“Shut up!” The asshole grabbed the girl forcefully by the hair.
Her entire body locked down in an instant when the blade of the knife was pressed against the front of her throat. The distressed man was so busy trying to control the panicked girl he didn’t see Jagger approaching the counter from the other direction.
“Scream like that again, and I’ll slice your throat from ear to ear.”
The gun in Jagger’s hand—a hand that wasstillnot trembling, by the way—was pointed square at his target’s head. “See, now I’m thinkin’ that’s not such a good idea.”
Hearing his voice, Hoodie Guy spun around, bringing the girl’s flailing body along with him. Crazed eyes looked back at Jagger with utter shock. An uncontrollable tweak of the guy’s muscles caused the tip of the knife to pierce the girl’s skin.
She winced as a trickle of bright red blood slowly fell down over her paling skin. But it was the tiny whimper escaping her straining throat that pissed Jagger right the hell off.
“Yeah, hi.” He flashed the idiot a quick grin. “This would be the part where you put down the knife and let the young lady go.”
Of course, it couldn’t be that easy.
“This ain’t got nothin’ to do with you,” the other man countered. This was followed by a demanding, “Just get the hell out of here, and leave us alone!”
Jagger was, in fact,notgoing to leave the strung-out crackhead alone to finish carrying out his crimes. And he sure as shit wasn’t leaving the poor girl to fend for herself.
Not a chance in hell.
“Come on, man,” he tried again, inching his way closer. The leather soles of his Italian sued Oxfords pressing silently against the floor’s aged and yellowing vinyl tiles. “I don’t want to kill anyone today.” Some days, he was more than ready, but this wasn’t one of those days. “I’m fairly certain you didn’t plan on dying. So why don’t you just let the young lady go, and?—”
“I can’t!” He frantically shook his head. Chin-length strands of greasy dark hair flew back and forth with the movement as he continued using the girl as a human shield. “I-I need the money, man.” Dull, brown eyes darted from Jagger, to the door, then back to the girl. “Cash!Now!”
A few seconds later, the terrified clerk finally,finallymanaged to open the drawer.
“Come on, man. You don’t have to do this. See? She’s getting you your money. So just drop the knife and let her go. Easy peasy, my friend.”
The girl fisted the last of the bills as she pulled them from the sectioned-off drawer. “There!” She dropped them into the small piles with the others. “That’s all of it. Now just…go! I won’t even call the cops, I swear. So please, just take the cash andgo!”
She was lying. Jagger knew it. Hell, even the crackhead knew it. Ofcourse, she’d be calling the police. It’s what any reasonably sane person would do.
But what these two didn’t know—what they couldn’t know—was that the fine men and women of the CPD had already been invited to the party.
Time to pull the final curtain on this little show.
“Listen, dude.” He kept his tone casual, as if they were two buddies discussing their plans for the night. “If you don’t let her go, I’m going to be forced to shoot you. She’ll probably get blood all over that pretty pink shirt of hers, I’ll have to go down to the police station to answer questions and fill out an official report, and you, well…” Jagger huffed out a breath. “I mean, let’s be real for a minute, shall we?”
“Shut up.”
“You and I both know what happens to the human body when a bullet pierces flesh and bone at over a thousand feet per second, right?” He ignored the man’s order and glanced down at the counter in front of him. “Pretty sure there’s only about, what…four, maybe five feet between us?” A low whistle. “Not sure evenIwant to see the kind of mess that’s left after putting a full-metal jacket through your skull.”
“Shut. Up.”
“Bone and brains…and of course, blood.” Jagger blew out a breath. “That’s gonna be a real bitch to clean.”
The string broke on the tweaker’s patience. Lifting the knife away from the girl’s throat, he swung the weapon in Jagger’s direction. “I said, shut the fuck up!”
Bingo.
Jagger exhaled slowly and then…he pulled the trigger. The girl screamed as her attacker howled in pain as the knife flew from the man’s bloodied and useless hand.
“You shot me!” The guy used his good hand to grip the other wrist tightly. “Y-you…you actually fucking shot me!”
Duh.
Shock had the would-be robber looking back at Jagger as ifhewere the criminal. Meanwhile, the young clerk wasted no time in running away from the man who’d just threatened to end her life.
