And then I open my eyes.
Time has slowed, almost stopped, shows me a world now rich with color, every gesture and glance shaded and textured. Gunn must know my tells by now, senses what I’m about to do, because he reaches for his pistol, a fast, fluid motion. But I thrust my hand forward, and Gunn’s weapon flits from his fingertips like a freed dove, flies into mine, and then I quickly throw up a force field in front of me, a thick, protective, transparent wall. In response, Dawson jumps to his feet, he and Howie whipping out their pistols to fire on me. But I enchant their weapons too.
Dawson’s gun goes off, but its bullet has a mind of its own now, darts across the room in the other direction, lands in the folds of Colletto’s stomach, and he gasps, falls over. Dawson’s gun fires again, shoots Colletto’s minion beside him, as well as the two standing above him. Howie grabs Dawson’s arm, shouting in his ear for him to stop, to stand down.
But it’s too late.
The two remaining D Street thugs leap to their feet in response, pull out their guns, and fire. They take out Kerrigan, then Sullivan, then O’Donnell left to right. And then they take down Howie, who falls into a pool of crimson. Dawson’s head splatters, a burst of red against the green-striped wallpaper of the far wall. A rogue bullet lodges into Gunn’s leg from the cross fire and sends him crumpling to the ground as he screams, “You bitch!”
The two standing D Street men turn their pistols on Gunn on the ground, but he rolls over and grabs Howie’s fallen gun. With two hot bullets, he takes the pair down. Both bodies slump and collapse like dead weight onto the couch.
I wait a moment, and then another, my heart pounding in my chest, blood surging to my ears.
Gunn still has Howie’s pistol in his hand. He keeps it trained on me as he looks down at his wound. It’s high, a shot right into his thigh, and the blood is thick and black as it seeps through that gray pinstripe suit. He presses his hand into his leg, trying to stop the flow, and gasps from the pain. I almost feel bad for him, until I remember it’s Gunn.
I focus on the pistol half-propped on his leg, loosely held in my direction with his trembling fingers, and whisper, “Fly.” The pistol floats like a cloud above his head and flings itself into the corner, as Gunn gasps again, winces from his pain.
I decide that I’m safe, release my protective wall, and cross the room for the money. Colletto’s near-overflowing bag of cash is lying half-open, discarded on the floor beside his chair, and I grab it and throw it over my shoulder, ignoring how a splash of blood oozes from the strap onto my shirt. Just go. Leave him.
But I turn to face Gunn. He’s now wrapped around his leg, shaking, sweating, those white-blue eyes as haunting as ever.
“You’ll pay for this,” he mutters between heavy breaths, but still manages to look me in the eyes. “I’m going to make you pay—”
I bend down in front of him. “Something tells me that’s not happening.”
“You’re nothing but backwoods trash,” he roars, but then devolves into a series of hacks. “I could have given you everything, and you threw it all away.” He stops, his flailing lungs trumping his angry mouth.
I stare at him, the man who has driven me to the brink, who turned me around so much that I forgot which way was up. Murdered Alex, threatened me and my family, disposed of anyone and anything that stood in front of him.
Not that it’s all his fault. I was far too willing to lose my way.
“Because you’re a terrible human being,” I say. “Because you’re a monster.”
At that, Gunn snaps a laugh. “If I’m a monster, Joan,” he says bitterly, “then what the hell are you?”
And then I can’t keep my anger in check anymore. I lunge for his face, grab his jaw, and push up his chin, just like he did to me in his office, when he thought the world couldn’t touch him. I spit his own words from before right back to him. “A survivor.”
I release him, go to the corner, grab his pistol, and toss it onto the couch, giving him an easy way out, an alternative to bleeding to death. And then I rush to the door, open it, and look back to Gunn once more. “Good-bye, Mr. Gunn.”
I close the door with a click, peer at Gunn through the little glass window in the door. And then, quick as lightning, I take my switchblade, hold my breath, and dash it quick across my palm. I press my hand into the wall, run it slowly over the door, from one side of the frame to the other, and whisper those words from the night Mama died, those words that saved me in the clearing, the words that will always be a part of my being—of blood, intention, and sacrifice: “Less of me, an offering to cage for eternity . . .”