Page 136 of Moonlighter

“Eric—” The word barely leaves my mouth before I hear a loudbang.

Someone screams, but not me. I am already airborne, Eric’s arms clamped around me. The lights of the restaurant blur as he sweeps me deeper into the room, away from the window.

Bang. Bang.

Breaking glass. More screams. And they don’t stop.

“Get down,” Eric says as my feet touch the floor again.

My knees give way, and I sink below a counter, my back against a dark wooden panel.Wainscoting, my brain offers up, trying to make sense of something. Anything.

“Taking cover,” Eric says to dispatch. “Total of three shots fired.”

We’re so close together that I can hear the reply from his earbud. “Standby for instructions. One man on the ground. Emergency services notified and responding. Pieter is in pursuit of the shooter.”

“Eric!” I gasp. “We should help that man. Is it Mr. Khun? Did they—” I gulp.

“We’re staying put,” he says.

“Just tell me. Did they hurt him?”

The chaos of the restaurant has evolved from the high pitch of terror to the low murmurs of shock. Eric rises, putting a hand on my head as a reminder not to move. He stands there for a long moment, not saying anything.

“What do you see?” I squeak.

“Don’t look,” is all he says. “Donotlook.”

Later,I’ll barely remember the ride home. Pieter drove. Eric sat in back, where I pasted myself to his body, still unable to understand what just happened.

Mr. Khun invites me to dinner to explain why he’s going to break our signed contract, but on his way down the block, someone shoots him.

Eric and I left by the back door, but I heard Pieter say under his breath, “…brains all over the sidewalk.”

Why? No matter that Max’s grand theory looks more true by the minute. What prize could possibly be worth a gunned-down tech manufacturer?

I have never shied away from a challenge. I never expected my job to be easy. But this? I didnotsign up for this.

And I’m terrified that I’m to blame. What if I hadn’t chosen him? Or what if I’d told Mr. Khun that it was late, and I didn’t want to come to Soho?

I spend the rest of the trip literally trying to rewrite the last two hours. It’s illogical to the extreme. But I do it anyway, answering his call again, telling him that tonight isn’t a good night to meet. Suggesting an alternate date…

We arrive at my building without incident. When we reach the penthouse floor, I don’t wait outside the apartment while Pieter and Eric check the rooms. I just march inside and head straight for my bathroom, where I close and lock the door. I turn on the cold water and pour myself a large glass, and then drink it all.

It takes a while until I can pull myself together. I change into a tent-shaped nightie and waddle out to my bed, getting in. But I don’t turn out the lights. I’m not ready to plunge into darkness with my thoughts.

Eric arrives a couple of minutes later, carrying a tray.

No, my stomach says immediately. It’s the first time I haven’t been hungry in…

Okay, I don’t remember the last time I wasn’t hungry.

Since my lap is gone, Eric puts the tray over my knees. I look down and see a bowl of egg drop soup that I ordered a lifetime ago. Eric has heated it to steaming hot.

“I know you’re upset,” he says quietly. “But you should eat this.”

I pick up the spoon and find that my body knows what to do. Before long, I’m scraping an empty dish and Eric is trading the bowl for a small plate of rice and chicken.

That’s all I can handle, though. After I eat a little, I slide off the bed and carry the tray into the kitchen by myself, abandoning it on the counter.