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Then he fired his weapon. A hole opened up in Kon’s forehead, a trickle of blood trailing down the bridge of his nose.
He slumped forward in the chair.
“I’ll pass,” Roman said to the empty room.
He made his way back into the hall and headed for the stairs.
He wasn’t done.
38
RUBY
She made it to the door of Roman’s bedroom before Adam, although she had no idea how close he was. She could hear him behind her, but she didn’t dare look back, didn’t dare waste a second.
She slammed the bedroom door behind her and locked it, then ran for the walk-in closet. The lock on the bedroom door was a standard interior lock: not enough to stop Adam, but enough to slow him down.
And she needed every second.
She heard the door knob rattle, followed by a kick, as she made her way to the back of the closet.
Roman’s scent filled her nose as she passed his hanging clothes. It gave her strength.
She was strong. Roman had known that — had seen it — even when she hadn’t.
Two more thuds sounded from the bedroom, but the door held and Ruby said a silent prayer of thanks to whoever had specced heavyweight doors into the loft’s construction.
She was at the door to the weapons’ room when gunfire sounded behind her.
Adam was tired of waiting. He’d blown the lock on the door.
Ruby thought of Olivia, prayed she and Vera stayed locked in her bedroom.
Prayed she would be able to save them.
Her heart hammered in her chest as she punched in the code to the weapons’ room with trembling fingers, adrenaline making her clumsy, forcing her to do it twice as she jabbed ineffectually at the keypad.
Finally it opened.
She threw herself inside just as Adam reached the door to the walk-in closet.
“Ruby!” he roared. “You know better than to hide from me.”
Something inside her shrank, her fear of him visceral and familiar, the temptation to cower, to cover her face with her arms and hands, strong.
She forced herself to keep moving, lunging for one of the handguns, the one that looked familiar, like the one she’d fired when Adam had taken her to the shooting range.
He stalked toward her, past Roman’s clothes and shoes as Ruby threw open the drawer full of ammo.
For a second, it all looked the same, her vision blurring with fear.
She breathed —I am safe in my body— forced herself to really see what was in the drawer.
She grabbed the magazine that looked right and prayed, slamming it up and into the gun and backing into the tiny room as Adam loomed in the doorway.
He smiled and her skin crawled with fear and disgust as she raised the weapon with shaking hands.
“You always were a dumb cunt,” he said. “We both know you’re not going to fire that thing. Not at me. I’m Olivia’s father.”
