Page 25 of Kingpin

His voice sounded angry. Agitated. Frustrated. So, I decided to listen. I clutched the gun close against my body as Israel threw open a random door in the hallway before setting me down on my feet. He gripped my shoulders and backed me into the room. He took the gun from my hand and checked the magazine before cocking it and giving it to me.

“Unless it’s me, you point, and you shoot. I don’t care who it is,” he said.

My eyes fell to the dark stain on his thigh. “Israel, you’re hurt.”

“Stay. Here.”

He slammed the door in my face, and I squealed. I drew in quick breaths as I heard footsteps skittering along the warehouse floor. I took a few steps back until my body hit the metal shelving in the storage room Israel had hidden me in. I leveled my gun at the door, and I stood there.

I waited.

Looking for anyone that might cross my path.

With every bullet that rang out, another tear slid down my cheek. Israel was already hurt, and there was no telling who else had gotten struck by a bullet. I tried to control my breathing. I tried not to make a sound. But when thunderous footsteps rushed down the hallway, my heart froze in my chest.

Unless it’s me, you point, and you shoot. I don’t care who it is.

His voice echoed off the corners of my mind. I latched on to them as the doorknob in front of me began to wiggle. They pulled the door before they cursed, and for a split second, I thought I recognized the voice.

No. It can’t be.

I slowly lowered the gun as the person on the other end tugged harder. When they cursed again, there was no mistaking it. I knew that voice. I’d grown up with that voice.

Why would my uncle order a hit on Israel’s warehouse?

“Hey!”

I heard my husband’s voice boom down the hallway, and the doorknob stopped moving. I swallowed down my sigh of relief as a gunshot whizzed down the empty expanse. I heard the person in front of the door grunt before they scurried off, heavy bootsteps falling away from me. Two more bullets sounded. Then another. And another. I wondered if Israel was hurt any more than he already was. I wondered if anyone had been killed. Finally, after what felt like hours of chaos and insanity had ensued, everything stopped.

Everything fell deadly silent.

11

Israel

I kept replayingthe afternoon in my head as I washed down in the shower.

I looked at my thigh, where the bullet had grazed me, and I silently vowed revenge on whoever decided to set their sights on me. I racked my brain as to what the hell could have happened. How those men could have gotten past the outer defenses of the warehouse. I thought about Brianna and how she could have gotten hurt. How that could have been the end of her, in the blink of an eye.

Brianna.

My back stiffened in the shower and I turned the water off. Something had been off about her ever since we’d met. I couldn’t explain it other than a gut feeling. Over those three weeks, since all of the shit had kicked up, she was the only thing that had changed. I took her as my wife, and all of a sudden, I was being attacked from all directions.

Something didn’t add up.

“Israel?”

Her voice fluttered through the bathroom door as I stepped out.

“Yes?”

“Is my purse in there?”

My eyes fell to it on the bathroom counter. “It is.”

“I’m sorry to bother you, but could you get my phone out of it? I want to call my father and let him know I’m okay. I’m sure news of what happened has already spread in the community.”

I wrapped a towel around me. “Give me a second to find it. Your purse is pretty big.”

---