like a nightmare soundtrack, and every instinct in my body is screaming move, move, move.
I don’t feel my knees scraping against the floor.
I don’t feel the sting of glass biting into my skin.
I don’t feel anything except terror pressing down on me so hard it makes the edges of my vision blur.
Someone is screaming. Maybe Sienna. Maybe me.
I can’t tell.
All I know is that we’re running, crawling, sliding trying to survive a night that was supposed to be full of lights and warmth and stupid holiday magic and instead became the moment everything in my life split apart.
“Birdie, this is bad,” she whispers, voice shaking. “We need to get out of here.”
More shots explode, louder this time. Someone screams—a raw, awful sound—and then Sara’s voice cuts through it.
“Dave!”
I look toward her just in time to see Dave on the floor, his white sweater blooming red, his dark eyes wide and empty. The sight hits harder than the pain in my arm. My breath catches, and the room tilts, all glittering lights and horror.
The apartment is pure chaos now. People scream, furniture topples, glass shatters. The smell of gunpowder mixes with cinnamon and beer, turning my stomach.
Sienna’s shaking beside me, clutching my good arm. “Birdie—please—”
“I know,” I rasp, forcing myself up. “Come on.”
We crawl toward the hallway, staying low, my arm slick with blood. The men are shouting. One of them kicks over the coffee table, sending bottles and cans flying. I grab Sienna’s wrist and drag her toward my room, praying the noise covers us.
A bullet hits the wall above us, spraying plaster like snow. We dive through the doorway, and I slam the bedroom door shut, twisting the flimsy lock that won’t hold for long.
My breath comes fast and shallow.
Sienna presses her hand over my wound. “You’re bleeding.”
“I was afraid of that,” I push her toward the corner behind the bed. “Stay down. Don’t move, no matter what happens.”
The doorknob rattles. Then a boot slams against the wood and the lock gives in an instant.
I grab the nearest thing I can which happens to be my bedside lamp and raise it like a weapon.
My hand trembles, but I plant myself between her and the door.
I don’t know why they want her, but I’m not going to let someone take my best friend, because I’m pretty sure that’s who they’re here for.
The door bursts open.
One of the intruders steps in, gun first, his face shadowed beneath a hood. I lift the lamp higher, ready to swing.
He laughs when he sees me. “Oh, this is cute.”
He fills the doorframe just as a new sound cuts through the chaos.
A shout from the front of the apartment. “Drop it!”
For one wild second, hope flares in my chest. Please, God, let it be the police.
But then automatic fire rips through the air, a brutal, deafening crack that shakes the walls.
The man in my doorway jerks violently before collapsing, his body crumpling to the carpet.
And the blood…I’ve never seen so much blood in my life.
I choke on a sob and drag Sienna into my arms, shielding her as boots thunder down the hallway.
Three men flood into the room wearing black tactical gear, weapons raised, movements precise. They sweep the space like they’ve done this a hundred times. For a breathless, trembling instant, I’m ready to sob with relief. But then one of them barks something over his shoulder, sharp and commanding.
Not English.
Italian.
My heart nosedives. These aren’t the police.
These are more of them. The accents are unmistakable—hard consonants, clipped vowels, the same cadence as the man who tried to grab us earlier.
Cold dread spreads through me, heavy as lead.
Whoever these men are they’re not here to save us. They’re here because someone sent them.
One of them lowers his rifle just slightly when he sees us. “Clear!” he calls, then into a mic, “Target secured. Conti’s daughter is here, unharmed.”
Relief hits me so hard it’s almost worse than the fear. My knees give out, and I sink to the floor, the adrenaline draining out of me all at once. The room tilts, edges blurring.
Sienna is suddenly there, hands on my shoulders, her face streaked with tears. She’s crying, silent and shaking, and I wrap my arms around her, holding on as tight as I can.
“It’s over,” I whisper, though the words taste like a lie. “We’re safe.”
The world narrows, sound fading until all I can hear is my heartbeat, which is getting slower by the second.
And then everything goes dark.