Chapter 138 140

Chapter 138 140
Outside, my men are firing. The air tears in two, like a thunder strike, when the Albino fires his sniper rifle. Somebody screams. I just keep dragging Fergal back down the warehouse, limping, wheezing, trying not to pass out as bullets kick up stones at my feet. Eventually, I get around the side of the cover where Benjamin has dragged Hazel.

I assess her. She’s unharmed. It’s a goddamn miracle but—wait, no, there’s a bullet wound in her calf. She looks strangely at me, then at her father.

That’s when I realize that Fergal died at some point during the shooting. I lay his corpse down and roar around the edge of the barricade, “One of your Irish fucks tries to sneak up on us and I’ll kill your fucking boss! My men are coming for you! The best thing you can do now is run!”

I collapse against the metal of the industrial equipment as I try to move toward Hazel. Benjamin is propped up against it already, his chest inflating and deflating rapidly. He’s been hit in the neck and the chest.

I struggle to my feet and pull Hazel’s gag free, and then look around for a blade. I left mine out there.

“My … pocket …” Benjamin croaks. He taps it weakly. “This one.”

“Why did you do that?” I whisper, taking it one-handed, using the other to aim the gun. Any second now, the Irish could come running around the edge of the cover. How many rounds do I have left? An Eagle holds seven. How many did I fire out there? I’m not even sure.

“She’s my sister.” He smiles sadly. “I forgive you, Carlo … for what you did, I mean … you thought I was … maybe I am … I’m not right in the head … never have been ...”

I cut Hazel free just as my legs give out from underneath me. She hobbles to her feet, catching me, lowering me against the cover and taking the pistol from my hand. I shake my head, trying to tell her that the recoil will blow her arm from the socket, that she needs to sit down, she needs to rest. She’s bleeding. She’s been shot. She needs to protect our baby.

But my eyelids are getting heavy. For a second, I think I’m in the pond; everything feels liquid and insubstantial. But it’s just my blood coursing from the wounds. I need to sleep. I can’t keep fighting anymore.

“Hazel,” I whisper. “I love you. I’ve always loved you. I loved you the first time I laid my eyes on you.”

“Liar,” she teases with a shaky smile, and then winces as she falls to one knee, her leg giving out. But even that she does gracefully. It’s a flesh wound. She knows to keep her weight off it. She’s smarter than I’ve ever given her credit for. “Don’t talk like that. We’re getting out of this alive. I can hear your cavalry. Keep your eyes open. You too, Benjy.”

She doesn’t look at her father’s corpse. The shooting continues. I hear Italians yelling, and then the Irish. More bullets crack the air around us.

“All my life I wanted to feel something,” Benjamin says, oddly lucid now. “Something real. I never did. But now I do. I feel proud. Proud that you found somebody to love, sis. Proud that you’re happy. Proud that …”

And just like that, he’s gone. That’s how a man dies. Speaking one second and choking on his own blood the next. His head slumps and his chin rests on his chest.

“Benjy?” Hazel murmurs uneasily. “Benjy, wake up!”

I want to tell her it’s no use. He’s gone. But then I can’t talk anymore, either. A blank curtain falls down over this world.

When I open my eyes, I’m in a kitchen and there’s the smell of vanilla in the air. Hazel is humming something, shimmying from side to side. Each time she does it, I catch a glimpse of her pregnant belly, bulging the apron.

I sneak up behind her and kiss her neck softly, and then rest my chin on her shoulder.

“Promise you’ll never leave me,” she whispers.

“I promise,” I sigh.

And then that, too, dissolves, and I’m left with nothing but oceans and oceans of darkness.

I wake up what feels like minutes later, but must only be seconds. People are yelling on the other side of the warehouse and Hazel has leaned down to shake me.

“I promise,” I mumble, but it sounds like somebody else.

“You don’t get to die on me,” she hisses. “Do you understand? Not now, not ever. I love you. We’re going to get through this and raise this baby together. We’re going to teach it how to paint and cook and run and be strong like its father. You’re going to teach our child respect and honor and all that Family stuff you’re always blabbing about. Okay? Do you understand me? You don’t get to die.”

Crack-crack-crack, the gunfire is endless.

She glances at the edge of the cover. Tears cling to her eyelashes, but she doesn’t sob. It’s Ben, I know. I can see the conflict in her face, her desire to mourn him warring with the man he was.

“He did right in the end,” I croak. My voice is fading. There’s so much blood I can hardly believe I’m still alive. “He saved you. And he told me something. He said your dad made up those stories about him killing kids.” I wheeze. “You need to wrap that wound. Even flesh wounds can hurt.”

She touches my face. “I don’t know what to do, Carlo,” she says. “You’re bleeding so much.”

“Take care of yourself. Take care of the baby. That’s what you can do.”

“Don’t say that. You’ll be here to take care of both of us.”

I growl out a laugh. “We both know you’ve never needed anyone to take care of you, Hazel. I just want you to know, I understand why you lied. I forgive you.”

“And I forgive you for being such a jerk.”

She leans in and kisses me softly. Everything else seems far away, but not her lips. Her lips are hot and tempting and perfect and even in the midst of the craziness, I imagine us in bed together, interlocked, fusing like we were made for each other. Because we were.

“What if the Italians lose?” Hazel ponders. “What if—Ah!”

She screams as an Irishman comes running around the corner. A stocky man with a jagged tattoo of a seeping wound across his throat—no, not a tattoo. He’s bleeding and stumbling and he’s got a knife in his hand, waving it around. He makes for Hazel and I know right away what he’s planning to do: take her hostage to save his own life.

“Shoot him!” I roar. But it doesn’t come out as a roar. It’s not even a whisper, not even a sound.

I try to stand but my legs buckle beneath me. Hazel raises the gun, taking a step back.

“Don’t move,” she snaps. “Don’t come any closer. I fucking mean it!”

“What?” the Irishman gurgles. “Little princess Colleen is gonna kill a man?” He tosses the knife from hand to hand, spry despite his injuries. I try to stand up again. Again, I fail. He has a tattoo on the back of his hand that reads “hope.” There’s something deranged about that. “We all know you haven’t got that in you, princess—fuck!” He howls and collapses, writhing in agony.

“Maybe not,” Hazel says, shooting him in his other knee. I was wrong about the recoil. She handles it quite well, all things considered. “But I’m not going to let you stab me, either, you dumb motherfucker. Now drop that fucking knife.”

The man doesn’t have a choice. I smile and try to tell Hazel I’m proud of her, even if maybe that’s a fucked-up thing to say, that you’re proud of somebody for kneecapping a person. But it’s the truth. I always knew she had fire in her. I always knew it could burn as well as heal.

“Carlo!” she yells, kneeling down beside me. She grabs my face, leans down to bring her face close to mine. I feel her breath dancing over me, but her words echo dimly in my head.

This time when I pass out, I don’t wake up.