Page 75 of Beautiful Revenge

Fuck. She opened her eyes.

“Baby, EMS will be here soon, but I need to get you out of here. Can you move?”

“EMS?”

She frowns up at me for a heavy moment. I see it in her eyes when reality seeps in. Her head rolls to the side far enough to glance at the man she was talking to before it all went down.

Her body jolts. “What happened?”

I’m forced to press her shoulders to the ground to keep her where she is. “You hit your head when you fell. I need to get you the hell out of here.”

She pushes my hands away. Since I don’t want to wrestle her to the court and risk hurting her further, I pull her up and tuck her to my chest instead. We may be out in the open, but I’ve got my back to the mountains.

Three shots. I saw the whole thing go down and know the exact spot they came from.

Her death grip on my arm feels like she’s searching for a lifeline. She can’t get close enough as her body convulses with emotion. “He was shot?”

I put my lips to her ear. “He’s got a pulse. It’s weak but you’re my priority. The shots came from the mountains. I need to get you inside. Can you move or should I carry you?”

She tries to push into my chest closer if that was possible. “Gunshots?”

“From the mountains across the lake.” I climb to my feet and bring her with me, wishing I could shield her body from every angle. It’s taken guests a minute to figure out what’s going on, but Rob must have kicked it into gear. My staff is doing their best to calmly usher guests toward the main building. But the calm won’t last long.

The moment they see Roman Malloy bleeding onto the tennis court, panic ensues. Half the guests race up the hill, and the other half are in shock not knowing what to do. It’s the ones recording the entire incident on their phones that make me realize this moment will plague me until the end of time.

“I’m getting you the hell out of here.” I turn Harlow in my arms when her body wracks with sobs. Holding her to my chest with one arm, I bend far enough to scoop her up under her knees with the other.

Even though she’s fisting my open dress shirt at the neck and trembling in my arms, she says on a shaky breath, “I can walk.”

My hold on her tightens. “I’ll put you down in my office where I can lock you up. There’s no way I’m giving the shooter an open target.”

She hiccups another sob. “That was meant for me.”

We’re almost to the atrium doors when Police Chief Dean Moretti surges from the building but stops to hold the door for me.

He’s wearing an intense frown and sweaty workout clothes holding his comm in one hand and his duty weapon in the other. His gaze shifts from me to Harlow and back to me. “What the fuck happened?”

I met Moretti the second day I was an official resident of Winslet. I called the city for help on another crime, the sort I was not prepared to deal with on my own without instigating mass murder.

A family of racoons made the greenhouse their home, and since I planned to turn the space into a five-star restaurant, I needed them out. That was when I learned that small town police don’t just work fender benders, write speeding tickets, or read to second graders once a week.

They also moonlight as animal control.

A sharpshooter and gunshot victim isn’t something they deal with often. Or ever. At least not since I moved here.

I move aside to allow guests to file in and set Harlow on her feet but don’t let go of her. She doesn’t argue and presses into my chest.

“Three shots came from the mountains. I’ll tell you exactly where it came from after I get Harlow to my office. One was hit—he’s on the courts. He caught a bullet to the gut.”

Dean glances out the windows at the mess that’s currently ensuing on my property. “Three? That doesn’t sound like a hunter.”

I put my hand to the back of Harlow’s head and hold her to me. “It was no stray bullet, Dean. This was targeted.”

“My men are on the way. I’ll send them across the lake to canvass the area.”

Harlow shifts, pulling her face from where it was pressed against the skin of my neck and turns to Dean. “It was meant for me. I know it was.”

Dean’s frown deepens, but I don’t give him the chance to question her. “Let me get her settled. I’ll find you and tell you everything I know.”