The stroller folded up like a beach chair when it was collapsed. I gripped it with both hands and waited until I saw her shadow in the dim yellow light casting pools on the pavement. In the last second before she passed the van, I swung the stroller and smashed it into her upper body.
The shock—and surprising power of the stroller—knocked her to the ground with a yelp.
“Damn, this thing really is a weapon,” I said in awe and looked at it still in my hands. It had felt like swinging a Wiffle-ball bat but with the power of a battering ram.
Olena lay on the ground, groaning and holding her chest like I’d cracked a rib. Maybe I had. The good news was the gun had flown from her grip and landed out of her reach. I dropped the stroller and lunged for it.
“Give me that!” she screamed and clawed at my legs. She got a grip on one of them and pulled me to the ground.
I cried out when my knees hit the asphalt. I felt my gown tear and gritty rock dig into my skin. I got one hand on the gun and kicked at her.
“Get off of me!” I landed a kick to her face and managed to scramble away. I was only a few steps away before she dove on me again.
This woman would not quit.
I held the gun out of her reach as she continued to claw and grab at me. I did my best to run, but she was with me every step, punching at me, reaching for the gun, hissing horrible threats in my ear.
“I’m going to kill you and enjoy it. Give me what’s mine, you nasty little bitch. I should have killed you when you were a kid.”
“Getoffme!” I roared and shoved her as hard as I could. In the process, the gun flew loose from my hand, but she didn’t seem to care. The cold fury in her eyes said she was going to kill me with her bare hands.
She came at me with her talons bared, dress tattered like mine, and blood dripping down her face. We were past the stopped traffic by now. It was just us and the empty road. We were still far out over the water. High enough for a fall to end in certain death. Olena charged and I could do nothing to get out of her way. She shoved me up against the icy railing of the bridge and put one hand around my throat.
“Where is it?” she hissed with pure venom in her voice and rage in her bloodshot eyes. She scratched at my chest, ripping her nails into my skin, and dug the diamond back out of its keep. “Yes! Mine for good this time,” she cheered and clutched it in her fist. She was still choking me with her other hand. Her nails drew blood on either side of my throat, I could feel it dripping. I pushed and clawed at her, trying to keep my balance. The bridge’s railing hit my midback. All it would take would be a hard shove, and momentum would pull me over the edge to a watery death.
“Goodbye, princess,” Olena sang with a laugh worthy of the wickedest witch.
My vision narrowed as my lungs fought for oxygen, which wouldn’t come. This was the end. I’d die alone, and no one would mourn me because I had no identity. I was no one. Nothing.
I tilted my head back, searching the night sky for stars or even a plane. Anything more pleasant than the soulless stare of my sworn enemy as she squeezed the life out of me. I thought I saw a star, even through the fog, but that might have been my suffocating brain mustering a twinkle as my vision turned to black.
In the second before I lost consciousness, a gunshot ripped the air apart. And suddenly, I could breathe again. Oxygen filled my lungs. My vision cleared. I was no longer doing a backbend over the railing. I clutched my own throat to feel it free of anyone’s grip and sucked in a big breath. My ears rang from the gunshot. I looked down to see Olena Nova dead at my feet with a single bullet wound in her temple and a pool of blood on the pavement.
I was still gasping for breath, gaining my bearings, when I heard my name float out on the air.
“Erin! Erin, you’re safe now.”
Agent Bray came flying at me out of nowhere and wrapped me in his arms. Through my haze, I returned his hug with one arm. I could see over his shoulder the reason the traffic had stopped: His cruiser sat parked sideways on the bridge with a flashing red siren attached to the top. I could hear more sirens coming up the road from behind it. We’d be swarmed in minutes.
I didn’t realize I was trembling until he smoothed my tangled hair and kissed my temple. “Hey, you’re okay. I’ve got you.”
I looked up at him in a daze and then down at Olena’s body. “Nice shot.”
He pivoted us so my back was to her and all I could see were his gray eyes. “I had to. She was going to push you over the edge.”
Snark about being well aware of that fact surged up my throat, but my mouth wouldn’t form the words. Looking into his face and seeing the biggest emotions I’d ever seen staring back at me, all I could say was, “Thank you.”
He softly smiled, like shooting someone to save my life was a given. “She’s gone. You’re safe now.”
She’s gone.Olena Nova was gone. The truth of that reality would take a long time to sink in, I knew it, but I could alreadyfeel a weight lifting. A glimpse of the freedom I’d been chasing for a decade.
“Erin, she’s gone,” Bray said again as if I hadn’t heard him. He smoothed my hair once more and tilted my chin up with his fingers. “You’re safe.”
He was right. I was safe. I could let him scoop me up in his strong arms and carry me in my bloodied, tattered dress to the ambulance still blaring up the road. He’d take care of me and maybe take me to his place for the night, screw the rules, and we’d pretend we had a normal life before I went back to working for the DSA.
But that would be it. I would only be safe. And only for now.
“What’s wrong?” he asked when I didn’t respond. He leaned back to get a better look into my eyes.
