Just away from me.
I don’t know if she wants me to reach for her to drag her back or just let her float into the distance. I know what I want. I want to pull her so close she can’t ever leave me again.
My stomach is a shambles, shredding itself with worry, with the fear that she’ll walk out the door and she’ll be gone for good.
Suddenly, that seems a far more ominous prospect than missing Rachel’s due date. My nerves are burning.
I’m intensely aware of Nadia, of the signals every part of her body is broadcasting. In return, she seems barely aware of me at all, her eyes fixed to the carpet, her mind playing out scenarios I can’t witness.
Then she nods her head and my shoulders sag with relief.
Too soon.
She pulls the missing gun from the pocket of her cargo shorts, aiming it directly at my face.
“I don’t want to hurt you, but I need to go.”
CHAPTERFOURTEEN
NADIA
My right handwants to tremble, and I grab its wrist with my left, making it steady. The barrel wavers as I look past its tip to see the disappointment on Malakai’s face.
I glance to the side, so I’m not forced to watch the emotion well in his eyes. I’m already drowning in guilt, if I swallow another drop of it my resolve will melt away and I need to stay strong.
The police are at my house. They could be digging up my worst secrets right this minute, ready to ruin my life.
Myreallife.
Not this weird adventure outside the guardrails, playing in the shadows. I can’t afford for my real life to fall apart. Not for a couple-of-days-long fling. Not for a man who’s going back to prison, who’s having a baby with another woman.
My throat swells. The back of my nose stings, making my eyes water. My limbs tremble but I keep the gun trained on him. My only answer to his strength.
Malakai slowly raises his hands in surrender. “What are you doing?”
“I told you. I’m leaving and going home.”
The disappointment turns to sadness turns to disbelief. “And you’re pulling a gun on me?”
A wave of guilt steals the air from my chest. “Why not?” I squeak before having to clear my throat. “You were perfectly happy to point it at me.”
“That was different. That was before…”
“Before what?”
“Before I knew you.”
“You think you know me? Why? Because you’ve been treating me as your personal whore?”
His eyes snap shut at the word like he’s taking a blow to the face. My throat corrodes into rust, even when I clear it, I can’t swallow.
“Give me the goddamn gun. We both know you won’t shoot me.”
Do we?
Despite the grip on my wrist, my hand trembles, the barrel jerking so I don’t know what I’m aiming at. Not his face, I would never, ever live past that. Not his torso where any bullet could tear through something important, felling him dead.
I shift it lower, aiming at his leg. Maybe his knee. Maybe just the wall behind him given how much my limbs shake.
