Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 92043 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 460(@200wpm)___ 368(@250wpm)___ 307(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 92043 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 460(@200wpm)___ 368(@250wpm)___ 307(@300wpm)
Reese’s rifle went off again. Again. Again.
They had to be getting closer to the house.
Laying the bat across the couch, I moved into place, kneeling below the first window, only my eyes and forehead above the frame. My palms were sweating as I checked to make sure the pistol was loaded and pulled back the slide. Carefully, I rested the barrel on the windowsill, flicked off the safety, and waited.
My pulse was pounding in my ears so loudly that I didn’t hear the first man until he came into view at the top of the porch steps.
I lifted the pistol off the windowsill. Aimed.
He was three steps in when I fired. The bullet hit him somewhere in his torso, and he spun toward me.
I fired again, hitting him in the crotch.
He went down like a sack of potatoes, screaming, and fell off the porch.
I swallowed the enormous amount of spit in my mouth, trying not to gag as I waited for the next one.
I hit him in the chest and belly because he’d turned toward me right away. He dropped in a heap on the porch, and I had to keep looking at him as I waited for the next one.
All the while, Reese fired from upstairs. I hoped she was hitting her marks because I felt like I was going to hyperventilate. I didn’t want to shoot anymore. I didn’t want to watch any more men fall. I didn’t want any of it.
I hit another as he came onto the porch, but he disappeared back off of it before I could shoot again. Which meant there was a wounded man who knew where I was shooting from.
I moved to the window at the opposite end. I could see the stairs better, but I didn’t like being in the line of fire from anyone in the yard. I glanced toward the front door.
I just had to keep them from the door.
Two men rushed the steps, and I panicked, shooting the pistol until I was out of ammunition.
I hadn’t thought to bring a spare magazine, only the extra ammo. Throwing myself to the side, I hid against the wall between the windows and the door as I ejected the magazine and reloaded it with shaky hands. I wasn’t sure how many bullets I dropped, but it was too many. It was taking me too long.
I’d barely gotten the magazine loaded back into the pistol when light from the moon was blocked by a large shadow outside the window.
Rolling onto my side, I pointed toward the window and fired.
Glass shattered and fell everywhere. I was covered in it. But the shadow dropped.
My relief was short-lived when someone shot at the door. Bang. Bang. Bang. The door rattled as I scrambled toward the couch, keeping one eye on the windows. One of them was basically just a frame now, an easy entrance.
When the door flew open, I screamed and fired.
The man stood there for a moment and then dropped in a heap. I couldn’t even tell where I’d shot him.
“Lucy,” Matilda called.
“I’m fine,” I called back. “Stay there.”
“The hell I will,” she said from somewhere behind me as I scrambled for the front door. I slammed it closed, but the lock and doorknob were absolutely mangled.
“The sideboard,” she said, racing toward me. She heaved the long cabinet down the foyer a foot before I’d even gotten a hold of the other end.
Someone must’ve been looking down on us, because I wasn’t sure how we managed to get the heavy cabinet wedged in front of the door before anyone else had made it onto the porch.
Reese’s rifle sounded again.
Okay, maybe the person looking down on us had been Reese.
“Did you do that to my window?” Matilda asked, breathing heavily as we snuck over to the couch.
“Charlie will reimburse you,” I said, crawling across the floor to where I’d left the box of ammunition. I clutched it to my chest and half-crawled, half-scooted back to her. “He’s filthy rich now, apparently.”
Matilda scoffed, but her lips turned up in a little smile.
“How much longer do you think we have?” I asked. It felt like we’d been at it for hours, but I knew that couldn’t be right because Ambrose would’ve been there already.
“Half an hour,” Matilda replied. “Fifteen minutes if we’re lucky.”
I nodded as we watched the windows.
“How’s Erik?”
“He’s going to be livid when he wakes,” she replied softly. “But otherwise, he’ll heal.”
“That’s good.”
“Do you—” She stopped and shook her head.
“What?” I asked. “Do I what?”
“It’s nothing.”
“Come on now,” I teased gently, my voice trembling with nerves. “If you can’t ask me now, when could you? We’re practically besties at this point. We’ve moved furniture together.”
“Do you think Charlie would be offended if I let him know he could call us Mom and Dad?”
If I hadn’t been staring so intently at the windows, searching for any hint of a shadow, my mouth would’ve dropped open in shock. It was the oddest time to think about my parents, but I couldn’t stop the memories that flashed through my mind.