B R E N

There wasn't time to stop it.

Just like that night with my mom, there wasn't anything I could do.

The bullet left the gun before my feet had the chance to move.

My mom had collapsed to the floor.

Now it was my turn.

The only thing I could do was flinch. In that millisecond before the bullet hit me, I tried to escape it. For some reason, I actually fucking tried.

I ended up on the floor. Just like I had known I would. I wasn't even sure if the bullet knocked me down or if I threw my body to the ground myself. But now blood was hitting the dirty, wooden slats. That spilling, seeping blood. Out of the corner of my blurry vision, I saw it.

There was screaming.

When my mom had died, it had been my voice ricocheting off the walls. A sixteen-year-old boy, shrieking like a small child. Drowning like a victim, yet still left alive to breathe in the cold water.

Now, Madie screamed.

Pain radiated down from my shoulder, spreading throughout my chest. If this was dying, it was going far too slow. I lifted my hand to my shoulder, trying to find where the blood was coming from, tracing the source of the pain. It wasn't enough blood. It wasn't enough blood for dying.

I felt the open wound, hissing as it throbbed beneath my fingers. The cut skimmed across the surface of my skin, my shirt ripped from where the bullet must have grazed me.

I groaned and lifted my head.

"Bren!" Madie shrieked, flailing as she strained against Quinton, her face turning the deepest shades of fire.

"Oh, fuck," Quinton said. He lifted an unsteady hand to his face. It was the one with the gun, the gun that had just unloaded on me. But then Quinton shook his head, running that hand over the sweat on his forehead. "Thank fucking god."

He dropped the gun. His face twisted in hatred. But it was a different kind of hate than what had been there two minutes ago. It was deep, dark, self-loathing. "I couldn't—I fucking couldn't—."

It was almost like he was apologizing for not killing me.

Without warning, he released Madie, his other arm swinging to his side. She collapsed to the floor, her knees hitting the ground first. But it only took her a moment to recover from the sudden fall. Her head whipped up; her eyes found mine.

"Madie," I croaked. I started to reach out for her, wincing and swearing beneath my breath from the pain. And then she was in my arms.

Hell, she was in my arms. And I was alive, actually alive.

"I'm okay," I said as her shaky hands began to flit over me. How? How was I okay?

Gritting my teeth, I pushed myself up to lean against the wall. I kept a bloody hand on my shoulder as if that would actually help to stop the pain.

I wasn't supposed to be alive. But I couldn't think about that now.

Madie was sobbing, but she listened to me when I urged her to move to the side. I helped give her a little push as she scooted behind the legs of the pool table. Quinton was still standing there, looking bereft. And I didn't trust him for a second.

Suddenly I heard people. There were other people here. I'd forgotten. Or had they left for a time? I had no fucking clue, but someone snatched Quinton's gun from the floor. They were saying things to him, saying things to us. But my attention was only for Madie.

I leaned toward her, cupping that pretty face with my non-bloodied hand so I could tilt it upward. "Shh, look at me." She stilled, but barely. Her watery eyes had truly become the sea. I trailed my fingers down her throat, over the red, slightly swollen skin. "Are you hurt?"

She shook her head, strawberry hair being thrown everywhere. Madie's eyes zeroed in on my shoulder before she began to search the area with a frantic, shifty gaze. She started to rise. "Madie," I said, catching her wrist before she stood up. I couldn't bear to see her walk away right now. I needed her next to me. I needed her. "It's okay. I'm okay."

It was hard to tell through all the blood, but I was pretty sure it was just a graze. A deep graze, maybe, but still.

And now it was time to get the hell out of here so we could escape Quinton Reid once and for all.

But by the time I looked up, police were surrounding Quinton, onlookers pointing to him as cops streamed into the building. And then Madie and I were being surrounded, too. Uniformed workers flocked to us, coming to look at my wound, coming to take my pulse. Evidence that I was still alive, that I hadn't died. I shrugged them off at first. It was just a flesh wound. A flesh wound that had somehow struck my heart.

But Madie was shaking, and Madie was telling me to stop so they could do their job. And so I listened. Because I would do anything for Madie fucking Lenertz.

Maybe even live.

The paramedics wheeled me out to the ambulance even though my legs worked just freaking fine. They cleaned the wound and bandaged it. They told me I should probably go to the hospital, that it probably need stitches.

I wasn't going to the hospital.

They'd covered Madie in one of those itchy-looking grey blankets, hoping to cease her shivering and shaking. And all I could think about was how I was going to watch Quinton drive away in that goddamn squad car and then take my girl home. I wasn't going to the hospital, not tonight anyway.

Quinton had been sitting in the back of the squad for a while. I wished I knew what they were waiting for and why he hadn't been towed to jail yet. I could barely see his face from the night's shadows that enshrouded him. But I knew he was there. The second they finished taking our statements and the paramedics said I was good to go, I started walking toward him.

Another officer had just strode toward the car, too. He leaned against the driver's door, talking in clipped tones with the guy behind the wheel. The driver nodded, and then the window rolled up; they were about to pull away.

But I needed to take this chance, this opportunity.

"Bren?" I heard Madie calling after me. "Bren, stop."

"Just give me one minute," I bit out.

"No!" she cried, and I stopped to look over my shoulder at her. The terror on her face made me turn around completely.

I swore and closed the distance between us, pressing my forehead to hers. "One minute. That's all, baby. And then I promise I'll take you home. We'll get out of here. It'll all be over."

