It wasn’t lost on me how the roles had reversed. Now he was the one on his knees before me.
And just as he had shown me no mercy for my soul, I would not either.
“For what you did to me.”
I pulled the trigger.
His head exploded. His body collapsed to the ground. Blood splattered over me.
And it was over.
I’d killed my rapist.
I’d killed the Bandits.
It was over.
And…
I collapsed to the ground, utterly exhausted and shaken. It was over. It was really over.
“You OK?” the Reaper said.
I looked up at him, but I didn’t have the strength to say anything. I didn’t…I couldn’t really feel anything. I hadn’t actually imagined a moment like this much because I’d always thought it would be the then-Bernard Boys, now Black Reapers, who would end this.
And yet, I’d gotten to do it.
Not just for me, but for God knows how many women he’d raped through the years. It was sickening to think about, and yet the antidote was to think about how that would never happen again. He would not rape or harm anyone else ever again.
“Rachel!”
I heard Brock’s voice. He sprinted into the room, gun cocked. But he lowered it quickly when he saw everything.
“Holy…”
He couldn’t even get the second word out. He just gawked at everything that had happened, stunned as I was. I’d never seen him so speechless in his life.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity of silence but was probably only about ten seconds, Brock swallowed and gathered himself.
“We need to get out of here,” he said. “Bandits are dead, but cops and others will be here within the next ten minutes. We need to go.”
“What about him?” I said, nodding to Mason.
“I’ve got him,” the black man said. “I’ll make sure he gets proper care.”
“Thanks, Axle,” Brock said. “Rachel? I’ll take you home.”
I nodded, grimacing in pain. I didn’t like the idea of riding on Brock’s bike, not when I’d told Mason that I couldn’t ride on his. But this wasn’t the time to be holding on to ideals, just practical decisions. I needed to get out of here.
“Wherever you’re getting treatment, I need to go there too,” I said. “Asshole shot me in the foot.”
“We can do that, but I’d prefer not to get you to the hospital right now if you’re not dying,” Brock said, “since the hospital will be swarming with Bandit survivors and officials.”
I grimaced. I wasn’t dying. Just in pain. It seemed to go against every rule in the book to not go seek medical attention, but I trusted Brock. I nodded, rose, and hobbled over to him.
“Let’s go home.”
* * *
