Chapter 28
Andi
The man is as good as his word. No sooner does he hear me say “lemur” than he cuts off whatever he was about to bellow. He swallows, shakes his head, takes a deep breath, and says, “What do you need?”
I scan the street and parking lot and then lead the way to his car. “I just wanted to tell you about it out here, okay? Not in the lobby where anyone could hear.”
He sighs. “This is why you always look at your surroundings so carefully, isn’t it?”
“Yes and no. I’ve been doing that for years. We all have. There’s no shortage of guys who hate everyone and everything to do with the shelter.”
An old high school “friend,” when he’d learned where I work, had said, “You like to put guys in jail, huh?”
I was so shocked and pissed that I snapped, “Only the ones who beat up people they’re supposed to love.” Later I wondered what his family life had been like, for him to have had that reaction.
Kevin’s waiting for me to say more.
“This guy’s recent. He sends vaguely threatening notes in which he calls me ‘bitch’ and demands that I ‘send them home or else.’ That’s one reason I run at the high school now instead of on the street. I’m careful about not giving out my address and about making sure no one’s following me, so I’m pretty sure he doesn’t know where I live. I’ve never actually seen anyone around here either.”
“Do the police know about this?”
“Yeah. They tried to pull fingerprints off the paper but didn’t have any luck. Now I just tell them whenever I get a new one and we all try to be extra vigilant.”
“Well, have they investigated all the assholes who put your clients here?”
I shake my head. “No, for a couple of reasons. One is that we protect the identities of our clients. We never give out that information without a court order. But also, we don’t know that it is from somebody connected to one of our clients. It could be from somebody whose partner or family left them and Threat Guy mistakenly thinks they came here.”
Kevin’s frown is ferocious, his cheeks are pink, and his hands are clenched, and somehow I have zero fear that he will direct his anger and frustration toward me.
I should have tried trusting him sooner.
“Isn’t there any thing they can do?” Pretty sure he’s gritting his teeth.
“Just wait it out. Gather more information if we can. Keep on being careful. And you know, the problem might take care of itself if whoever he thinks we’re sheltering decides to go home to him. Lord knows that happens all the time.” I’d rather they not, though.
“Gahhhh! This makes me want to break things.” He throws up his hands and slumps against his car.
“Welcome to my world.” I stand on tiptoe to press a kiss to his mouth, and his arms come around me like he’s never going to let go.
And I’m tempted to stay right here for a long, long time. But. “Go on, Kev. You know all my secrets now. Fetch us some dinner and figure out whether you’ve got more questions for me, and we’ll talk about whatever you want when you get back.” I pull away so he can open his car door.
He heaves a sigh and climbs in. “Okay, but you go inside first. I’ll watch till you’re safely in the door.”
He does, too. Gives me a nod as I wave from the doorway, then he drives away.
Pattie looks up at me, wincing a little, as I pass her desk. “I’m sorry I said that. I didn’t know he didn’t know.”
I wave it off, stopping at my office threshold. “No problem. It’s probably good he does know now, so he’ll be careful too. Oh shoot, I forgot to get my phone out of the car.”
I swivel around and walk right back outside, fishing in my pocket for my keys.
Just as I expected, the phone’s in my cup holder. I grab it and am back on the sidewalk on my way inside when there’s sudden movement to my left—a man, coming from between two parked cars I just passed.
I duck away but he lunges, grabs my sweatshirt, and yanks me back toward him.
“Hello, bitch,” he singsongs, his voice oily and venomous.
He’s got the advantage of evil on his side.
But I’ve got the love of a determined grandma plus thirty years of self-defense and martial arts classes.
I let momentum carry me back and I stomp with all my weight on his instep. Shove off and spin right to clock him in the side of his head with my elbow, my other hand swinging around to grab his hair and ear and slam his face down into the knee I raise with the fury of thousands of years of women fending off men’s attacks.
Then everything turns to jerky slow motion, fragments and fleeting impressions. Blood spatters. The asshole staggers backward, I hear something like an angry bull bearing down on us, there’s a flash from near the guy’s hand, and a sound like an explosion. A ping, a soft thump. Bodies colliding, rolling and skidding past me. A pungent smell. A clatter of something metal and dense hitting the sidewalk.
