The lock clicks and humor vanishes as the door slides open an inch. Positioning Aerin behind me, I remove my gun from my waist and push the door open as slowly as I dare. My first step inside sets my heart pounding as an achingly familiar scent immediately assaults my nose.
Blood.
With Aerin walking slowly behind me, we walk through an empty kitchen and an empty hallway. Cold air clings to my exposed skin like icy fingers trying to draw me away from what I already know is behind the door to the living room.
I can smell it.
The silence here is heavy. Each breath struggles for space against my racing, pounding heartbeat. Reaching the door, I grasp the handle and keep my gun raised and close to my chest. Waiting just a single second, I steel every nerve that’s threatening to burst and push open the door.
I can’t breathe.
Pidge sits on the couch in his living room, his laptop resting next to him on an upturned pillow. His eyes are closed, his head resting back against the cushion and his mouth slack.
There’s a single bullet hole between his eyes, vibrant against the ashy paleness of his skin. No blood trickles down from the wound because Pidge was already dead when they shot him in the head. His torso is riddled with bullet holes, his clothes torn and soaked with crimson that also seeps down into the couch and across the floor at his slack feet.
The bullet to the head was a message.
A strange, ragged breath tears from me as I stare, motionless, at Pidge’s cold, dead form.
He was my friend. He was the only one who put up with me. He had my back and I…I had his.
I wassupposedto have his.
Suddenly, Aerin’s warm hands cup my face and she coaxes me to look down at her. No sound escapes her moving lips, so I frown and finally blink away the burning in my eyes.
“…do that?”
“What?” I croak.
“Sweep the apartment,” she says, her brows knitting together as sorrow fills her eyes. “I need you to sweep the apartment and make sure no one else is here. Can you do that for me?”
How long was she talking to me and I didn’t hear her?
I never thought of myself as a man easily shocked anymore, but this grips me like a vice and doesn’t let go. Every sensation inside me grows numb and cold, but I force myself to nod.
Focus.
Protect Aerin.
Sweep the apartment.
“Stay here,” I instruct, then I tear myself away from the living room.
Pidge is dead.
How thefuckis he dead?
The rest of his apartment is exactly the same as it was the last time I was here. Every room is empty, filled with his belongings scattered around, but there are no traps, no assailants, and no hints that any fight took place leading up to his execution.
By the time I return to the living room, I can feel my heart beating again.
“I called Bullet and Rex,” Aerin says. “I didn’t know the codes or anything, so I just asked them to come for drinks. They’re on their way.”
“They’re okay?” I ask numbly, gazing past her to Pidge’s motionless corpse.
“Yes. I also tried to get Pidge’s computer working, but it seems fried. I plugged it in to charge but it’s not turning on.” She hiccups suddenly and her hand shoots to her mouth, tears shining in her eyes. “Falco… I’m so sorry.”
“It’s fine.”
