Page 91 of The Way Back Home

“G-g-give me the f-f-f-fucking phone and g-g-get on the f-f-floor. Y-y-you’re ju-ju-just like t-t-them.”

“No! Dalton, I’m not. I’m here for you, okay? Just put the gun down. We’ll talk—”

“Get on the fucking floor!” he yells, and there’s no stutter this time. Betty squeals and charges for him, ramming her tiny head into his leg, but he kicks her, and she lands with a screech and a wounded animal cry against the refrigerator. I gasp and move toward her tiny body, but the cool bite of metal against the nape of my neck convinces me otherwise. I stick my hands up, and lower myself to the ground, kneeling in front of him. Shards of broken glass pierce the soft skin of my legs. I swallow back a scream.

“Dalton, please. You don’t want to do this; you don’t want to hurt me.”

“Shut up, shut up, sh-hut up!” he screams smacking his temple with the butt of his gun. What seems like forever—but is more than likely just a few minutes—later, a dog barks at my front door, a sharp, loud report echoing around the porch outside.Zora. I breathe a sigh of relief, but it’s short-lived because if something happens to August, I couldn’t live with that. I can’t live with that.

I whimper. Dalton covers my mouth with a dirty hand that reeks of tobacco. He grabs my hair and yanks me to my feet. I cry out, but his hand tightens on my mouth. I feel as if I’m suffocating, drowning in fear, panic, and desperation. I stare at Dalton’s wild-eyed gaze in the reflection from the glass cabinets. I don’t even know this man. This isn’t the shy, sweet-natured veteran who’d shown up at my shelter asking for a job. This is a man ravaged by war, by violence and the demons in his head. Illness has raped his mind and left only madness in its place.

Glass shatters. August crashes through the door, and panic seizes my heart. Faced with a bigger threat, Dalton turns and releases his hold on me. I grab a knife from the block on the counter, and lunge at him. He screams as I sink the sharp blade into his arm. He raises the gun and fires. The report echoes around the small kitchen, and I dart out of the way, feeling the sharp sting of pain as my muscles protest their misuse. August is on his feet. The two men tussle and more shots go off, but August has Dalton in a headlock. He shoves the butt of the gun up under the other man’s chin. He squeezes. Dalton’s hand is still on the trigger, and a final shot rings out as the man slumps against August.

For a beat, we both just stand there, shaken, bloody, and then August lays Dalton’s inert body on the ground. His face is covered in blood, chunks of meat, and shards of bone. I gasp, and it hurts all over. Bile rises in my throat. My vision goes dark, my head spinning, over and over, as if it were a top. August takes a step closer, and I hold up my hand for him to stop but then the ground rushes toward me, and he catches me in his arms.

“Liv,” August cries out. My whole body is burning, set alight, razed by fire and pain.

“I don’t . . . feel so good.”

“Olivia, just stay with me. I got you, princess,” he says, but I slip through his fingers, into the black watery depths of fear, and pain, and then nothingness.

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

Olivia

SLEEP. Is that too much to ask for? All around me there’s an incessant beeping, the sound of trolleys, and hushed voices, and the cloying scent of flowers fills the room. There are warm hands, though—or at least there’s one warm hand tracing patterns on my palm.August. I open my eyes, blinking up at the stark white light above my bed.

I groan. My throat is dry and scratchy from misuse. My whole body aches, and my head feels as if it’s been stuffed full of cotton.Did I die? Surely Heaven wouldn’t be this annoying, would it? “Am I dead?”

August smiles. “You think I’d let them take you away from me? Darlin’, even God is afraid of Marines. He knows I’d beat down his door until he gave you back. I’m afraid you’re stuck with me a bit longer, princess.”

“I like stuck,” I mumble, more to myself than to him. Drugs cloud my head, making my thoughts foggy and incoherent.

“How you feelin’?”

“Like I got shot,” I say, giving him a sleepy smile. “I don’t ... I remember the pain, knowing I’d been hit and looking down at all the blood, but the rest is hazy.”

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