“Under the seat.”
He reached between his legs, grabbed the bag of fentanyl, and inspected it in the moonlight. “Yes!” He leaned over the console and gave her a rapid peck on the cheek. “You’ve just saved my life.”
“Where do you need to go?”
“I’m where I need to be. Now get out of here.”
“We’ll talk about rehab when you get home?”
He didn’t answer. His eyes were on the end of the block ahead of him, then he turned and checked the end of the block behind them.
“Right, Joey? You promised you’d go if I brought you that shit. Said you’d be done. Said you wanted to get clean.”
His knee bounced as he scanned the area around the car. Vague and distracted, he replied, “Yeah. Right. When I get home, we’ll talk about it.”
She stared at him. “You have no intention of going, do you? You just said that so I’d bring you your drugs. Goddammit, Joey! It’s bad enough you made me complicit in your dealing. Do you have any idea what this could do to me if we’re caught?”
“Nothing’s going to touch you, Glennon. Not if you get out of here.”
A car pulled in at the end of the block behind them and began to slow roll toward them.
“Go on. Go home,” he urged.
Another car turned onto the block in front of them.
“Shit! You need to get out of here. Now!”
He pitched himself out of the car and made a mad dash for the house they were parked in front of, but it was too late. Before Glennon could even turn the engine over, shots rang out, a barrage of bullets coming from three directions. Several bodies poured out of both cars, shooting as they ran toward her brother, and windows of the house broke as residents inside rained down return fire.
Glennon watched in horror as Joey’s body was hit, pinwheeled, and went down. More bodies hit the lawn, road, and sidewalk. Without thinking, she scrambled out her door and ran around the car. “Joey!”
The bullets had stopped now, and the two cars sped away down the street, leaving their passengers dead or bleeding out. Except for her panting breaths and sobs as she sped to the still form of her brother on the sidewalk of the house he’d been running toward, silence reigned.
She gathered his dead weight into her arms, struggling to turn him over in her lap.
Joey’s eyes were already turning glassy, and his bloody hand grabbed her arm. He tried to speak, but his mouth only opened and closed like a fish drowning on dry land. A faint wheezing sound was all he could manage.
A quick survey of his body showed his chest littered with bullet wounds, blood soaking through his shirt. His fingers made one last desperate attempt to grab her arm, briefly gripping theupper sleeve of her thin sweater, then dropped slack in the crook of it, a series of bright-red streaks marring the material.
His eyes were open, but there was no life in them.
Sobs wrenched from her body. “Joey, oh my god, no! No! No! No!”
She had no idea how long she sat there, rocking back and forth, but at some point, a figure ran into the yard, grabbed the bag Joey had flung to the ground when he’d been gunned down, then took off running toward the backyard.
Time had no meaning as she continued to hold him. This neighborhood would be used to gunfire. More than likely, people would hide until they were sure the danger had passed before thinking to call the police.
Rain began to fall, mixing with the tears on her face. That was how the police finally found her thirty minutes later.
SHADOWLANDS
Triumph
One elbowon the rail of the second-floor balcony, he raised a bottle of water to his mouth with his free hand. From his position, back to the pillar, Triumph detachedly surveyed the groupings below. He saw voyeurs on their own, couples, and throuples in the private nooks. A larger grouping occupied the central social area. Amid the action, servers patrolled and provided sustenance in whatever capacity was needed, and staff roamed throughout, monitoring the patrons.
Unmoved by the sights, he felt the strong bass line latch onto his heartbeat, causing his fingers to automatically tap against the plastic in time to the music. The throbbing pulse of the electronic melodies underscored the action, but not so loud as to drown out the guests’ voices or their nonverbal responses.
“Triumph,” a voice intoned from behind him.
