Bella stands there, gun raised, fingers trembling on the trigger while mascara streaks down her cheeks.
“Beautiful, Bella,” Brodie sighs. “What are you doing?”
“You were really going to shoot your brother?” Bella whispers, this horrified undertone in her words as she focuses on Brodie.
Brodie scoffs. “Always worried about everyone else. Drop the gun before you hurt yourself, Bella.”
She grips it tighter.
“L-Let her go.”
“Bella, don’t,” Erin wheezes.
“I’d listen to her, beautiful,” Brodie warns.
“Don’t call me that!” Bella cries. “Was any of it real? Did you ever love me? Or was it all lies to build your secret drug club?”
Red emotion glimmers in Brodie’s eyes for a fraction of a second. “It was real,” Brodie answers.
“Was?” She repeats, trying to keep it together.
“Everything was real,” he says. “Until I found out who she was.” He jerks Erin closer. “Until I realized thisbitchcould take my birthright. The moment I learned that, I knew I’d lose you, too. You’d never choose me over her.”
“But I did choose you,” Bella whispers. “I loved you and went to California with you.”
“You don’t even know the real me.”
“If you loved me, then let Erin go.”
“I can’t, Bella.”
“Yes, you can.” Bella’s voice shakes, but she steps forward. “I know everything now—who you are, what you did, who yourfather is. Erin won’t take anything from you. Let her go…and I’ll leave with you. We’ll start over.”
“Bella!” Erin cries.
Brodie’s arm tightens around Erin’s neck.
Bella inches closer, gun still aimed at him. “Let. Her. Go.”
“My beautiful Bella, you’d really hurt me?”
“I don’t want to,” she whispers.
Ever so slowly—Brodie loosens his arm. He drops the gun from Erin’s side. The moment she’s free, she bolts straight for me.
Brodie smirks, “Sorry, beautiful, but you’re no killer.”
My stomach drops as he raises the gun at Erin’s back.
Two cracks ricochet, bullets buzzing through the air one after the other. Time slows down. Erin stops running and turns, looking back at the thing that was about to kill her. Brodie staggers and drops to his knees.
His gun slips from his grasp, and he collapses onto the gravel.
Nothing ever hits Erin. Those shots weren’t for her.
She’s safe.
Cops flood in and swarm us, most likely from hearing the shot.