"You need to go to the hospit—"

"I'm fine, Madie. We're going to go home. Just let me do this."

"You were shot, Bren," she breathed lowly, before biting down on her trembling lip. 

"Madie." Her name was spoken as a plea, and I hoped she understood.

She seized my arm, her fingers digging into my bicep. "I'm coming with you then."

I sucked in a breath. I didn't want to leave her alone right now, but I also wanted her as far away from Quinton as possible. There was no way that Madie was going to let go of me, though, and suddenly there was no way I was going to walk away without saying my piece—what I had held back from saying when he'd held a gun to my face.

Spinning around, I ran straight into the quick-talking officer. "Sir, please take a step back from the car."

"Just let me talk to him." My voice was nearly unrecognizable, deep, and scratchy. Madie's grip tightened on me.

"Sir—"

"I'll stay right here, I swear." I made a point of planting my feet on the tar of the parking lot. We were at least ten feet from the squad, and Quinton's eyes blinked at me through the window. I wrapped my arm around Madie's form, pushing her back behind me. "Just let me talk to him."

The officer sighed, not leaving his position as my barrier while he twisted and motioned to the driver of the squad. The car had begun to roll, but it stopped at the officer's hand. The cop behind the wheel flashed a skeptical look but cracked the back window, just barely.

"Quinton," I snapped.

He didn't say anything. His devilish blue eyes were pinned on me, though. "Just for the record, I fucking hate you, too." There wasn't a lot of time; cutting straight to the chase seemed like the right move. "But you know what? My dad was also an abusive asshole. And you don't have to become it." 

He closed his eyes, a rueful blink. Tears covered his face, a shiny mask that was doing nothing to deceive me. "I already have."

It was hard to argue with that. But there was a part of Quinton's pain that was inside me, too. So I sighed.

"Would your dad have killed me?" I asked, practically yelling across the space.

His gaze flashed, opening again.

"Would your dad have hit me in the chest instead of wavering his aim at the last minute? I might have flinched, but you didn't aim true."

Quinton didn't answer. Instead, he screwed his face up and asked, "How? How did you..." He stopped, shaking his head. "...not become it."

It was hard to hear him, the window still a barrier between us. But I knew what remorse after abuse sounded like. It was here now, in Quinton's tone. That didn't mean it would stay.

I shrugged. "I swore I would never become the thing that destroyed me. And I fucking keep my promises." I swallowed hard. My throat was still dry. I needed a goddamn drink. "And Quinton?"

"Yeah?"

"I promise that you ever so much as try to talk to Madie, I will come after you. I swear to god. Don't you even fucking look at her again. You can blackmail me all you want. But she's not your girl."

The cop cut me off then, mumbling something about how that was enough, gently pushing back. But Madie took the opportunity to slip out from behind me. She stepped in front of the officer and me.

"I tried," she said, avoiding me as I tried to reach for her. "I tried to love you enough, Quinton."

Madie stood there before me, wrapped in her blanket, sucking in a shaky breath. And I hung back, watching. It killed me to see her so vulnerable. But I had to let her say her piece, too.

Somehow her voice had a quiet strength when she said, "It wouldn't ever have been enough. It will never be enough, Quinton, until you figure out how to love yourself and try...try to make yourself someone that people can love. I can't believe who you've become. I can't believe you almost...." Her voice wobbled, and she broke away.

"Madie..." he called, but she was already walking away. She grabbed my hand, and we were out of there. Madie mutely handed the blanket off to a passing man in uniform, and the two of us strode quickly to my car.

Her tears grew silent as I drove us home with one arm, trying not to move the other one too much. I kept my other hand on her leg, rubbing it, attempting to keep her calm until we got back to the beach house. "Everything is okay now, baby," I murmured. Who knew how many times I murmured that.

I wasn't really sure if everything was okay. But I needed her to believe it.

Parking the car in the driveway, I let Madie get out before I flicked open the glove box. Under a pile of papers, I found what I was looking for. My fingers wrapped around the cold metal of the gun, finding solace in something solid, something that would be better than merely flinching. Because I didn't trust Quinton Reid's weaselly, manipulative ass for one single moment.

Madie gasped. Moonlight shone over her shocked face. "Have you had that this whole time?"

"Yeah," I muttered, getting out of the car and tucking the gun into the waistband of my pants. I walked over to her, wrapping her under my good shoulder as we made our way to the front door.

"But...why? Because of Quinton?"

"Partly." I should have brought it in with me tonight. I should have been carrying it everywhere we went. What if Quinton had pointed his gun at her instead? I had gotten too complacent in thinking we were safe. I gritted my teeth before admitting, "I've had this gun since the moment I was legally allowed to buy it." Madie gave me a sharp glance, and I pushed the next words out through a grimace. "In case my dad came back to kill me."

"What do you mean? Your dad...your dad is dead, Bren."

"Dead to me," I said, kicking in the door of the house after I unlocked it, not wanting to keep my hands off her for longer than I needed to. "For the last three years, he's been dead to me. I watched him die that night, vanish from my life. I haven't had a dad since the moment he killed my mom."

I paused, sighing raggedly. "But he's actually really fucking alive."

🖤
Okay, I lied. There's one more chapter after this, and it is already up. I figured I have tortured you all enough. And the chapters are super connected.

I DIDN'T KILL BREN

xoxoxoxoxo