“We don’t have secrets from each other,” I reminded him with a gentle nudge.
The sunlight was too bright, so I closed my eyes, listening to the soft slur of Ash’s light accent.
“I still dream that I’m standing in the spotlight, but when the music starts, my body doesn’t move. It’s like I’m frozen. I’m trying to move, but I can’t. And then . . . then Sergei is there, sometimes Oleg too, and they’re laughing and laughing. Once, the girl was there as well, and they pointed the gun at her and then at me, deciding who they’d shoot first.”
I felt moisture in my eyes and I opened them to find Ash staring at me, tears running down his cheeks, as well.
“You mustn’t give up on your dreams. Not because of those monsters. Never because of them.”
And I wasn’t sure which of us had spoken . . .
Ash
I SAT BY Laney’s bed, watching the steady rise and fall of her chest. I could see traces of dried blood in her hair. She’d hate that. A white bandage covered the left side of her head, one forearm heavy under a thick blue cast.
She’d been lucky, they said. The bullet had sliced across the surface of her skull and knocked her out. But he hadn’t killed her. She’d wake up soon.
I was lucky, too. Luckier than I deserved. My St. Christopher had been folded in half by the impact of Sergei’s bullet. X-rays confirmed that I had a cracked sternum which made it painful to breathe. Black and purple bruises were spreading across my chest, and they kept checking my EKG. Something to do with a trauma injury to the chest, I didn’t care.
Up and down. Up and down.
For hours, I watched Laney breathing. I watched her living. And that was enough.
My left hand throbbed, wrapped in bandages. Sergei had shot off the tip of my index finger. They hadn’t found it, so it was probably still at the theater. I felt sorry for the janitor. Sweeping up candy wrappers was one thing; blood and body parts probably wasn’t in their contract.
Up and down. Up and down.
The police had talked to me while I was still being treated. I couldn’t focus and didn’t really understand their questions. I didn’t care either. Laney’s dad told me that Angela was helping. But nothing mattered—just Laney.
Her father was sitting on the other side of the bed, and he kept glancing toward the door, expecting Laney’s mother at any moment. She’d been out of town with Laney’s sisters, but now they were all on their way.
He cleared his throat.
“We have a witness—one of the ushers says you threw yourself at that piece of shit while you were unarmed.”
My head jerked up, surprised that he’d spoken to me. I was still waiting for him to throw me in jail for getting Laney hurt.
His face reddened and his eyes watered as he stared at me.
“You saved her life.”
I cocked my head to one side, weighing his words and finding them sincere, but so wrong.
“Sergei came to Chicago because of me. Laney would never have been in danger otherwise.”
“Son, I can see that you’re not the kind of man who goes looking for trouble. There are a lot of fucked up people in this world, and bad things happen to good people. I don’t know why and neither does anyone else. My wife tells me that God knows. Well, good for Him, ‘cause it sure as shit makes no sense to me.” He paused. “But I know that my daughter is alive because of you.”
Then he stood up to shake my hand.
“Welcome to the family, son.”
It was so unexpected that I just stared at him like an idiot until I realized that I’d left him hanging. I stood painfully, trying not to breathe too much, and shook his hand.
A moment later, the door was flung open and Laney’s mother and sisters poured in. Their questions rattled like rain on a tin roof and I couldn’t concentrate.
Thankfully, her dad was used to it and worked his way through the questions one at a time, until they were all satisfied that Laney was in no immediate danger.
“But what about the big boss?” asked Bernice. “The mafia boss?”
Laney’s dad grimaced.
“We think he’s the reason Boykov was here in the first place. The big boss, Volkov, is cleaning house. It looks like he got tired of the mess his second-in-command was making. If Ash hadn’t taken him out, Volkov would have.”
Their wide eyes switched to me.
“The boy saved our Laney.”
That was it—I was engulfed in hugs and kisses that made me groan with pain. Laney’s dad peeled them off one by one, explaining that I was injured, too. Then they fluttered around and I wanted to wave my hands until they scattered like starlings. They meant well, but being surrounded by so many people made me twitchy.
I leaned forward, concentrating on Laney’s face, and when I looked up again, much later, they’d all gone.