2. Diego
DIEGO
The second man crumples to the ground instantly, and silence comes when the dying man I shot in the throat succumbs to his injuries.
I sit there, frozen.
I shot him.
I shot them both.
Out of fear for my life. That’s okay, right? That’ll stand up in court, won’t it?
My brief wobble about prison vanishes from my mind as the woman on the ground coughs and chokes. I drop the gun, scramble to my feet, and sprint toward her, then crash down to my knees when I land next to her.
“Oh, my God.” Her face is bruised and covered in blood, her hair turning dark from being soaked in it, and each blink is sluggish enough that fear enters my heart. “C-Can you hear me?”
I need to call an ambulance. The cops. Someone.
“Shit, where’s my phone? Fuck, don’t worry, okay?
I’m gonna call for help. I’m gonna call the police, okay?
You just stay!” Scared to touch her, my hands hover over her bloodstained clothes for a few seconds.
Then I turn on the spot and glance around at the carnage, praying my phone somehow ended up on the road with us.
Just as I move away, her warm hand seals around my wrist with surprising strength, given the weak nature of her body. “N-N-No…”
“No?” I turn back and my heart begins to race. “You need a doctor. A hospital. You need help. Real help!”
“No!” Panic surges through her voice and her eyes widen. “N-No cops,” she gasps. “C-can’t trust—can’t—not th-them, please.”
No cops? The pain barely hides the sheer panic in her voice and something cold crawls down my spine. I glance at the two bodies spread out on the road.
Were they cops?
Did I shoot cops?
But what kind of cops would beat a woman like this? Or run me off the road?
“O-Okay.” I breathe deeply, fighting to calm my racing heart. “No cops. But I have to call an ambulance!”
“W-W-W—” The word catches and her eyes close, then her grip on my wrist tightens and she forces her eyes wide again, wild like a rabbit caught in a wire. “We… will…” She gurgles, and blood dots the corner of her mouth. “We… die… no c-cops… no one b-but… soo—”
Her eyes flutter and she gazes up at me as if trying to pass something to me through the power of her look alone, then her eyes flutter and her grip fades. She slumps down against the ground, still and silent.
“Ma’am?”
No response.
“Hey! Hey, it’s probably not a good idea for you to sleep right now!
Hey!” I shake her shoulder as much as I dare and pat her cheek until my fingers are sticky with blood, but she doesn’t wake.
She doesn’t even make a sound. She just lies there, pale and drenched in blood that continues to weep from various wounds across her body.
The gash to her head is deep enough that she needs to go to a hospital.
But she was scared.
Scared enough to get into a stranger’s car and threaten them. Scared enough to make sure I don’t take her to places of help. What the hell is she running from?
“No cops,” I murmur to myself, shaking my head. “No cops and no hospital. Shit. Shit. Fucking shit, shit!”
This is insane. Insane.
Slowly, I climb to my feet and wince as pain pulls tight across my chest. My car remains a wreck. Carnage stretches across from one side of the road to the other, all illuminated by the lights of the pursuing car. It’s a stroke of sheer luck that no one else has driven along this road yet.
What the hell do I do?
Every thought, every idea, every possible plan ends with the very real conclusion that I am not equipped to deal with any of this, but those bastards tried to run me off the road, they nearly beat the shit out of me, and now it sounds like any authority I contact will hand this poor woman right back into the hands she’s trying to escape.
Trusting her likely isn’t the smartest idea, either, but out of the three bodies on the ground, she’s the only one capable of giving me answers.
My internal debate ends.
It doesn’t take long to find the car keys in the pocket of the man I shot in the neck.
Murmuring a weak apology to him as I steal them, I then gather the unconscious woman in my arms and place her in the large SUV.
After retrieving my phone from the remains of my own car, I climb into the SUV and start driving.
It doesn’t take long for the roads to become familiar again and I’m pulling up outside my apartment within thirty minutes of leaving the crime scene.
Fuck, it’s a crime scene.
I murdered people.
What are the chances I’ve just helped some escaped serial killer?
Or worse, some truly God-awful criminal who will cut my throat the second she’s back on her feet?
Hard to imagine her like that while she’s unconscious in my arms, but as I carry her into my apartment, it’s difficult to control those thoughts.
Am I doing the right thing?
I really should call the cops.
Placing her on my bed, I return to the stolen car and drive it a few miles from my apartment, then leave it with the keys inside and walk away. If anyone traces that car, they won’t find it outside my building, and the walk back to my apartment gives me time to decide what to do.
If I get back there and she’s dead, I’m calling the cops. If she’s alive, then I’m calling an ambulance and then the cops. I’ll tell them she threatened my life, held me at gunpoint, and I only killed those two men in self-defense.
I’m sure the words of an ex-addict will be treated as gospel.
My heart’s calmer and my thoughts less tangled by the time I let myself back into my apartment and am greeted by utter silence. No signs of life, no woman waiting behind the door to attack me.
