stop, my brain takes this very moment to die and I take my thumb and dig it right into the spot where I shot him. I know exactly where it is because the spurting of blood is ingrained in my head for the rest of my life, which is probably only about ten minutes long with the way Tex is now hollering.
Free from Tex, I run back toward the door, but Delta sends a punch that meets my face so hard that I drop to my knees and fall onto my back.
I’m going to die.
This is it.
Death is coming for me.
“Boss!” someone shouts as the door flings open. If I weren’t currently lying on my back questioning how hard it would be to become part of the floor, I might’ve made a dive for it. “Someone was trying to break into the place. I think it’s a cop.”
A cop? Did Father send someone for me after all?
“Put the cop in the holding room.”
“The door’s broken on the one. The only room we have is the one the chief’s kid’s in.”
Tony sighs. “Must I do everything all the time?” he asks as he heads out the door. “Shepherd, watch the kid.”
While I roll around on the ground and question if my lungs have given up their main job of keeping me alive, Shepherd goes over to the couch and casually sits on it while playing on his phone.
“Can you breathe a little quieter? Your wheezing is ruining my game,” he says.
“Fuck… you…” I whisper.
Since blood is running down my throat, I roll onto my stomach and watch it drip on the ground for a moment before I start crawling just a little bit toward the door in the hopes he doesn’t notice.
“Where are you going?” Shepherd asks.
“D-Disney,” I choke out. “I heard they’re having a special on Go Fuck Yourself ice cream.”
“My favorite kind,” he says.
I roll a little bit closer to the door as he continues to play on his phone. So far, he hasn’t gotten up to do anything, so any inch I can accomplish is an inch closer to freedom and an inch farther from him. Once I’m halfway across the room, I push myself up and run for the door. Just as I go to open it, the door swings inward, slamming into me.
“Fuck,” I hiss as I grab for my already throbbing face.
“Are you watching him?” Tony asks.
“Of course. I was watching him run into the door,” Shepherd says as he walks over to me and grabs my wrist.
“Our new guest has decided to take up residency in our five-star suite, so I need you to keep an eye on the kid,” Tony says.
“I’m not a babysitter,” Shepherd growls. “Have Rod do it.”
“Rod’s a fucking idiot that’ll lose him in an hour,” Tony says as he snaps a handcuff over my wrist. “Cuff him to something.”
Shepherd just stares at Tony, clearly unimpressed with the turn of events. Oh, but nothing compares to the look on his face when Tony snaps the other end of the handcuffs onto Shepherd’s wrist.
Tony claps his hands together with a gleeful look on his face. “Situation’s solved! Now you don’t need to find something sturdy enough to lock him to. If you lose him, it’s going to be your body they find in the fucking river, not his.”
Shepherd stares at him until he leaves. Then he turns to stare at me, which makes me even more uncomfortable. With a horribly loud sigh, he heads toward the door, yanking me after him.
I stumble as I try to keep up while my body aches. But I get my feet under me and follow him. “Can I go to the bathroom to clean up the blood?” I ask as I wave to the blood still dripping from my nose.
Shepherd has turned silent again as I’m taken down the hallway and into a small room with a desk. He shuffles some papers around, clearly planning on going about his day while pretending like I’m just a growth that doesn’t need to be checked out.
“Can I please have a tissue or something?” I ask quietly.
He hands me a sheet of paper that I stare at. Am I really supposed to wipe my nose with paper? But when he sits down and turns on a computer, it’s clear I’m not getting anything else.
Awkwardly, I stand there with my paper as he starts messing on the computer.