Eighty-Eight

Sabrina lunged forward, faking with her left hand in order to draw his attention. Estefan turned his head and lifted his hands to block the attack, leaving the left side of his face vulnerable.

She jabbed fast with her right hand, burying the pike in his eye, its trajectory cut short by the side of her fist as it punched into his socket. She let go even as he screamed. It was the kind of scream that told her she’d only managed to wound a rabid animal instead of put it down. There was a sickening popping sound, followed by a gush of something warm and thick against her hand. Leaving the pike, she planted her hands on his chest and shoved, sending him tumbling over the back of the settee he’d been sitting on when she arrived.

He reached for her as he fell and she stumbled back, hips slamming into the vanity at her back. Her hands skittered along its surface until she found what she was looking for. The hairbrush.

Estefan lay on the floor between her and the door, hands clutching at the pike she’d driven into his eye, moaning as blood, turned a yellowish orange by the viscous fluid it was mixed with, ran down his face.

She finally managed to unscrew the handle from the paddle of the brush. It was hollow and something was inside. Please …
please … please …

Shake a tail feather, darlin’—that ain’t gonna hold him off for long …

Dumping it out with shaking fingers, she closed her fist around what was inside. A key. Lydia’s key.

Run.

She dropped the dismantled brush and moved, skirting around the settee, sights zeroed in on the door. She wasn’t sure if the key would even work, but she had to try. Staying here was suicide.

Estefan was stretched out between her and the door. There was no going around him, and even as she took the leap she knew what would happen. His hand shot out and snagged her pant leg, and she went down hard, chin clipping the coffee table as she fell. She clamped her teeth together to keep them from breaking but even so, she felt them crack, blood filling her mouth so suddenly that she gagged. The key bounced out her hand, spinning across the hardwood floor.

She flipped over, drawing her knee to her chest to hammer him in the face with the heavy sole of her boot, but he was still lying flat on his back, his hand an iron clamp around her ankle. The gun she had hidden there bit into it, metal grinding against bone. The moment his hand tightened around her ankle, she knew he’d felt it for what it was.

“Naughty, naughty …” he said, rolling onto his side so that he could grab her with two hands. She could see that he’d pulled the pike from his eye. He was grappling with her boot, trying to pull it off to get to her gun. He was too far away for her to deliver a kick that would do any real damage, so she changed course, bringing her heel down on his hands, breaking his grip on her.

It all happened in a matter of seconds and she scrambled back, the LCP falling from her pant leg onto the floor between them, but he was closer, and the bloody grin he gave her said he knew it.

Time to get dirty, darlin’.

Wade’s voice sounded strangely composed, a spot of calm in the panic that swirled inside her head and she listened, popping forward to deliver a superman punch to his damaged eye just as his fingers closed around the grip of the gun.

The momentum of the blow stunned him, landing her on top of him and she straddled his chest, raining blows down on each and every part of him that she could reach.

He flipped her and she was suddenly on her back, staring up at him no more than a moment before she was seeing stars again, delivered by the fist she caught against her temple. Another blow glanced across her cheekbone, but it was enough to stun her. Slow her down.

He was between her legs, saying something, taunting her, and she blinked stupidly, trying to clear the buzzing that muddled her brain. He hit her again—a vicious open-handed slap meant to stun and shame her before he wrapped his hands around her neck to squeeze.

She brought her fists down on his forearms, trying to break the hold he had on her throat, and it worked for a moment, loosening his grip enough to allow her to take a hurried breath before he re-applied pressure.

She used the breath to clear her mind, allowing her to push panic away just enough to remember her training. Kicking her leg straight up, she popped her hip off the ground, angling it enough to hook an ankle around his neck. Using her own body weight as a fulcrum, Sabrina levered herself up and over him until she straddled his chest.

Using the momentum of the switch, she barreled down on him, breaking the hold he had on her throat. She swung hard with heavy fists, feeling things break and bleed beneath her hands, her training and technique giving way to blind rage. She beat him until he stopped moving, stopped trying to protect himself. And then she took the chance to roll off of him, fitting the LCP in her hand as she did, coming up with it pointed squarely at his face.

Do it, Melissa.

Wade’s tone had gone dark—no longer playful, no longer serene. It was a command, and she felt the momentary tension of her finger as it tightened around the trigger, ready to do as he said.

Kill him. Do it now.

Church had warned her that the gun was a last resort. A gunshot would alert Alberto Reyes that something was wrong, and she’d lose the element of surprise.

There was a pillow a few feet away on the bed. She could see herself dropping down to her knees to press it into his face, the barrel of the gun deep in its folds. She could pull the trigger then, couldn’t she? She could kill him and no one would hear a thing.

That’s the way, darlin … put him out of your misery.

Blood dribbled down her chin and her teeth ached almost as bad as her hands. She looked down at them, her fingers shaking, knuckles split open and weeping, more than one of them broken. As bad as she felt, he looked worse.

Estefan’s nose, smashed into his face, was nearly as swollen as his eye, both oozing blood and other bodily fluids. His face was lumpy bruised knots sprouting up under broken skin, mouth open in an effort to keep breathing, and she could see how much it cost him just to take a breath. She could hear the gurgle of blood in his throat.

Dropping the pillow, she took her finger off the trigger.

You can’t let him live, darlin’. You know that.

Tucking the LCP into the small of her back, she focused on finding the key, blocking out the truth she heard in her head. Estefan was attempting to roll over onto his side, probably so he wouldn’t drown in his own blood. His mouth was moving, broken and mangled—the words sliding from it sounding as wet and fat as slugs. She couldn’t understand them, but she knew he was talking to her.

You walk out that door with him still breathin’, you’re gonna regret it.

She knew Wade was right, but she redoubled her efforts, lifting the dust ruffle on the bed to look beneath it.

There.

She had to wriggle under it in order to reach the key and when she came up with it, she found Estefan on all fours, head hanging low between his shoulders, blood and mucus a constant drip from his mangled face.

He was still talking, but she just added his voice to Wade’s and ignored him too.

At the door she shoved the key into the lock and took a deep breath and a look over her shoulder. Estefan was on his knees now, facing her, glaring at her.

Please. Please let this work …

She turned the key and the lock gave way.

“… over,” he said behind her, the words sounding like they were too big for his mouth. “… never be over.”

Told ya so …

She didn’t answer. Didn’t give either of them the satisfaction. She just pulled open the door and stumbled into the hall before pulling it closed with a quiet click.