Chapter 43 #2
I shook my head back and forth as I swallowed the fear that was bubbling up inside me. My hands were shaking, but my gaze remained steady on her. “I think you should go.”
Her laugh turned into a cackle. She even set down her gun to hold her stomach and laugh a full belly laugh.
“You’re so fucking weak. I can’t believe he fell for you, of all people. A woman who would never be ready to stand by his side. Or to be a mother to Franny. You’d never ever be ready for that or shooting me, you stupid little darling bitch.”
“Just go.” The ringing in my ears was getting louder. I didn’t want to do it, didn’t want to take her life.
“No. You’re not ready, Mia. But I am. I always have been.
I can be ready to fuck my husband and another man in one night for the good of my life.
Mine.” She barred her teeth aggressively now.
“And I’ll be ready to hand my child over too.
” She grabbed her gun. “I’m ready to hand her over and kill you, because I don’t give a fuck if she’s my daughter or”—she began to lift her arm to point the gun at me—“you’re the love of my husband’s life—”
I pulled the trigger. One shot. Loud. Lethal.
The gun had been loaded. Ready for me too.
“You’re wrong, Alexandra. I’m more than ready to protect my family.”
The ringing stopped. And so did that woman’s heart.
I sat there with that gun in my hand for seconds. Minutes. Maybe hours.
Her blood spread across the marble flooring, turning it red where it used to be white.
I heard his voice from what felt like a mile away.
Jameson Knight had finally been let into the hotel, it seemed. When I looked up at him, he appeared concerned, his five-o’clock shadow much darker, the shadows under his eyes more pronounced. My enigma of a man looked like he’d been put through hell since I’d last seen him.
Better than me, though, seeing as how I was soaked in blood in plant pajamas. “It was her,” I told him, but my voice didn’t really carry. It echoed around me over and over. “It was her, it was her. I swear it was her. Your wife … she’s the one who came after us at the academy.”
Jameson almost flinched at the conclusion, but then he said cautiously, “Darling Mia, I’m sorry, baby. I’m so sorry.”
He did sound sorry, but I wasn’t sure what for at the moment. I lifted the gun and turned it in my hands. “Sorry for what?”
“For not getting here faster.” His breath seemed to be shaking. “For her getting out and to you. For her planning a damn shooting at the school you worked at. For you thinking I didn’t trust you—”
“Don’t be.” I shook my head. “You know, I didn’t know if this thing would work. If I would do it right. But I shot her straight in the heart just fine. She maybe wasn’t even going to shoot me. I really don’t know.”
“She would have. She was … She killed a cop already today. It’s okay,” he said again, like that would make it all better. “You can put the gun down, Mia.”
It shook in my hand as I stared at the black metal. “I shot her, and I’d do it again.”
“Mia.” He breathed my name, and hearing his voice alone consoled me. It shouldn’t have. Not like this. Not here, kneeling in blood.
I closed my eyes and let one tear fall. “Can you save her?”
“Oh, baby, even if I could, I wouldn’t.” He took one step closer. “It’s going to be okay, Darling. I promise.”
“Heart-in-pinkie promise?” I whispered to him what his daughter would normally ask me.
He murmured, “Heart-in-pinkie promise.”
“How can I believe you?” I touched the red liquid and then smeared it back and forth over my fingertips. “I’m worse than you. I killed her mother. Franny’s mom.”
“Goddamn it.” He moved to come to me, but I raised the gun at him. His men standing behind him raised theirs at me.
He didn’t even defend himself but rather turned to them and said, “You harm her in any way, I will not only kill you but your whole fucking family.”
Weapons were lowered and holstered. All but mine. “You warn them for me, but don’t warn me for yourself?”
“Darling Mia. Remember when you said you believed me. That you knew I wouldn’t do anything to hurt Franny.
I believe the same for you. You’re our darling.
My darling. My daughter’s darling, baby.
You didn’t kill her mother because that woman wasn’t a mother to her.
You were. You are. You always have been. ”
“How will you tell her …” I choked on the idea.
“We will figure that out together. Let them clean this up and come home. You’ve done the job you needed to do.”
The second tear fell then. “I killed her. She threatened to sell her, Jameson. She wanted more partnerships for her company, and I couldn’t … I didn’t know what else to do.”
“Sometimes doing what’s right feels like the hardest thing to do. You did what I couldn’t, love. You did what had to be done.”
“Why aren’t you screaming and turning me into the authorities?”
“Because you’re a Diamond now, Mia. We do what has to be done, and it might be behind closed doors, but we’re proud. Be proud you saved our girl.”
“I only work for—”
“You’re about to marry into that role. They won’t lock you up. You’re my Sanctum too. Completely and utterly untouchable.”
“Why would you make me that?”
“Because even if you weren’t ready to love me, I was ready to love you enough for the both of us.”
With that, he wrapped me in his arms and carried me to the SUV.
He carried me back to Paradise Grove.
He carried me home.