Page 64

We move.

The back stairwell is half a hallway away, but it might as well be a mile. We go fast and low, Carmine ahead, Enzo’s body between me and the open stairs, and for a few seconds, it’s almost working, and then two men race up the landing below us, dark clothes, weapons up, and they see us.

Everything happens at once and very slowly.

Carmine shoots first. The sound is enormous, as intense as a physical blow to my ears. One of the men folds over in a way that makes me sick, but the other gets off a wild burst. The wall beside us comes apart in a shower of plaster and noise, and Enzo shoves me sideways through an open doorway into some kind of service alcove.

He covers me the entire time, making sure any bullet headed my way would hit him first. As he moves, he turns just enough to raise his own pistol and fire. Two shots, bang-bang, close enough that the room lights up for a split second.

Then there’s an awful quiet.

“Hallway’s clear,” Carmine says from the hall. “That’s two. The other two are pulling back. Sounds like whoever was still on the main floor is pulling back, too. Guess they didn’t plan on anyone actually shooting back.”

There’s blood running off Carmine’s left hand where a chunk of flying plaster opened it up. He doesn’t even look at it.

Enzo’s already pulling me up. “Are you hit? Stevie. Look at me. Are you hit?”

“No.” I do a fast inventory. “No. I’m okay. I’m okay.”

Over his shoulder, in the hall, I see the man Enzo dropped, and there’s no looking away fast enough. It’s awful. I don’t need to ask to know he’s dead. The man is so still. Dark spreads underneath him, and the look on his face is one of total surprise, as if he’d never considered in a million years the actual possibility that he might get shot. His death mask is a record of that being his final thought.

My stomach turns over hard and the world tilts.

Then I hear a sound underneath the ringing that pulls me back into my body faster than any amount of fear could.

Someone crying.

We move down the hall and take a turn, not using the stairs we used to get up here. This path takes us through the service hallway, and I spot a kid, barely twenty, in a server’s black vest and white shirt, and he’s been hit. He’s making a high, thin sound that’s not even words. I pause, wanting to do something, anything for this poor kid caught in the crossfire of something that had nothing to do with him.

“Stay back,” Enzo says.

He drops to the kid’s side and assesses. When he’s done, he puts his hand on the kid’s sweaty cheek.

“They missed the artery,” he says. “You’re going to be fine. EMTs will be here soon. Take off your vest and use it to keep pressure on the wound.”

I can’t believe how calm he is, speaking like nothing had happened at all.

Something about Enzo’s tone is enough to snap the kid out of his daze. He slips out of his vest and presses it against his leg, just as Enzo said. But the kid’s still groggy and not sure what to do. I hurry over to him and drop to my knees next to Enzo and press down hard on the leg the way you’re supposed to, harder than he’s doing, and I put my face right in front of his.

“Hey. Hey. Look at me, not the leg. What’s your name?”

“M-Marcus…”

“Marcus. You’re okay. It’s the leg, it’s not bad. I’ve got it. You’re going to be fine. Keep your hand right here with mine and keep looking at me. Don’t look at the leg. Are you waiting tables to pay for something?”

“School,” he gasps.

“School. Good. You’re going to finish school. Press here.” I move his hands back where they need to be without letting go of him.

“Come on,” Carmine says. “We need to keep going.”

It’s not over yet. The other men are still here. I ease one hand away and Marcus covers the wound with his own, aware enough now to help hold the pressure.

“Is it over?” I ask. “You said the other two are gone?”

“Pulling back,” Carmine says. “Stay down anyway.”

Enzo is watching me. I feel it more than I see it, a half second where his attention is on me instead of the stairs, and there’s something in it I don’t have time to read.