Chapter 11 #2
We sat in silence for several seconds. The awkwardness elevated with each moment that passed. Finally, we both burst out laughing.
“This is weird, right?” Nico asked, still laughing.
“So weird,” I agreed.
“Look, this isn’t how I pictured my life going, either, but like I said, I’m not going to push you into anything.”
“I know. It’s a lot to work through.”
“My first priority is to keep you safe. Find answers and try to get your life back to normal. Well, as normal as it can be. Maybe it’s all just a really big misunderstanding. I don’t think it is, but I’m going to do everything I can to figure this out. I want you to be able to sleep easy at night.”
His words dripped through my mind, gentle and kind.
It made me all warm and fuzzy inside. It wasn’t helping with the thoughts I was having about him.
I stared at my fingers for a few seconds, trying to think of what to say.
At last, I found the courage to look up to speak, but the words died on my lips.
Nico’s brows were knit into a deep frown, and his body had gone stiff. He glanced around the diner. I could tell there was something wrong by the way he was holding himself.
“What’s wrong?” I whispered.
“We’re being watched.”
An icy finger of fear stabbed into my chest. “What? How can you tell?”
“Instinct. Something feels…off. I can sense eyes on us. Like we’re being watched.”
Nico pulled his cell phone out and put it on the table. He flipped through the numbers until he got to Sebastian’s name. He called him, all the while glancing around the diner.
“Bro, I’m not even home yet. What do you need?” Sebastian answered.
“There’s eyes on us. I think someone followed me and Maddy to Gena’s Diner.”
“What? Are you sure?”
“Almost a hundred percent. Get down here. Luis is in Tampa. Call Felipe and tell him to get here. Move it.”
“Okay, okay, I’m on it. Be right there.”
“What are we gonna do?” I asked, my voice quavering. Memories of the attack flashed through my mind.
Nico reached across the table and laid a hand on my wrist. “Maddy, it’s gonna be okay. We—”
He clamped his hand around my wrist like a steel vise.
Before I could wince or tell him it hurt, he yanked on my arm, pulling me down at the same instant that the window beside us shattered.
The world around us exploded into movement.
The few patrons who’d been in the diner with us started screaming.
The waitress and cooks were yelling at each other to call 911.
More gunshots rang out in the early morning darkness.
I lay on the floor of the restaurant and watched a coffee mug burst into a thousand pieces, then the cash register shattered as three bullets slammed into it.
Nico was on top of me, shielding my body from falling glass and porcelain.
Once there was a break in the gunfire, he took my hand and we ran to the kitchen, staying as low as we could, basically running at a crouch.
I heard a cook screaming into a cell phone as we made our way toward the back door.
Nico opened the door and leaned out, checking the parking lot.
I could hear squealing tires from the front of the diner, followed by the screaming roar of an engine.
“I think they’re gone, but let’s be careful,” Nico said, helping me down the back steps.
By the time we got to the asphalt of the parking lot, my Jeep came tearing down the road at a solid hundred miles an hour. Sebastian had taken it home since I was riding with Nico. Any other time I’d have been pissed to see him driving it like that, but the moment, I’d never been happier to see it.
The tires screeched as it slowed and pulled into the lot. Sebastian threw it into park and jumped out of the cab. The jovial, happy-go-lucky guy was gone now. Sebastian had turned into a monster, angry and ready to kill. He ran to us, a scowl on his face.
“What the fuck happened?” he asked through clenched teeth.
“We were being watched,” Nico said.
I heard sirens wailing in the distance.
“I passed a car driving like a bat out of hell on the way here. It must have been them. Big black SUV,” Sebastian said.
“Probably,” Nicol said. “I don’t know where they were hiding. Once I saw the red laser dot on Maddy’s temple, I yanked her ass to the ground.”
What? My hand went to my mouth as I realized why he’d almost pulled my arm out of its socket.
A laser sight? On my head? I remembered the bursting window and realized I’d been less than a second from dying.
Again. I imagined my brains splattered all over the diner, and I started to shiver uncontrollably.
Nico led me to the Jeep and got me into the passenger seat.
He cupped my cheeks in his palms and forced me to look into his eyes.
“Hey, it’s okay. You’re safe now. I promised I’d keep you safe, and I will.
I need to go hunt these assholes down, or try to.
Sebastian will take you home and stay with you. ”
I nodded in response, unable to talk. My body was quivering so much that I couldn’t even control it.
If this kept up, I was certain I would shake apart.
Nico pressed his forehead to mine, and almost instantly, I could feel a calming energy seep out of his skin and into mine.
My heart rate slowed, and I was finally able to control my body better.
“How are your wounds?” Nico asked.
My sides were sore, but not painful. “Fine. I didn’t rip out the stitches or anything.”
“Good,” he whispered and kissed my forehead. “I’ll be home as soon as I can.”
As he finished saying that, a truck came flying into the parking lot. I glanced up and saw Felipe behind the steering wheel. He leaned out the window. “What’s the word?”
“We need to track down the guys who tried to kill us,” Nico called over his shoulder.
Felipe’s face went dark. “Son of a bitch,” he hissed and pounded a fist into his truck’s door.
Nico turned to join him, and I stretched out a hand. “Nico?” I called.
He slid to a stop and turned back to me. “Yeah?”
“Be careful.”
He grinned. “Always.”
Without another word, he jumped into Felipe’s truck and they took off into the night. They headed down the highway, going the direction Sebastian had come from.
I leaned back in the Jeep’s seat, my skin feeling hot and clammy. Sebastian came around to my side. “Maddy? Are you good? You don’t—”
He jumped out of the way as I leaned out of the Jeep and retched.
The fear and panic of the last few minutes had caught up to me.
I gagged and vomited all over the pavement.
Finally, when what little was in my stomach had been expelled, I relaxed back into my seat.
The night felt ominous and full of horror.
Relief washed over me as Sebastian drove away from the diner. I fell into an exhausted sleep before we made it home.