With trembling hands, I sucked in a deep breath and pulled the trigger.
Again, the blowback took my breath away, and I dropped the gun.Fuck!The bullet missed Madison, flying just above her head and hitting a tree trunk.
Madison pounced forward and snatched up the gun, pointing it right at my head again. I closed my eyes, waiting for her to pull the trigger and finally kill me like she’d been threatening to all night. When nothing happened, I opened my eyes.
Madison was still pointing the gun at me, smirking. “Nice try. No, really, I mean it—that was a good move. But not good enough. Enough of this. Get up, and start walking.”
“Don’t move!”
I saw a flash of confusion in Madison’s eyes at the sound of an unfamiliar voice coming from behind her.
All of a sudden, a thick beam of light broke through the trees, landing right in my face, blinding me. I opened my eyes to see Madison’s black silhouette, lit from behind.
“Put down the gun! Hands above your head!” the disembodied voice bellowed, through some kind of speaker.
Madison raised her other arm to grip the gun with both hands. Though I could see she was rattled by this sudden development, she didn’t take her eyes—or her aim—off me.
“Ma’am, I repeat—put the gun down, and put your hands above your head.”
Madison gripped the gun tighter, and didn’t move.
“Madison Clark! This is the police! We are not going to say it again—put down your weapon and surrender!”
“It’sMrs. Hunter!” Madison screamed in frustration. She lunged behind me and pushed the barrel of the gun painfully into the back of my skull. Then she gave me a shove forward, forcing me to walk in the direction of the voice. “Don’t shoot! Pregnant woman coming out!” she yelled.
Madison gave me another hard shove in the small of my back. I held my belly with my right hand and held my left arm up, palm out, trying to block the blinding beams of the spotlight. For the first time, I noticed that the darkness around us was starting to lift; it was almost morning.
Madison and I trudged forward. As we passed the first large redwood I had hidden behind, I heard a series of clicks as several police officers cocked their guns.
“Stop right there! Put. The gun. Down.”
As my eyes adjusted to the glare, I made out two police cars and four officers. Three were crouched behind their open doors for cover, pointing their guns at us, while the fourth stood with one leg up on the door frame, speaking through a megaphone.
“This woman is in labor,” Madison announced. “We need to get her into the cabin now, before this baby comes. It’s almost time.”
“Put down your weapon and step away from her,” said the officer.
“This ismy babyshe’s about to give birth to. But she tried to run away with it. I couldn’t let her do that!” Madison shouted.
“Ma’am, I repeat—put the gun down and everything will be okay.”
“No! You’re just going to take my baby away from me!” Madison shrieked. “I’m telling you—back off, or we’re all going to be sorry.”
My insides exploded with pain again. I clutched my belly and let out a bloodcurdling scream.
“Madison!” yelled another voice, coming from the direction of the woods.
Max.
He was clutching his side. A dark, wet stain ran down the bottom half of his shirt and his pant leg. He was limping very slowly toward us.
“Madison … please … don’t hurt the baby,” he said breathlessly.
Madison kept the gun trained on me as I fell onto all fours on the forest ground, breathing heavily through my contraction.
“I’m not letting her get away, Max. If I let them take her to the hospital, we’ll never get Baby Charlie.”
“Madison … this has gone too far. I don’t want anyone else to get hurt, okay? I don’t want you to shoot Savannah. And I don’t want the police to shoot you.”
