As I turn the corner, I slow.
There, stopped in the middle of the road, are three black SUVs. Doors are open but there’s no one inside them. Bodies litter the pavement, blood is splattered and pooling everywhere. There has to be about fifteen dead men. They’re all dressed in black but I can see where bullets have cut through the material.
Holy shit.
I gape at the grisly scene, unable to understand what transpired. Blair took out fifteen men? On herown? I’m not sure if I should be impressed or terrified. Shock wins—it takes over and helps numb the whirlwind of emotions battling inside me. It helps me focus. If these men are dead, then Blair has to be alive, right?
Hope flares hot in my chest. My eyes whip over the scene again as I try to find her. The tail end of the car she was driving is sticking up from a ditch. The lights are on and the door hangs open.
“Blair?” I call out. “Blair!”
“I’m here.” She stumbles out from the bushes to my left, breathless but alive.
A wave of relief hits me at the sight of her. I hurry over, frantic to help in any way that I can, but as I approach I can see she didn’t come away unscathed. There’s blood trickling down from her forehead. Up close I can see where glass has ripped through her clothes. Some shards still protrude from her skin. Scrapes mar her face and hands. As she moves, there’s a slight limp in her gait.
“Oh shit…” I whisper in horror as I come to her side. “Blair?—”
“Are you okay?” she asks, cutting me off. “Where’s Santi?”
“We were run off the road but we’re both okay. He’s back at the truck calling for help,” I assure her as my eyes travel over her wounds. She staggers a bit as she takes a step forward, and I catch her by the arm. “Here, I can carry you back and we?—”
“No.” She pulls her arm free and straightens. “Go back to Santi and head for the cabin. I heard them radioing in for back-up and they’re nearly here. You have to go, Rhett.”
I blink, confused, as she takes a step back from me—awayfrom me.
“We.” I correct her. “Wehave to go, Blair.”
She doesn’t look at me as she takes another step away. Her gaze sweeps over the lifeless bodies littering the ground. She bends down and steals a gun from a corpse. Clicking the clip and finding it full, she shoves it into her waistband.
“This isn’t your fight,” she says as she repeats the action with another corpse and another gun.
“Hey!” I stomp forward and grab her by the arm to stop her.
Blair’s head whips around and our eyes lock. I nearly recoil at the emptiness in hers. I’ve never seen anyone so devoid of emotion. Her face is an unreadable mask. I hardly recognize Blair like this.
“I’m leaving, Rhett. I’m not safe in Caddawalk, and neither are the rest of you if I stay,” she says, her voice cold and hard.
“You’re here because we can protect you, Blair. You can’t just?—”
“Rhett,” she scoffs. “You and I both know it would be stupid for me to stay. You’ve been saying that from the very beginning, since I got here. So let go and?—”
“But I was wrong!” I shout as fear surges forward again. “None of this was your fault. You didn’t bring trouble to Caddawalk—this was all Sparrow’s fault! He put the hit out on you and your dad. You’re innocent in all of this. You?—”
Blair recoils. She jerks her arm out of my grasp and stumbles away from me, as if she’s been shot. Her eyes nearly bulge from their sockets, and her mouth drops open as she takes a few more steps back.
“Whosefault is this, Rhett?” She asks, her voice nothing more than a thin whisper.
“Sparrow’s and he?—”
“No!” Her head whips back and forth in denial. “No,you’re wrong. He wouldn’t do that. Sparrow?—”
“Is Ledger, right?” I cut her off, grimly.
Blair opens and closes her mouth as she stands there, gaping at me. When she tries to speak again, still nothing comes out. She swallows and tries for a third time. Finally, she manages to choke out, “Sparrow is Ledger’s alias.”
“Santi just discovered all of this right before you called,” I tell her, my voice laced with pain. “I didn’t want to believe it either, but it’s all there. Ledger, he’s behindallof this.”
Blair’s eyes water and the shock on her face melts into despair. The sound she emits is a low, heart wrenching wail that sinks beneath my skin and causes my soul to shiver. Blair bends at the waist, bracing her hands on her knees as she sucks in a shaky breath.
