We talk through the proposal, and I’m in mid-riff on liquidity windows when my phone buzzes with an unknown number. I decline without thinking. A shiver runs through me. Something’s off.
A matte-black sedan glides past the windows, just a shade too slowly. The steam wand hisses at the counter. A couple laughs. Angie checks her watch, then the door, then me, like she’s waiting for someone.
“How’s home?” she asks. “Can’t be all bad in the penthouse.”
“Five-star prison.”
She purses her lips again, then reaches over to grab my hand. “Hey, after what happened, I can’t really blame Sasha for keeping you safe. If someone’s looking to get you…”
“I know, I know. But sti?—”
Something pops outside. Could be a truck backfiring. I don’t flinch, but Angie’s head snaps toward the window. The black sedan slides back into frame and the passenger window drops. There’s a glint of something silver, and I freeze as soon as I see it. Angie’s eyes flash, then sherises from her chair just enough to reach forward and hook her hand around the back of my neck and pull me down. I tumble, my cheek hitting the tile. The table rattles, the mugs fall and shatter.
Pop, pop, pop.
The first shot punches a hole the size of a quarter through the front window. The second shatters the glass. Someone shouts. Someone else screams.
Pop…pop-pop…pop.
“Down,” Angie says, her voice flat, like she’s done this a million times before. She wedges herself against me, a human shield in a blazer.
Three more shots. The room is a chorus of screams and shouts as people duck for cover from the gunfire. My heart tries to kick out through my ribs. My mind goes right to the baby, and I clamp my palm over my abdomen like I could protect him or her with just my hand.
The door explodes open. A tall shadow slices across the floor.
Bogdan.
He doesn’t look at us. He’s already moving, already drawing, already sighting. Two shots—controlled, precise. I can’t see where he shoots, but I sure as hell can hear it. The first shot hits something metal. The second, a tire. He takes one more shot, and I hear the sound of something hitting glass.
I rise just a bit, high enough to see outside. The sedan fishtails. For one glorious, almost cartoonish second, it lookslike it’s going to eat a light pole. But it straightens at the last minute and screams away. One tire’s flat; the back windshield is a mess of spiderweb cracks.
Silence hits the café like a wave. Then, a sob. The slow clink of a cup rolling. A barista, voice shaking, “Everyone—please—stay low—are you okay?”
I plop into a sitting position. Angie’s next to me, breathing hard but steadily. I spot an older man by the window, a long cut on his arm. Near him, a girl is picking glittering specks out of her sleeve with shaking hands.
Thank God, it doesn’t look like anyone was hit or hurt too badly.
Bogdan steps into our line of sight and scans the room.
“Stay away from the windows,” he says, calm, clipped. “Move to the back. Now.”
He says something in Russian into the comm at his shoulder, then his eyes lock back to mine. I nod.
He takes out his phone, dials a number. “Le James Café, multiple shots fired. Westbound sedan. Two visible injuries, minor—glass cuts. Shooter window down passenger side. We need units now.”
The fury hits hot and clean. Someone tried to kill me.
Again.
Someone tried to killmy baby.
Bogdan returns, crouches next to Angie and me. “Come on—we’re leaving.”
“This is our place,” I say, useless, childish.
“Not anymore,” he says, his tone not unkind. “Come on. Back hallway. You too, blondie.”
“Blondie?” Angie retorts.
