LUKE SAW KELSEY just before Abby yelled, “Gun!” He started that way, shoving people out of his path. When Cox started shooting, he made it behind a barrier, wishing he had a weapon as he saw security people fall. He saw Rollins go down. The governor fell onto the stage and rolled off, smacking the ground hard. Then Luke saw an opening. The security officer closest to him ran for the fallen governor.
With Kelsey focused on Abby, he could get behind her, maybe distract her enough for Abby to take a shot. He leaped over a barrier and scooted past the bloody governor, pausing for a moment, but there was nothing to be done for the man.
He heard Abby trying to talk to Kelsey and Kelsey not having any of it. He briefly considered his options. But there was no time. He had to act or Alyssa was dead —of that he was sure. Here, closer to the stage, was another dead security guard.
Luke focused on Kelsey. The stage was waist-high; he could easily grab the woman. But if he jostled her wrong . . .
He eased toward her as Alyssa raised her high-heel-clad foot and stomped down hard on Kelsey’s foot.
Kelsey screamed and Alyssa wrenched free. Kelsey pointed her gun, but it was Abby who fired, striking Kelsey in the shoulder. She lost her balance and toppled backward off the stage. Luke grabbed for her, but all he could do was slow her fall.
Her gun bounced from her grasp, and despite being hurt and bleeding, she still tried to scramble for the gun. Luke grabbed it first and shoved it into his pocket. He then pulled out some plastic restraints he carried with him. He quickly tied her wrists and was about to check her wound when a San Luis Obispo cop appeared.
“I got this; I got this.”
He gave the officer the gun and looked around for Abby.
She was nowhere to be seen.
Abby saw Kelsey fall toward Luke, and her first impulse was to go toward him and help. But Alyssa, showing an agility Abby never would have thought she had, climbed down from the stage and started to run. It wasn’t fast —in fact it was almost comical. She had on high heels, but the sight was such a shock to Abby she hesitated a second.
“Hey!” she yelled, holstering her weapon and leaping after the First Lady. She reached her quickly and grabbed her shoulder, spinning her around.
Alyssa faced her with a look of pure fury and raised her arm. The sun glinted off the blade of a knife as Alyssa jammed it toward Abby’s chest. Abby shifted, and the blade missed its intended mark but still struck Abby’s shoulder and upper arm, jarring her and inflicting stinging numbness that made her left arm useless. But Abby didn’t need her left arm. Her anger matched Alyssa’s, and she brought back her right fist, behind it the anger and frustration of nearly twenty-eight years, and punched forward, smacking Alyssa square in the nose, feeling the crunch of cartilage.
The First Lady of California went down, falling back into a planter like a sack of potatoes. Security appeared. At first it looked to Abby as though they were angry because she’d slugged the First Lady. But their attitude changed when they looked from the woman on the ground to her.
What was wrong? she wondered as things slowly got hazy.
Panic struck Luke like a bullet. He leaped up on the stage and looked around. He caught sight of Abby at the edge of the platform and jumped down, sprinting for her. He saw her land a knockout blow and Alyssa go down. Elation turned to fear as he reached Abby, and she turned to him, and he saw the blood spurting from her arm.
Abby stared at Alyssa on the ground as dizziness hit. She felt wobbly; then strong arms gripped her, pulled her away. It was Luke, but there was blood, so much blood.
Was Luke bleeding?
Strength fled and she was so weak. “Luke, are you hurt?”
The pain in his eyes pierced her soul, but her eyes were so heavy, Abby couldn’t keep them open, and everything faded from her view.
Blood —there was blood everywhere. He held her as her knees crumpled beneath her. She said something he couldn’t hear and then fainted away. Luke knew they had to stop the bleeding from the wound in her arm. His surroundings seemed to disappear as he applied the pressure needed to stanch the flow of blood. Her face was so pale. Luke prayed as he had never prayed, and then Woody was there with an improvised tourniquet.
Woody and Mike had to move like football players to get through the station and out to the platform after they heard the shots. People were being herded out, and they were going against the flow. When they got to the platform, the crowd thinned out.
Then Woody saw Abby. It felt like a kick to the gut to see all the blood. He rushed forward and fell to his knees at her side. He saw Mike rush to Alyssa, but at that moment Woody couldn’t care less for Alyssa.
He took off his belt because he saw that what Luke was doing didn’t seem to be helping. Quickly Woody made a tourniquet with his belt as medics arrived. His face felt wet with tears, and his chest hurt. She was the daughter he’d never had.
“Oh, Lord, it can’t end like this!”
For only the second time in his life, as he pressed the wound to stop the blood, he opened his heart and prayed.