Maybe some would suggest I weigh my options longer, utilize every second available, search for a stalling tactic. Make damn sure that I’m not about to lodge a bullet in the wrong person. But that’s not me.
I fucking leap.
Within the span of one solitary chord of freedom—a single black grain—I cock my gun and shout my one-sentence declaration, four words that will only resonate with the men in the pews.
“I smell kettle corn.”
TY
Aim. Fire.
Crack. Crack. Crack. Crack.
Not one, but four shots. They strike so swiftly that Balzano never sees them coming, his body jolting from the force.
She fucking did it. My heart swells and shatters within a single beat. Because it’s finally over, and yet this may always linger for her.
Nevertheless, my wife is brilliant, issuing a simple sentence that meant nothing to most and everything to the three of us. Axel, Jax, and I were on our feet and shooting with her by the time theNincornfell from her lips.
For me, it was justice. After what Balzano stole from Rena, the penalty was mild. Maybe that’s how she views this too. If I’d been granted the opportunity to end Steve for what he did to my mom and sisters, not a speck of remorse or guilt would have followed me. But Rena is purer than I am, despite her upbringing, so Isuppose we’ll see.
Cheers abound, shrieks of joy now that the big bad witch is dead.
Rushing to Rena, I sweep her into my arms and breathe her in, replacing the bitter scent of myrrh with her butterscotch aroma. “You did so good, baby girl. So good. Jesus, I love you so much.” I pull back, threading my fingers into her silky tresses and cradling her face between my palms, my eyes stinging from both relief and the pressure of my lungs finally filling. “I couldn’t breathe.”
“Me neither,” she whispers, her green-hazel eyes brimming with unshed tears. “But you came through, sailor. Delivered my true north.”
I dip my chin, pain lancing through my sternum at the sight of her anguish. There might be a tinge of vindication in her features, but there’s also distress.
This is the darkness I feared would drown her. The no-turning-back events that chip away at a soul. They’re far too plentiful in this life. Just because she’s treading well doesn’t mean she isn’t on the brink of letting go. Whether she hated the man or not, she helped kill her father. That’s a scar I can’t erase.
“How much of your soul did they take?” I ask.
Still rattled but brushing it off with her nonchalant bravado, she shakes her head within my hold. “I left my soul with you, Ty, so it was perfectly safe.” She glances to where her brothers and I were sitting. “It was there in that pew.”
I press my lips to hers, kissing her with abandon in the midst of one of our most harrowing days, which is saying something, considering the hellfire we’ve trekked through. Always content to live in the moment, she fists my shirt to urge me closer and opens for me, allowing me to fill her with every morsel of hope and light, love and joy she’s gifted me.
She pulls back, a subtle smirk playing on her swollen lips as she nips once more at mine. “And you gave me a freaking theme song. If that doesn’t spell soulmate, I don’t know what does.”
A chuckle pours out of me, which seems wholly inappropriatefor our current setting, but one thousand percent fitting in the presence of my wife. At the sound of our mellow exchange, Axel and Jax storm us, unwilling to wait another second. Knowing how sick they must have been, confined to that pew, helpless, I release her.
In less than a beat, Wells and Ivy are on us too. And as though it’s merely a mess of spilled juice at the knights’ table, dutiful soldiers emerge to dispose of the body.
Ivy kisses my cheek and blows out a jagged breath. “Last night was one of the worst nights of my life. I mean, Liam wrote that you were okay in that report, but not being able to hear your voice, to see all of you … I—”
“I know, Freckles. I’m okay.” Curling her into my embrace, I peck her hair.
She buries her face in my chest—a fleeting sign of vulnerability for the O’Reilly boss when KORT is in session, but at the end of the day, she’s just Ivy, the spitfire who first made us a family. “Celeste is beside herself with worry, so hopefully, we can get out of here soon.”
“I’ve missed Lettie, missed you all. I’m more than ready to go home.” I squeeze her against me, and her eyes coast over to my wife, so I give her a nudge to go steal Rena while I pull Wells aside.
As soon as I have his full attention, my heart crashes with the torment that coursed through my veins during every excruciating second of that final test. “And if Balzano had shot back? Tell me his weapon was disabled.”
“Of course.” Wells’s eyebrows furrow as he grips the back of my neck. “We wouldn’t have brought her in here otherwise. I personally took care of it—filed down the firing pin and tested it myself. And Ivy and I both had shots on him.”
Filing down the firing pin is about the only way he could have accomplished that. Blanks are risky because if Balzano had checked his gun, he would have known immediately. And depending on the range of shot, they can still cause damage. But if the firing pin can’t make contact with the bullets, the gun is nothing more than a prop. Useless.
Once I saw Wells and Ivy face the wall, I pieced things together, so I figured Balzano’s weapon was out of commission.
