Strike Me Down - Mindy Mejia Page 0,101
hadn’t. Thank God she hadn’t.
When she reached the end of the red carpet, Logan stopped. Gregg’s attention was fixed on his wife. He didn’t notice Nora slide her good hand into her pocket.
“I thought you coerced Aaden into helping you, that you tricked him or threatened him. I thought he killed himself over the guilt.” Logan’s entire body shook with fury. “He was just a kid, and you murdered him.”
Gregg’s mouth curled into a sneer. “I’ve got ironclad evidence of your embezzlement, of laundering money around the world, and you have nothing on me, Logan. Nothing. Strike is mine.”
In reply, Logan lifted a hand into the air, revealing her phone and the app that was still recording, that must have been recording Gregg and Nora this entire time.
Gregg swung around, pointing the gun from Nora to Logan.
Nora didn’t think. She didn’t hesitate. She pulled the box cutter out of her pocket and plunged the blade into the side of his neck. The gun went off, deafening her, and one of the body bags behind Logan shuddered with the impact of the bullet. Gregg stumbled and grabbed his throat. Dark columns of blood seeped from between his fingers, but she didn’t see him fall. She’d already turned to Logan; Logan, who had refused to leave town; Logan, who’d found her in time to save her life; Logan, who slowly lowered the phone and stared back at Nora as her husband choked and writhed.
ALIVE
July 12, 2019
This is Logan and yes, spoiler alert, I’m alive. For all the fans who didn’t believe the police announcement, or the Associated Press story confirming my safety, or the pictures Strike posted to show everyone I’m actually fine, I get it. It’s been a little crazy lately. So keep your guard up and follow me over to this live feed.
The embedded link goes live, showing Logan sitting in a low chair with one knee up and an arm cocked on top of it. The plaster wall behind her is white and alive with the skittering shadows of sunlight filtered through waving trees. Logan wears a tank top and shorts, and her skin shows no marks or wounds. Her hair is slicked back, her face makeup-less as she looks unblinking into the camera.
“It’s me. I’m safe. Thank you.
“Thank you to the literally hundreds of thousands of you who responded to the appeal at Strike Down and were looking for me last week, and that includes the good people at the Minneapolis PD.
“Let me set the record straight. I wasn’t kidnapped. I wasn’t murdered. I didn’t go early onset dementia and wander off into a lake, not yet anyway.”
Logan pauses and narrows her eyes at the camera.
“Someone I once trusted with everything was trying to take me down. That person failed. That person is gone, and I have one message for all of you watching today.
“Fight. Everyone. Who. Holds. You. Down.”
Logan glances off camera, her expression softening, before she turns her attention back to the feed.
“I’ve learned a lot in the past few weeks, some of it wrenching, some of it beautiful. I’ve learned there isn’t one kind of strong. Strong is a refugee making a home for her family on the other side of the planet. Strong is putting your entire career on the line for someone you believe in. Sometimes strong is even letting someone else fight for you, trusting them with your life.”
Tears run down Logan’s face. She doesn’t wipe them away.
“No matter what strong means to you, find it. Find your strength and if someone tries to take it away from you, hunt them down. Make them fight. Be the one left standing.
“And never, ever apologize for winning.”
Logan leans in and smothers the camera with her hand. The feed ends.
NORA
THE BEACH was too white. It blinded, even from the shade of a wind-battered palapa, and made it almost impossible to see her laptop screen. Nora’s eyes watered as she looked away, into fronds as wide as her arm-span where tiny green lizards darted around with the speed and precision of hummingbirds. Beyond the palms the green stretched back and up, rising into a volcanic peak. In all the years she’d tracked money to Nevis, this tiny speck of island that cast shadows large enough to obscure billions, she never imagined it would be lovely.
Hurricane season had just begun, the innkeeper told them at check-in, but overhead the sky glowed a faultless blue. The beach was deserted except for two figures boogie boarding in the surf.