stop them.
My hand dives into the front pocket of my hoodie, and I’m shocked to find my gun still tucked inside.
The moment my finger wraps around the trigger, I’m back outside Huckabee Foods, staring at a beautiful boy in a blue Hawaiian shirt, who is smiling at me with perfect white teeth. His light eyes sparkle under a canopy of black lashes, and I’m lost in them until his face contorts in pain. Blood explodes from his shoulder, and I don’t hesitate. I don’t think. I grab the machine gun off the dead guard beside me, turn, and pull the trigger, spraying two men and a sliding glass door with enough bullets to take out an entire army of meth-head gangbangers.
I’ve done this before, I tell myself.
I can do it again.
But I don’t have a machine gun this time. And I can’t be impulsive.
As the executioner raises his weapon, I realize that I can only get one shot off before the riot cops see me and take me out.
This is it.
I pull the gun out of my pocket.
Time slows down.
And I’m forced to make the hardest decision of my life in an instant.
Assassinate the governor and end the Green Mile once and for all but risk Wes still being executed in the process?
Or kill the executioner and give Wes a chance to escape in the confusion?
His legs aren’t shackled. He could slip between the vehicles and disappear into the crowd.
But how many more “accused” would die in his place? How much longer would the governor’s reign of terror last?
Do I sacrifice one life to save the others?
Or sacrifice the others to save the one?
My one.
My Wes.
My decision is made.
Ten Minutes Earlier
Wes
When Hoyt told me that “Ms. McCartney” came to get Elliott to introduce the governor, I knew she had some shit up her sleeve. When he wordlessly put me in the back of a police cruiser instead of walking me through the tunnel, I knew it must be bad. But when he pulled up behind another cruiser, a SWAT vehicle, and Mac’s fucking tank just to escort me into Plaza Park, that’s when I knew.
That dream was no fucking fluke.
That dream was planted by a certain little black-haired rag doll with a death wish.
As soon as the park comes into view, my mouth falls open in a silent curse. I’ve never seen so many people shoved into one square block before. The entire crowd is fighting and flailing and pounding their fists in the air as tear gas canisters sail overhead, and gunshots loud enough to hear inside Hoyt’s bulletproof cruiser ring out.
What the fuck have you done, baby?
I shake my head as adrenaline floods into my extremities, and panic seizes my lungs. My eyes scan the mob, frantically searching for a familiar heart-shaped face, but everything is just a blur of fists and weapons and smoke and mouths twisted in pain and anger.
I told you I’d get out of this. What the fuck have you done?
Hoyt glances at me in the rearview mirror. All the shaggy, unwashed hair in the world couldn’t hide the pity and remorse written all over his doughy face. I don’t have to pretend to be fucking terrified when I look back at him. I am.
Just not for me.
The tank barrels into the crowd, and the screams of the people in its path bounce off the windshield.
“Goddamn.” I cringe and cling to the seat with cuffed hands as people flood into the risers to get out of the way.
Hoyt and the other two vehicles pull into the park behind the tank, and the four of them form a perfect little square.
I don’t have to be able to see the ground to know what they’re protecting.
My fucking grave.
Hoyt throws the car in park and sits with his thick hands wrapped around the steering wheel. He doesn’t move. He doesn’t speak. And gauging from the amount of swallowing and throat-clearing he’s doing, he’s not real happy about what’s about to happen.
Or at least, what he thinks is about to happen.
Poor bastard. I want to let him in on my plan just to put him out of his misery, but I can’t fucking trust him to play along. He’s a worse actor than Elliott. Look at him. He can’t even pretend to be professional.
My attention is pulled away from Hoyt when I notice riot cops in gas masks, carrying full-body bulletproof shields, marching over to the car. The first three climb directly on top of our cruiser, standing