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His voice rang in my ears, echoing in the tiny chamber of a room.
“No,” I yelled back.
“Do it.”
I pictured Anniston’s innocent round eyes.
“Shoot the can, Chandler.” Leo’s chest heaved with every breath.
I scrubbed a hand over my eyes and down my face.
“Shoot. The. Can,” he said again.
My hand, sweaty but still, tightened around the gun. My finger poised on the trigger. Time seemed to still, and everything went silent. The ringing in my ears dulled to a whisper. I blew out a breath and fired, watching as the bullet flew through the air in seemingly slow motion. The can exploded, spewing brown liquid all over the wall and Leo’s face.
He tensed for a moment, then let out a breath. His shoulders slumped as a deep, hearty laugh filled the room. “I knew you could do it, you fucker.” He continued laughing. “I fucking knew you had balls of steel somewhere.”
“Now shoot the other can,” the man next to me said in his deep, emotionless voice.
I froze.
Leo stopped laughing.
“What the fuck did you just say?” I asked him.
“Shoot the second can.”
“No. Fuck no. That wasn’t part of the deal.” I shook my head, disbelief stealing my breath and making my throat close. “I shot the can, now get him out of the goddamn chair.”
“I’m afraid it doesn’t work that way.”
“Says who? You?” I arched a brow and waved the gun in the air. “Or the man holding the gun?”
Behind me, I heard the familiar click of a magazine being loaded into a handgun.
Leo must have heard it too. “Do it, C. If you don’t, they will, and you fucking know it.” He swallowed hard. “I’d rather it be you. Those pussies will probably miss and blow my fucking brains out.”
I’d never shed a tear a day in my miserable life, but in this moment, I found myself having to blink them away.
I shook my head. “I can’t.”
“You have to.”
I blew out a breath.
“Who gives a fuck about a pretty face, anyway. I can pull plenty of chicks with my dick.”
Leave it to this motherfucker to be thinking about pussy right now.
“You’re an asshole, you know that?”
“Yeah, so are you.” His fingers flexed against the arm of the chair as if he were bracing himself. “Pull the trigger, so I can get the fuck out of here. It smells like piss.”
I tilted my head back to stare up at the ceiling, knowing that on the other side of that concrete there was the Jesus mural, the angels, and the saints. I doubted God would ever forgive me for all the things I’d done, but I hoped Leo could. He was right about one thing. If I didn’t do it, these men would. And they wouldn’t care about where they aimed.
I lowered my head and focused on my best friend, taking in the way he looked now, committing his unmarred face to memory. “I’m so fucking sorry.” A single tear fell over my cheek as I pulled the trigger one more time.
