Page 3 of Made Man

“Down!” Tony shouts from the trees.

I roll to cover Mira, but she’s already on her feet.

“Get down!” I shout, swiping for her, but she’s already running back across the bridge, leaping down into the mulch.

“Mira, get back here!” I stand, trip over my jeans, scramble to pull them over my ass. The gunfire just keeps going.

The shots are coming from her place, the first property as you enter our cul-de-sac. The iron gates are wide open, and two cars have their brights aimed at the door, lighting the front of the house like a stage. Rifle muzzles poke from windows, the glass busted out. Stucco explodes as bullets pockmark the wall.

“Mira, stop,” I bellow, hopping over the bridge railing, knees slamming to the ground before I scramble up and after her.

We race down the middle of the street—Mira, Tony, and me—the houses to our left and right lighting as we go. Somehow, Mira’s in the lead. She’s running into a gunfight.

I pump my arms harder, forcing my stride to lengthen, running faster than I ever have before.

Tony has a pistol drawn, trying to brace his forearm and aim as he sprints. “Range is hot, Mira,” he shouts. “Range is hot!”

She glances over her shoulder, slowing for a second. It’s all I need. I launch myself into the air and tackle her.

I try to twist her, protect her from the asphalt, but I have too much momentum and not enough skill. I slam her face down into the street. Her chin hits it with a crack. She screams in pain. The sound plunges into my heart, serrated, brutal.

“No, Mira, no. Stop. For fuck’s sake, stop!” I gasp for air, hooking my elbow around her neck, pressing my whole weight into her back to keep her trapped while she scrabbles and flails,fighting with all she has to throw me off and crawl forward. Warm blood dribbles from her chin onto my forearm.

“Don’t let her go,” Tony barks at me and stops in the middle of the street. He steadies his grip, inhales, aims, exhales, and shoots. Once, twice, three times. Yards away, men in black, crouched behind the open doors of their nondescript sedans, crumple and fall to the ground.

The silence is as sudden as a slap.

“Keep her there,” Tony orders.

Men stream from Mira’s front door and around from the back of the house. I absorb her kicks and the impact of her butting head as I watch her father’s men do a set change in her circular drive. They hoist bodies and carry them off. One struggles, still alive. I watch Ray, the guard who’s like a grandfather to Mira, put the cars in neutral and steer as other guys silently push them into Mr. Volpe’s windowless, six car garage. Another man, Vinnie by his height, hoses down the asphalt.

It all happens before the first neighbor gets the balls to poke his nose out of his house. Unsurprisingly, it’s not my father. He’s an expert at not being interested in shit that’s not going to benefit him.

Tony walks over to us. There’s no sign of his weapon, but he smells like gunpowder. “Let her up,” he says quietly, and I realize I’ve still got Mira pinned. She’s not fighting anymore. She’s crying.

My stomach clenches. I hurt her. I hop up, and she staggers to her feet.

“Fuck you, Wyatt,” she says, slapping away the hand I’d offered to help her up. She stumbles and then jogs for her house, snotty tears running down her face.

I stand in the middle of Rocking Horse Circle, my ears ringing, completely lost.

“No worries,” Tony calls out to old Mr. Benowitz, the only neighbor brave enough to come out to his porch. “Just kids setting off fireworks.”

Tony slings his arm around my shoulder and propels me toward Mira’s house. I numbly follow where he leads. Up ahead, Mrs. Volpe rushes outside, and Mira rushes into her arms. Mr. Volpe comes to stand beside them, and he glares at me with his cold fish eyes every step I take up his drive.

A fresh wave of adrenaline floods my system, screaming at me that I’m walking in the wrong direction, but Mira’s there, and that’s where I need to be.

As I come to the bottom of the stone steps leading up to the house, Mrs. Volpe peels Mira away and examines her face. “You’ve got a cut on your chin.”

“Wyatt tackled me,” Mira says through her easing sobs. “He wouldn’t let me go.”

Mr. Volpe’s glare takes on a different quality, his eyes narrowing almost imperceptibly. I get the sense he’s changed his mind about something.

“Posy, take her inside,” he says to his wife. “Get her cleaned up while I have a word with Mr. Foster here.”

Mira glances over, finally seeming to notice me. She immediately tries to come for me, but her mother has her by the arm.

“Daddy, he didn’t mean to hurt me. He was trying to stop me from getting hurt. He didn’t see anything. It was dark.” She’s pleading, her voice turning childlike as it rises with fear.

---