She’s exactly where I left her on my bed, splayed in the same position she landed and completely out cold. But alive, thankfully, and relief blooms in my chest as the soft touch of air from her nose tickles the back of my wrist.
Definitely alive.
“Okay,” I murmur to myself. “It’s not the first time you’ve had to patch someone up. It’s fine.”
It’s fine.
I repeat it like a mantra in my mind while seeking out my stashed medical kit from the kitchen and set to work.
The last person I patched up was Tech after he met the unfriendly side of a knife, and before that, it was Trudy from the bar when a glass shattered in her hand. Before that… it was mostly myself.
Can’t afford drugs if I have to waste the money on medical bills.
But I’ve never seen anything like this.
The deep gash on her forehead leading up into her hair takes my immediate attention.
It’s not deep enough that bone is visible, but it’s enough that my heart pounds and my fingers tremble as I do my best to clean the area, pull skin together with multiple butterfly stitches, and tape it down with gauze.
She needs a real doctor, but every time I think about calling 911, her panicked words ring in my ears.
“Okay,” I breathe out, half wishing she would wake up before the next stage.
She doesn’t.
This woman is beaten to hell. Her blood-soaked T-shirt almost falls apart in my hands when I cut it off, and the bruises beneath are enough to turn my stomach.
Some are fresh and others slightly yellow from age, but all of them cluster around her gut.
I wash her with warm water and a sponge, then spend twenty minutes tending to all the small scratches, lacerations, and cuts over her body and arms. Burn marks litter one shoulder and deep gouges at least a few days old tear down her back, and they weep as I clean them and stitch them the best I can.
More bruises litter her hips and thighs with some very clear handprints that make my blood run cold.
The more I tend to her, the more I lose all understanding of what could have happened to her.
This doesn’t look like any beating I’ve ever seen, nor does it look like someone who escaped from the police.
Her fear of the authorities suggests they’re the culprit, but if I didn’t know any better, I’d say she’d been tortured.
The sun peeks through the curtains by the time I’ve stitched up every wound, cleaned every scratch, covered every laceration, and gently manhandled her into one of my old T-shirts.
Her underwear remains untouched, but that doesn’t mean she’ll take kindly to my removing the rest of her clothes when she wakes up.
If she wakes up.
What do I do if she doesn’t?
If she’s unconscious forever, how long do I care for her before I cave and call the police?
Exhaustion weighs me down all the way to the bathroom where I tear off my blood-stained T-shirt and gaze blearily at my bruised body in the mirror.
That seatbelt mark is gonna bruise badly, and that fucker who kicked me?
Bastard must have had steel-toed boots because I’ve taken beatings before, and none have been like that.
“What the fuck,” I murmur, turning on the tap and running my hands under the lukewarm water. The pipes shudder in the wall and cold follows, then more warmth and finally, hot.
I stare down. Blood stains my palms, catches in the wrinkles of my knuckles, and splashes up my wrist where her hand gripped me so tightly for a woman so injured.
An imprint of her fear.
Turning my hands under the spray, I slowly coax my thumb over my palm and begin washing the blood away.
Water trickles and blood dissolves, fading from my palms and wrists, but it’s more stubborn around my knuckles.
I press harder and harder, rubbing my hands together and glaring down at the stubborn streaks refusing to leave.
Suddenly, I’m fifteen again and it’s my brother’s blood I can’t wash off. A stain that remained on my skin for months after his death and no amount of washing could ever remove it. Nothing could.
Except drugs.
Drugs remove everything bad and replace it with their own, but even the downsides are better than real life because none of it is personal.
None of it hurts.
Maybe I should call Tech.
That thought plagues me as her blood finally fades from my skin and the water runs clear.
If I wake up tomorrow with the cops on my doorstep and a dead body in my bed, will it have been worth it?
I’m so out of my depth here that I can’t answer my own question, so I slink off to the living room and ease myself down onto the couch.
One hour. I’ll give her one hour to wake up and then I’m calling the cops. Whatever explanation there is for her fear and actions, I can’t handle it on my own. I’m just a guy. She’s a stranger, and they’ll know what to do.
That hour never comes because I’m asleep within minutes. Exhaustion from my busy day and the fading adrenaline in my system pull me into a sleep so deep that I sag back against the cushions, mouth open and body finally relaxed.
Gunshots echo in my dream. Dying gurgles of strange men, screams of terrified women, and anger.
Rage toward me for killing those men and kidnapping that woman.
The slam of the jail cell behind me jolts me from my sleep, and I bolt upright.
The world blurs while I try to focus and my breath catches in my throat as my dry tongue sticks to my dry mouth.
Fuck.
Pain radiates through my torso like a fever, and I grunt softly, rubbing my eyes.
Shit.
Didn’t mean to fall asleep. I was supposed to…
Another crash echoes through my apartment, and all lingering sleep vanishes as if I’ve just been doused in cold water.
That came from the bedroom.
Is she awake?