CHAPTER 17 - RED
CHAPTER
Red
M Y HEAD RINGS and my heart pounds, but more than anything else is the dread coursing through my veins. I see the spray of bullets as they leave the gun before the deafening cracks registers.
I don’t think twice about diving on Arianna and knocking her to the ground, shielding her body from the rain of metal showering through the air. But is it enough? Has one hit her because I sure as fuck know that one has got me.
I guess it’s just a graze as I barely feel anything, short of the sickness in my gut when Arianna’s head thuds against the floor under my weight. Although I have thought of little else but having this woman underneath me, this isn’t the way I want it.
A gust of air rushes over me through the fire escape.
There’s no sound now from the loading bay below.
All I hear is my deafening heartbeat inside my eardrums. Arianna’s body is small underneath mine, but I dare not move until it’s safe.
My brain is scrambled, but not so much that I don’t know what has happened.
The sudden screech of an engine and the telltale noise of skidding tires as a vehicle speeds away signifies it’s safe to move. The entire event, from calling Arianna’s name to now, lasted less than ten seconds, but seems an age longer.
I remain motionless for a few seconds longer before propping myself up on an elbow.
Arianna is below me, and as I rise, she stares at me with wide eyes.
“Are you hurt?” My hands move under her head to make sure it’s intact.
There’s no blood, thank fuck, but she’s not answering. “ Arianna?” I hiss, my dread returning.
“I-I’m okay.” Her eyes dart around in terror. “What happened? Oh God, you’re... you’re bleeding!”
Her shaking hand reaches for my shoulder, and I stare at the red patch blooming on my white shirt. “It’s just a graze.”
“You... you could have been killed!” Her eyes glisten with unshed tears. “You...”
“I need to get you inside.” I get to my feet, and it is then that there are shouts from the loading bay. Reality pounds back into my brain as I swing towards the noise.
Fuck!
Arianna struggles to her feet, her eyes widening further as she sees what I see: the sprawled body of Steve lying on the concrete floor.
“Wait there!” Mounting the railings of the fire escape, I clatter down the metal steps, adrenaline pounding through every vein. God, no. Please don’t let him be badly injured.
“STEVE!” I roar, my feet pounding across the hard concrete while Liam fires round after round into the darkness at the fast-disappearing Transit. All I focus on is the crumpled body of one of my best men lying in an ever-growing pool of blood spreading out from the many holes littering his torso.
I drop to the floor, the pain in my knees making contact with the solid ground not touching the sides of my senses. “Steve?”
Gently turning my loyal friend and comrade onto his back, I hide the immediate instinct to recoil at the mess where his face once was. A low moan rumbles from the back of my throat, my fingers slipping in the mess of blood and flesh as I search for a sign that he still lives.
“Can’t you see he’s fucking dead?”
I hear Liam’s voice, but I don’t turn to him. I just need Steve to breathe. If he breathes, he’ll live. There are doctors who will sort this, I know they can. They’ll make Steve look like Steve again. They’ll ma...
“I said, he’s fucking dead!” Liam grabs my shoulder and rips me away from Steve. “Just leave it!”
Through my swirling torrent of desperation, I jump to my feet. “Don’t tell me to leave it! He’s one of my best men and...”
“You should have thought about that before you forced him to drag me out here! Steve wouldn’t have been here in the first place if it wasn’t for you and your obsession with that bitch!”
“Guys, this isn’t helping!” Oscar places his big frame between me and Liam.
I’ll kill Liam for saying what he did. I’ll kill him for starting this. How is it my fault? I didn’t shoot Steve! He can’t be dead. I won’t allow it.
“Let’s get him inside in case they come back.”
I don’t know whether Oscar is talking to me or what he’s doing. I can’t make sense of anything. Steve cannot be dead.
“Oh, God!” Arianna’s voice jolts me from my spinning mind. She’s not two feet from me, staring at the remains of Steve, her face paler than ever in the harsh glare of the floodlights. “Oh, God!” she repeats, like He can help in this.
“Get her the fuck away from me!” Liam rages, his teeth bared. “I swear to God, bitch, if you don’t get the hell out of my face, you’ll join your fucking husband in hell!”
Oscar stops Liam’s advance with one of his meaty hands, and I realize he’s doing the same to me with his other hand.
“You haven’t worked it out yet?” Liam screams at me. “Your head’s too full of that whore to realize that her lot have just killed one of our men!” His eyes narrow to menacing slits. “I hope she’s worth it, Red, because this is on you !”
I hear an animalistic roar as I surge forward, not realizing the noise is coming from me. I launch myself at Liam, but another pair of hands grabs me from behind.
“Calm it!”
Del’s voice is clear and calm. I didn’t see him arrive. My head pounds, and my veins jerk with adrenaline. “This was the Galvatores?” I hiss - a statement or a question, I do not know or care.
“Them or the Bristonis,” Oscar says. “The only thing the gunman shouted before he opened fire was, ‘You have one of my family and now we take one of yours’.”
I hear Arianna sobbing. She’s saying something too, but I can’t make it out. All I can hear is the jangling in my head.
This was retaliation ? Steve is dead from retaliation for something we didn’t do? Is it because I have Arianna? Or have they discovered we took Roberto’s body? The noise inside my head gets louder.
Except then I realize the noise isn’t in my head - it’s because I’m battering the hell out of the side of one of my Transit vans.
“Please get him inside,” Arianna begs.
“Being as this is your fault, why don’t you ? Part of your plan, was it? Mission fucking accomplished! ”
“No point in having a go at the girl, Liam.”
Everyone is talking, but all I hear is myself screaming about what I will do to whoever did this. The Galvatores, the Bristonis - they’re all fucking dead.
I register nothing else Arianna says, but somewhere inside me understands because I move back into my building, leaving my comrade and friend dead on the floor. There’s nothing else I can do because nothing is real.
I stare at Arianna’s small hand on my arm as the door slams behind me.
Liam is right. This woman’s presence is what’s caused one of my men to lie lifeless in the loading bay, so why have I allowed her to steer me away from the aftermath?
I might be inside now; led a way like an obedient little sheep, but that isn’t the best idea anyone’s ever had because there’s only one way I know how to deal with shit. There’s no other way to expel my rage.
Some things never change.
I wait until we draw level with my office door before I stop and turn, my eyes alight with the need to inflict punishment. I throw her grip off my arm.
“Red? Wha...?”
Her question gets cut short as I grab her around the shoulders, pull her into my office and lock the door behind me.