“Shut up, bitch!” he yelled, angling his head to look at me, but keeping the gun trained on his family. “You think you’re going to leave me after everything I’ve given you?” he shouted at Anne Marie, spittle flying from his mouth.
“M-Michael, we, uh, we…” Anne Marie was at a loss for words, paralyzed by fear.
“Michael, listen, we weren’t leaving. I was just taking Anne Marie and Noah somewhere to sleep. To let everyone calm down for the night,” I started. I held my phone against my stomach, hoping he didn’t notice it.
“You’re lying!” He turned back to me, gun and all. “You think I don’t know who the fuck you are?! I knew the day we saw you at the farmer’s market you were lying. I searched through Anne’s stuff and found this!”
He held up my business card.
“Yup! A fucking divorce lawyer. I had a buddy of mine at the police department do a little research and come to find out my fucking wife hired a divorce lawyer and had been communicating with her in the last month. You’re trying to break up my family!” He jabbed the gun at me.
My knees nearly buckled. I tried to think my way out of this. I asked for the right words to say to get the irrational man in front of me to calm down long enough for all three of us to escape. At that second, I heard a noise behind Michael and saw Anne Marie turn and run as she held Noah. Michael glanced over his shoulder, noticed what was happening, and took one last look at me before turning and chasing his wife.
“Oh, God!” I screamed when I heard the first shot. I put my phone to my ear. “Hello! Hello! Is anyone there!” My voice was foreign to me.
“Yes, ma’am. Police have been dispatched. Is he still in the room with you?” The nine-one-one operator asked. This time, my knees did buckle as I sank to the floor, finally dropping the bags I’d been holding.
“Uh, n-no. He’s chasing them.” I knew I needed to get up. To at least lock myself in the room or make a beeline for the front door, but fear gripped every part of my body, holding me in place.
“Come here, bitch!” I heard in the background.
“Nooo!” I yelled into the phone, then covered my mouth when I heard a shot. “H-he’s going to kill them; you have to hurry up!” I yelled, finally pulling myself up off the floor. I ran to the bedroom door, looked out into the hallway, and gasped when I saw blood stains on the carpet. I trembled and jumped when I heard more gunshots from downstairs. In the distance, I heard what I thought were police sirens. Everything felt like it was happening in slow motion. I took cautious strides as I followed the trail of blood down the steps.
“AHHH!” I heard a feminine scream.
I yelped and fell on the bottom step when something whizzed by me. I looked up, realizing a bullet had just pierced the wall behind me.
“This is all your fault!” I heard Michael’s voice in the living room.
Three more shots rang out, and then everything was eerily quiet. Too quiet. I shook like a leaf but still managed to pull myself up by the banister of the stairs, ignoring the trickle of blood that ran down my arm. Cautiously, I walked into the living room; my phone had long been forgotten by now.
“Oh, God!” I screamed when I saw Anne Marie lying on the floor, blood spilling out of the gaping hole in her head, a vacant look in her opened eye. Next to her lay Michael, a self-inflicted gunshot having taken off nearly the entire bottom half of his face. I flinched, covering my mouth at the grotesque sight in front of me. Bile rose up in my mouth, but I still searched for Noah, hoping that he’d been spared.
I searched the room and saw a tiny foot sticking out from behind one of the lounge chairs. I hurried over to him.
“Noah,” I called and received no answer. Although terrified of what I might find, I stepped around the couch and fell to my knees. Noah lay there, clutching his bleeding chest, gasping for air. He looked so tiny and helpless. To know a father had done this to his child…
“It’s okay,” I tried to calm him, reaching for a blanket that lay strewn over the back of the loveseat. I used it to try to stem the flow of blood from the wound. “The police are on their way. You’re going to be okay,” I repeated over and over, unsure whether it was more for my benefit or his. I grabbed a few books that sat on the coffee table to prop up under his feet, trying to stave off the shock, using what I’d been taught in my CPR certification class a few years prior.
“They’ll be here real soon. You’re going to be okay,” I kept repeating as I pressed the blanket against this chest. When he went silent, I lowered my ear to his face to see if I could feel his breathing. When I didn’t, I pinched his nose, opened his mouth and forced air into his lungs with my mouth. I kept this up until I felt a firm hand on my shoulder.
“Ma’am, we can take it from here.”
It took me a second to realize it was the paramedics trying to get me out of the way so they could do their jobs. I felt another hand on my other arm, helping me to stand.
“She’s hit too,” I heard another male voice say.
“Adult male, deceased. Adult female, deceased.”
Everything became a blur.
Chapter Twenty
Xavier
I charged through the hospital entrance, my body riddled with panic, but that came across as anger when I barked at the nurse at the desk to tell me where I could find Chanel Richards.
“Sir, do you have any relation to the patient?”
