Page 77 of Last One Standing
By midnight, mostly everyone was passed out. Angel was lying on my lap, and I was rubbing my hand over his head. I couldn’t sleep. I’d tried, but it was a no-go. Noel was currently awake, he and Nick each taking turns keeping an eye on the monitors. Pika was out cold on a very large beanbag chair in the corner of the room, and Four had gone upstairs to be with Lizzy, having instructed us to text him if Colette called.
JJ and Mason were in the love seat talking about something while Shep and Gabe were asleep on the ridiculously oversized couch. I didn’t know where Matt or Phoenix had gone.
I was just starting to feel sleep pull me under when a beeping noise caught my attention.
“What the hell is that?” I yelped.
Angel jumped up, and what had been a quiet, calm room a minute ago turned into chaos.
“Intruders.” Noel was calm, focused on his laptop.
Nick came running into the room his laptop in hand. “I have three alert points.”
Three? What was going on? “Intruders?”
“We have cameras for when people turn on our street. Alarms when they reach the driveway. When it beeps, that means someone has stepped onto the property without our permission,” Angel answered.
“You don’t have a gate. Doesn’t that mean everyone who approaches is an intruder?” Pika asked.
“Yes, except…” Nick hit a button, and the TV split into three separate areas of the property. “Each alarm has a different sound and purpose. The one we just heard is from the cliffs.”
“The cliffs?” JJ shouted. “They’d be climbing from the ocean, then.”
“The other two are for the driveway and through the woods on the right side of the house.” Nick pointed out where there were figures skulking through the night.
“Why aren’t you all freaking out?” I grabbed Pika’s arm and yanked him to me.
“Because this house is the safest place for any of us. Watch.” Noel cackled as he typed on his keyboard, and I observed what appeared to be a long whip, maybe, swipe across the trees and take down three people.
“Holy shit!” I gasped.
Four came into the living room with guns of all kinds and handed them out to the brothers. Mason and JJ each took one as well, but Matt refused. He handed me a smaller kind of handgun. I’d never held a gun in my life and had no idea what caliber or anything it was.
“This is a .357 magnum snub-nosed revolver. Fairly easy to use. It’s loaded, just point and shoot.” Four’s gaze was intense. “Anyone that’s not us comes near you, shoot them.”
“What?”
“Point. Shoot.” He walked away before I could tell him I had no idea what I was doing.
I was gawking at the weapon in the palm of my hand. It was heavy, silver, looked like a mini cowboy gun, and I was supposed to use it?
“Hey.”
I glanced up into sweet brown eyes. “Stay with me, you and Pika. You’ll be fine.” Angel smiled.
“I can’t kill someone, Angel.”
He covered the revolver with his hand. “You won’t have to. Don’t worry.”
Pika’s eyes were wide as he stared at the screen, but Angel’s were soft. He wasn’t afraid, and I trusted him.
“Okay.”
“Keep it at your side, pointing down. Finger off the trigger, rest it alongside like this.” He positioned my fingers. “It’s just a precaution.”
“Yeah…of course.”
On the television, four people all in black were climbing over the rocks by the cliff. They walked maybe five feet; then their bodies went ramrod straight, they vibrated, and fell to the ground unmoving.
