Page 183 of Make Me Trust Again
“John,” I plead. “Please, let him go. He’s just a child.”
Shadow barks, and there is something deadly in the sound as she jumps even closer to John. He yelps, clearly surprised, and stumbles back, pulling Kyle against his chest, the sound of tearing echoing in the air.
I suck in a breath, my heart thundering as my mind wraps around what just happened while John curses up a storm.
She bit him.
“Call off that beast of yours, Williams,” John mutters, glaring at us. With one hand, he’s holding Kyle in a headlock, his other one going behind his back. “Or I swear I’ll put the dirty mutt six feet under myself.”
He pulls his hand in front of him, and something metal shines under the light of the street lamp not too far away.
My heart flutters as fear grips my stomach.
“John…” I say slowly, too afraid to move a muscle, too afraid to breathe. “What are you doing?”
A gun.
He has a gun in his hand.
“Call it off!” John screams.
Even though Kyle can’t hear him, or see him since his back is to John, his body shakes in fear as his fingers curl around John’s arm, his eyes are locked on me, tears shining in them, making his fear that more palpable.
“M-mom… I wanna go h-home.”
My lips open, but no words come out. I don’t know what to tell him. I want to reassure him, but my gaze keeps going to that gun. It’s shaking in John’s hand as that anger inside him grows. Or maybe it’s the alcohol. I’m not sure. He’s reckless. Unpredictable. And that makes him even more dangerous.
We will.I sign, praying he can see it.Just stay still.
“Okay, just… wait.” Chase’s fingers slip from my arm as he pats the side of his leg, but for the first time since I’ve met them, Shadow ignores him, her attention still locked on Kyle and John as she slowly continues walking around him, eyeing her prey.
“You have five seconds. Five.”
“You’re hurting Kyle, so she’s not listening.” Chase takes a step closer. The movement is minuscule, his arms are lifted in the air, his voice steady. “Let him go, drop the gun, and she’ll stop.”
“Don’t tell me what to do with my son!” John yells, turning his gun toward us.
Chase steps in front of me, shielding me from John’s view, and raises his arms higher in the air as he nods. “You’re right. He’s your son.”
Calm.
Steady.
How can he be so relaxed when there is a gun pointed at his chest?
I want to shake him senseless.
I want to yell at him.
I want to hug him so tight and never let him go.
“Damn right. And you should remember that the next time you’re playing family. I’m his father.” John’s breathing is ragged; each word is accompanied by the jab of the gun in Chase’s direction. “I get to decide what happens with him, and I’m saying he’s going with me. You don’t get to steal him away from me.”
“I don’t want to go with you,” Kyle protests, trying to push the hand that’s holding him against John. “I want to go home with Mom and Chase! Let me go.”
The pleading in Kyle’s voice is like a punch to my gut. I peek around Chase as best as I can. “John, just let him go. You’re scaring him. Nobody is trying to steal him away?—”
“Like hell you aren’t!” Those blazing eyes shift to me, and I can feel the acid burn the back of my throat. “I told you, Rose. I warned you, but you didn’t want to listen. You can’t run away from me. You and Kyle belong to me. Always have and always will.”
