Well, shit.
Very suddenly, my plan to push Barnes to the breaking point has worked entirely too well.
“Do you want to die?”
The whole mood is different, and I’m not laughing anymore when I look into Barnes’s eyes and see a man with nothing left to lose. Fuck me, I’ve pushed him too hard, and whatever window to react in I was hoping for is gone. Not when I can see pure murder on his face.
“Do you?!” he roars.
I say nothing, and instead, my mind goes blank. Inside, I look away from this, and look into the eyes of the girl I love—the girl I wasn’t even looking for, who hit me like a perfect storm. I don’t know where she is, and if she’s okay, or if I’m even going to be alive in five minutes. But I focus on her in my head.
If I’m going out, she’s the last thing I want to see.
Barnes laughs, like a fucking maniac who’s snapped, as he turns to his mates.
“Is he fuckin’ retarded?”
He turns back to me, snarling.
“Listen, you stupid, stupid little fucker,” he grunts, pushing the gun against the inside of my cheek.
“I know what you’re doing, and it ain’t gonna work,” he whispers in a hiss. “Not with how much money your little pal is going to pay me. You know, it’s not just you he wants, either. It’s this brother of yours. So let’s make a deal, huh? I’m a businessman, you’re a—well, you’re a stupid motherfucker who thinks I give a shit if you fucked that little piece of trailer trash. So let’s make a deal. You give me your brother, I’ll let you go.”
I mutter my best “fuck off” around the gun. The sigh from Barnes tells me he understands anyways.
“No? Tell you what. I heard about this little gang of yours up in the mountains? This—this motorcycle gang?” he snickers, and then frowns at me. “You fuckers think you can muscle in on me? Trying to take my territory and customers?”
I could try and explain to this muppet that the Lost Devils don’t touch drugs and have a less than zero percent interest in anything related to him, but you know… the gun in my mouth and all. Plus, I don’t think Barnes is even interested in listening to reason at this point.
“Give me this brother that this Basher guy wants too, and I’ll say you slipped away. Shit, it might even get me paid twice if I catch your ass again,” he grins “Or give me this crew of yours, let me and my boys roll up there with some firepower and take them out, and you can take off. Fuck, take the bitch with you and consider our debts paid.”
Barnes smiles thinly.
“What do you say, shithead?”
I nod, and he grins.
“Really?”
“Suck a dick,” I mumble around the gun.
The smile fades from his face in a second, and he hisses, making me grunt as he jams the gun hard into my mouth.
“Not smart, asshole,” he mutters. “Not fucking smart. Well tell me this then, he hisses and leans close. The gun presses hard into the side of my fucking cheek, and I grunt.
“Do you want to die?”
The answer, if things were simple, is no. Like I said, a week ago, I might have flipped the geezer off, told him to go fuck his mother, or if I was feeling especially, well, me, maybe just go ahead and pull my dick out or something. But that was then, and this is now. And now, things are different. Things have changed.
“Blow his fuckin’ head off, Barnesy!”
I glance over at Jay and narrow my eyes.
“Mfmmmgg.”
Barnes frowns. “The fuck did you just say?”
I repeat myself. “Mfmmmgg.”
He grins. “Well shit, is reason finally getting through that fuckin’ head of yours?”
I shrug, and Barnes beckons Jay over. “Talk to him!” he barks. “Make this stupid fucker see reason.”
Jay flicks his cigarette away and strolls over until he’s standing right over me. Barnes pulls the gun out of my mouth, and I gasp. I clear my throat and spit on the ground as Jay leans down over me. With those beady little eyes and that stubby little nose, the cunt always looks like a right pig to me.
“Well what is it, douchebag,” he grunts. “You gonna tell us what we want to hear?”
I nod, looking at the ground, and he chuckles a wheezing laugh. “Speak, dipshit.”
I mumble something, and he scowls.
“The fuck was that? Speak English, fuckhead!”
“He speaks English, dude.”
Jay whips his head around and glares at the other blokes from their crew. “I know he speaks English, retard! I meant American English!” He turns back to glare at me. “Well?”
I mumble again, drooling slightly as I look at the ground.
Jay leans down closer, right over m, and I smile.
“Alright you dumb English motherfucker. Tell us what we want to hear, or we’re gonna—”
I thrust my head up, hard, catching Jay right in the nose. Blood sprays all over the place as he screams. I slam my forehead forwards, headbutting him right in the fucking balls, and the little piggy goes down hard, screaming and clutching his nuts.
I just start laughing my ass off, but Barnes roars, grabbing me by the throat. And suddenly, metal fills my mouth. I choke on the gun, suddenly unable to breath as I look up into the enraged face of the man who I stole from.
And the thing is? I’d steal her from him, and anyone else, a million times out of a million times, even if every fucking scenario ended with me here on my knees in an empty warehouse with a gun in my mouth.
“Last. Fucking. Chance.” Barnes hisses through clenched teeth, glaring at me. “We both know the only reason I haven’t blown your goddamn head off is because of the money Basher’s promised me. But my patience is thinning, dumbass, and I’m done with deals. Tell you what, you’re fucked either way, but if you give me this brother too, then I won’t put a bullet in Delphine’s pretty little head. But first I’m gonna make her watch me slice you up.”
As if on cue, there’s a screamed swear. My blood chills, and every muscle in my body clenches. I whip my head around, and I roar as I lunge to my feet. But Barnes and a few of his mates shove me back down, and a blade goes to my throat.
The van has been parked behind the rest of his guys since I came to. But I never imagined she was here too, inside of it. She screams again as the door slides open, two of Barnes’s guys hauling her out, dressed in a bathrobe.
Our eyes lock, my smoky blues on her pretty green ones, and I don’t blink.
“Her,” Barnes growls. “Look at her, that stupid fucking slut. Because that look of horror and disgust in her eyes when I carve your fucking face up first is gonna be the last thing you see.” The knife leaves my throat, and his gun levels against my forehead, right between the eyes.
“No more games, fuckhead,” Barnes hisses. The gun pushes to my head, and time goes still. I look at her, she looks right back at me, and I see forever and eternity in her eyes. I can feel the ways she moves under my hands, taste her sweet lips on mine, and hear her whispered words and lover’s prayers in my ears.
I see everything that’s happened, and everything that might have been. I see every choice made—every wrong turn, every right one, and every corner I never even looked around.