And Kevin’s urgent voice. “Andi, you okay? Get the gun!”
***
Kevin
No sooner do I turn the corner than I realize there is no way I’m leaving town if Andi’s staying here with a freaking stalker on the loose. I tell my phone to call her so I can let her know I’ll be canceling both plane tickets, but the phone rings and rings until it goes to voicemail.
Oh, hell. Andi’s phone is still in her car. She’d gone back inside without it. And if she realizes that, she’ll probably go right back out for it.
And I can’t call to tell her to wait, that I’ll get it for her when I come back.
I can’t stand the thought of her going out alone, now that I know what I know. I turn the corner and circle the block. I’ll get her keys, fetch her phone myself, and then go pick up our dinner.
But as I turn onto the shelter street again, I see Andi already on the sidewalk, heading back to the front door, and a guy leap out from the parked cars to grab at her—and he’s got a fucking gun…
And I slam my gearshift into park and am out of my car running, my sneakers making hardly any sound compared to the blood rushing and pounding in my ears. I’m five steps away when she stomps his foot. Three steps away when she spins and catches him hard with her elbow—Jesus, my woman is kicking this shithead’s ass!—going into my dive as she slams his head down into her knee, and that’s when things get weird.
I don’t think the guy pointed the gun at either of us—he’s too busy trying to hold his broken face together—but it goes off with a flash and a boom! just as I hit him. It bounces toward the building while the asshole and I skid and bounce up the sidewalk away from Andi. I land on top of him, pressing his jaw into the cement with my forearm as I twist to look back at Andi to make sure she’s all right. “Andi, you okay? Get the gun!”
She’s already scrabbling for it, grim and determined, but she pauses, looking at me instead of grabbing it. She puts her foot on it, pulls her phone out of her pocket and dials. “Yes, I need an ambulance and police, right away, at the Women’s Crisis Shelter. This is Andi Salazar. There’s been a shooting on the sidewalk out front.”
The guy under me struggles feebly.
“Hold still!” I push his jaw down harder and he stops.
Then Andi’s words register and I turn back to her, frantic, my eyes scanning her up and down again, looking for any sign of injury. “Are you okay? Andi? Are you hurt?”
“I’m fine, Kev. I wasn’t hit.” She’s moving fast, yanking her sweatshirt over her head, leaving her in just her running bra, and for one ridiculous second I think she’s proving she’s okay in a way she knows I’ll especially enjoy.
But then she picks up the gun with the sweatshirt sleeve, tucks it in the back waistband of her sweatpants, and hustles over to me. I hear sirens as she kneels beside me, wads up the sweatshirt into a tight ball, and presses it hard against my inner thigh.
And it hurts like a motherfucker.
And for the first time I notice the puddle of blood under me.
“Lie down on him, babe,” she says softly, looking in my eyes. “Get your heart low to the ground.”
And I get it now. A bullet got me . And Andi’s afraid I’m going to bleed out.
Come to think of it, I’m not feeling so great. I lie across the asshole, wishing I was wearing a belt we could tie him with instead of my running clothes. Glad help is on the way, in case I pass out.
Andi elevates my leg, resting it on her thigh, applying pressure with near-inhuman strength, and murmurs something. She’s singing to me—“Cover Me Up,” a Jason Isbell song we’ve argued about—her voice sweet and rough at the same time.
Sirens scream closer and the asshole squirms again. Andi leans over him. Says conversationally, “Hold still, Asshole. Unless you want me to kill you with your own gun. No, you know what? I think I’d like that. Why don’t you try that again and give me an excuse?”
The guy freezes. Doesn’t move a muscle, even when first responders surround us and the medics slide me off of him onto a collapsible gurney. Andi waits for officers to restrain the guy and then runs to the ambulance the medics have loaded me into. “I’ll be there as soon as I can, Kev, okay? I’ll follow y’all the second the police are done with me.” She reaches out and I reach out and our fingertips brush and as the medic starts to close the doors I say, “I love you, Andi.”
But the stubborn, cautious woman doesn’t say it back. She just says, “Tell me again in a few hours.”