Chapter Thirty-Three
In which Violet never knows if she can, until she must.
Violet…
This is my fault.
We're crouching in a wooded area off the roadway. Only a couple of cars have driven by, and we duck each time. I'm clutching the Glock in a death grip, held up the way Roman taught me.
It's my fault because if Roman hadn't had to pull half their soldiers to rescue us, his family wouldn't be in danger right now.
"You're blaming yourself," Rose whispers. "Stop that."
"Yeah," Iris says, "you do not control time and space. This is the Bratva, remember? I bet this stuff happens all the time. They'll be okay."
"You didn't see Roman's face when Dmitri told him their father was shot." My eyes are welling up and sensible Violet yells at me. You stop this whiny shit right now. There's family to protect right here.
Sensible Violet is also mourning the fact that the three of us are in these ridiculous wedding dresses. White wedding gowns that are screaming, "Hey, look! Look how visible we are in the dark!"
"No guilt." I suck in a deep breath. "We need to get further into the field. These bushes aren't enough to hide us if someone's headlights hit this spot."
The night is swelteringly hot, my wedding dress is rubbing against my skin, itching. Every step we take, a little wave of grasshoppers flee in the grass in front of us.
It's then I hear it. A wave of gunfire that sounds like a dragon's roar, an avalanche of bullets that even a quarter mile away, are making my ears ring.
"Good," I whisper. "Kill them all, honey." Crouching awkwardly, we crab-walk further into the brush, wincing as the thorny branches scrape along our bare arms. I can see the sky light up with flares of yellow and then a new roar, rapid and staccato.
"It sounds like one of those war movies," Iris says, rubbing her skinny arms.
"Someone's got an AK-47," I say. "I hope it's our side."
It feels like an hour, the endless round of gunfire. Sometimes, I think I can hear screams and I cross myself, praying that it's not one of Roman's people.
That it's not Roman.
I only told him that I loved him once, there in that bloody courtyard. I wanted to say it more. Outline a lot of really good reasons for my stance on loving him. Hopefully, he'd say it again, too.
The firefight lighting up the sky above us bears a horrifying similarity to the fireworks we'd watched from Dmitri and Ava's penthouse on the Fourth of July.
How the explosions accelerate, faster and bigger and brighter until the final, climactic detonation.
Rose makes a noise in her throat, putting her head on my shoulder and I scoot closer to them both, keeping a grip on the Glock.
"Almost done," I whisper. "They've got them all. Now we wait."
Then we hear something plowing through the brush, the heavy tread of boots. But no one's calling for us.
Because it's not Roman.
***
When Roman first taught me to shoot, he told me having a gun gives you about ninety percent deterrence from threats.
Then he asked me about the ten percent of the time, when I would have to fire the gun if I wanted to live.
Was I capable of killing someone? He was plastered against me at the time, his front pressed to my back, his hands on my arms, holding them straight with the gun in my hands.
He whispered the question in my ear and at the time, I admit that I was not capable of serious consideration.
"If you're in that moment and you're forced to shoot," he'd said, "don’t show your hand. Keep your gun hidden until it’s time to use it. Don’t give them a chance to get it away from you."
Can I kill someone?
My hand drops and I hide the gun behind the folds of my torn dress as two men round the tree, spotting us.
"Don't hurt us!" My voice is shaking. "Please, we didn’t see anything. We won't say a word to anyone."
The bigger, uglier one smirks. He's wearing black, holding a gun with a rifle strapped across his back. I hate his type. I’ve done nothing but run from assholes like him for the last seventy-two hours.
"Shut the fuck up!" he snaps. "You three, get over here." He says something, I’m guessing in Albanian, to his slimy friend, who grins with sudden hope. Probably something about holding us hostage.
I hope it's not worse than that.
"This is no wedding," he gestures at our bridal attire and laughs.
We don't laugh, though I fake a convincing whimper.
His face darkens. "Are you stupid? I told you bitches to come here." He strides toward us, his little buddy behind him, arm sagging and covered in blood. His gun is still in his holster. I can see it.
Now, they're about five feet away. My hand holding the gun rises and I pull the trigger.
Sight the target, Roman whispers. Breathe, pull the trigger.
I shoot, center mass, just the way he taught me, and hit the first man in the chest. He drops like a rock and my next bullet catches the second one in the throat. He has his hands on his neck, blood seeping between his fingers, his eyes wide in shock.
I guess I can kill someone.