Page 196 of Empire State Enemies

I almost feel bad for him. But then I remember that he’s pointing a fucking gun at me.

My hands go up. “Deano, come on, put that down,” I plead, my whole body quaking with fear.

Grace and I stand there, frozen like statues, scared shitless. It’s dark, there’s no one around. We’re totally at his mercy.

I wonder how much it hurts to get shot. Do you feel everything or does the shock make you numb?

“Why . . . what . . .” I can’t even string a sentence together. My body feels like it’s been dunked in Connor’s ice bath.

I feel like I might pass out or puke my guts out. I can’t even scream. Fear’s got me by the windpipe, muffling my cries, my breath, my ability to think straight.

But my sense of smell still works, and I can smell the stale cigarette stench coming off him. I hate that this might be the last thing I ever smell. Talk about adding insult to injury.

Grace clings to my side, her nails digging into my arm. I wrap her in my arms, holding her tight, in case she tries to run. The look on Deano’s face says he’s got nothing to lose. Maybe he wants us to give him an excuse, a reason to pull the trigger.

“While I was behind bars, thanks to you, you’ve been cozying up with your dream guy, right, darling? Looks like you reallyturned Quinn’s world upside down that night, had him eating out of your hand. You think I’m clueless, that I don’t know you had a hand in putting me in that cell?”

“What?” I whisper, my voice drowned out by the sound of my heart.

He inches closer, the gun pointed right between my eyes. I let out a whimper that sounds like a dying animal, a sound that I didn’t even know I could make.

This is it. This is how I go out.

In a dark, empty park, at the hands of a man I think is a total moron, a guy I never should’ve gotten mixed up with in the first place. Oh my god, what would happen to Mom?

It’s bizarre, you never really know how you’ll react until you’re staring down a moment like this. Turns out, I’m a beggar—a chatty one at that. While Grace is quietly panicking next to me, I’m spewing a stream of desperate pleas, my words jumbling together in a frantic prayer. “Please. No. Don’t. God.”

I squeeze my eyes shut, steeling myself for the sound of a gunshot, bracing for unimaginable pain.

But it doesn’t come.

Instead, I hear a voice I never thought I’d hear again.

“I think you should be pointing that thing at me, don’t you?”

The low, velvety voice I’ve replayed in my mind during countless sleepless hours, crafting conversations that never happened outside my own head.

“Connor,” Grace squeaks.

“Connor,” I rasp, staring at him.

He’s here. In his tux. Looking like James Bond and the hot felon model guy rolled into one ridiculously handsome package.

“Don’t hurt them,” Connor says, his gaze fixed on Deano as if I’m not even there.

I want to run into his arms, to bury my face in his chest and just breathe him in. To replace the stench of Deano’s stale cigarette breath with the intoxicating scent of Connor.

His chest rises and falls with each labored breath, his jaw locked tight, eyes burning with fierce resolve. “This has nothing to do with Lexi or Grace. I’m the one who got you locked up. Your problem’s with me. Point that thing my way,” he says slowly and deliberately.

He takes a step toward Deano, his hands raised in a gesture of surrender.

Deano keeps his gun aimed right at me.

“Shoot me. You know you want to. I’m right here, buddy, yours for the taking. Why go near Lexi when you can have me?” Connor’s voice is steady, but I can hear the undercurrent of desperation.

Oh my god, he’s goading him. He’s actually trying to get Deano to shoot him instead of us.

“Connor, don’t,” I whisper. “Don’t.”