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I look back, flinching when a bullet sails past. “Fucking hell,” I breathe, literally running for my fucking life. And Pearl’s. As soon as I make it to her, I pull her away from the door and yank her into me a second before endless bullets sink into the metal.
“Oh my God,” she gasps, making herself small in my chest as I pick her up and run for cover. I feel a sharp pain slam into the back of my arm. For fuck’s sake. I look down, seeing Pearl’s shoulder around the same place but on the front of my body, and in a panic, I wrench her away, checking to see if the bullet exited my arm and sank itself into her shoulder.
“Pearl,” I breathe, scanning her body for blood and her face for pain.
She blinks. “You’re bleeding,” she whispers, automatically feeling at the wound.
I hiss, pain searing through me. “Yeah, gorgeous, don’t touch it.” I pull her back into my chest and look for Nolan.
And lose my breath when I see him on the ground. “No,” I whisper, looking up the alley, seeing the car practically on two wheels as it takes the corner, smoke billowing up from the tires. “Get inside.” I release Pearl and pull the door open, shoving her in. “Get Danny.”
I run over to Nolan, dropping to my knee, scanning his body that’s face first on the concrete. “Shit, no.”
19
ROSE
* * *
“Honestly,” Beau says quietly. “I’m going to kick his ass all over the house when we get home.” Her nose wrinkles. “As long as Allison’s not with him, obviously. He’s being a dick for the sake of it now. If he likes Allison, he should channel all his energy into her. I’m happy for him.”
I wriggle on my stool, wincing at the achy feeling inside. But, God, we both needed that. It was fuck each other or murder each other. “Do you really think he likes her?” I look at the lawyer a few stools down, now on her phone after excusing herself. She doesn’t seem as chirpy as she did when I got to the bar after Danny and I . . . my cheeks heat.
“Who knows what the hell that man’s thinking these days.”
“Well, she’s a nice lady,” I muse.
“And also a fucking lawyer, Rose.”
I pout. “You and I always nag him about settling down. Maybe he’s taken our advice.” I take a small sip of my wine, now that my husband has permitted Mason to serve me.
Beau hums, sounding skeptical, and I can’t really blame her. Brad’s sudden devotion to one woman is out of the blue. But Allison seems reasonable. More Brad’s age too. Yet I can’t see her fitting in—accepting this life—like Beau and I do. Still . . . “And if he wants to hook up with Allison, fine, but it doesn’t mean he has to be a dick to Pearl.”
“He’s always been a dick to Pearl,” I point out. “I think it weirds him out that Pearl saw him as a hero.” I slip down off my stool. “My husband soon fixed that when he gave her explicit details of Brad’s bad habits.”
Beau shakes her head in disappointment, turning fully toward me. “So how was dinner?”
I falter a fraction as I set my glass down. “Lovely.”
“Rose?” she says slowly. “How was dinner?”
I cringe, not only because I don’t want to admit I jumped to the wrong conclusion and completely embarrassed myself about my husband’s fidelity, but I also don’t want to tell Beau what Danny eventually confessed. How is it possible that Sandy, my son’s father, the monster who raped me, is still breathing when Danny told me he’d ended him six months ago? I can’t forget—won’t forget—that Sandy tried to kill Beau when she lay helpless in hospital after she’d been shot by her bent-cop uncle and lost her baby as a consequence. My lip wobbles, the pain I feel for my best friend as real as if I’m suffering it myself. We’ve all been through so much. Beau’s journey has been treacherous. And James’s. They’ve both only recently been freed from their many demons, and I really don’t want to be the person to tell her one is still alive. “You should talk to James.”
Her eyes widen. “Don’t make me tell your husband that you’re hiding a razor behind the toilet.”
My mouth falls open. “You wouldn’t.”
She snorts, looking over to the table. “Hey, Danny.”
“Beau!” I hiss, outraged. “You call yourself a friend?”
“And you do?”
I scowl at her. “Fine.” God damn it. “Sandy’s not dead.”
“Oh.”
“Oh?” I parrot, studying her, seeing her obviously contemplating something. “That’s all you’ve got to say? Oh?” Is she high?
