Page 95 of Unruly

“Bye, baby.” Then, Cross thought to add, “Miguel, have Catherine call me as soon as she can.”

“Will do, Cross. Later.”

The FaceTime call blinked off, and Cross shut down the iPad. He headed for the kitchen to get a pot of coffee ready for when his mother and sister arrived. He didn’t even bother to look away from the slowly filling carafe as he heard a car pull into the driveway of the home.

Maybe he should have.

Brrrraaaaaappp.

Cross hit the floor as glass shattered. Hot coffee went flying as the carafe exploded. Bullets embedded into the cupboards above his head.

Repeated, fast pops from an automatic assault rifle kept ripping through the now broken windows at the front of his home. He kept low, and moved to a safe spot while the bullets kept coming. Hidden behind the kitchen island.

It had a special feature on the backside—a one-inch thick piece of metal that covered the entire back of the island, but was beneath the wood where it couldn’t be seen.

Another round of bullets ripped through the kitchen, and cold March air blew in right behind it. Cross really wished he had been in the living room where he had a fucking AK hidden up under the couch.

Then, all at once, the firing stopped.

A cupboard door fell down.

Tires screeched.

Cross didn’t move a fucking inch. He trusted nothing, not even his instinct to get up and run. Moving from his one safe position might mean his death. Silence echoed minutes after the bullets stopped coming. He could plainly hear people outside his house, the voices of his neighbors filtering in.

Then, a car, and another familiar pair of voices.

His mother and sister.

“Oh, my God!”

“Cross. Cross!”

He forced himself up off the floor, and headed for the front of the house. Even the windows of the front door had been blown out in the attack.

Catherine was not going to be happy about this.

Cross opened the front door to find his mother and sister parked in the driveway, and standing beside Emma’s black Mercedes. They looked as though they had just gotten out of their car.

Instantly, his mother burst into tears at the sight of him standing there. Camilla—the first time she had been back to New York since shortly before Christmas—let out a shaky breath before she too started crying.

“I’m okay,” he said.

They didn’t look like they believed him.

Really, he didn’t trust himself in that moment.

Something on the front door caught his eye because it flapped in the wind. He ripped the piece of paper off the door, and turned it around to see the image printed on the backside.

Black and white.

Dated and timestamped.

His wife and daughter.

In Mexico, by the looks of the ice-cream sign behind them written in Spanish.

Fuck.