“I’d rather be a coward than do your dirty work anymore. I’m done, Father.”
“Fine, if you won’t, then I’ll have to.”
A muffled gunshot splits the air, but I don’t have time to react before I’m being shoved to the floor by Devin. He lands heavily on top of me, and smirks when I turn to look up at him in surprise. Did he just save my life?
“Stay down,” he murmurs, and uses his father’s desk to get unsteadily to his feet.
He grimaces, but stands tall and straight, and I realize he’s holding the gun. Devin’s breathing is labored, but he doesn’t falter. Is he hurt?
“No more, Father. I told you, I’m done.”
He squeezes the trigger and the loud sound of a gunshot fills the room just as the office door bursts open and Devin collapses to the floor.
“Father? Devin?” Sebastian’s voice reaches me, and I roll over, scrambling to check on Devin. “Ethan?”
“Sebastian, get over here!” I shout, and my heart jolts as I spot a dark patch of red blossoming on Devin’s chest.
He saved my life, and now he’s dying, bleeding out right in front of me. Sebastian rushes over to where I’m kneeling next to Devin and I apply pressure to the wound.
“Did it come out!” I snap, and Sebastian carefully moves his brother to check.
“Yes.”
I’m both relieved and worried at the same time, it’s a clean shot but it’s going to be harder to stop him bleeding out. I carefully maneuver him into an upright position and press firmly against his injuries from both sides with my palms. I could let him die, but no matter what he’s done, I’m not sure he deserves that. I’m more conflicted than ever, but Katy wouldn’t want me to let someone die if I could save them, even though this man is responsible for her death.
Sebastian is speaking in the background, but I focus on Devin, and keeping the pressure steady.
“An ambulance is on its way.”
I hear Sebastian move around the desk. “What about your father?”
“He’s dead. What happened, Ethan?”
“Your father killed Katy, and then he tried to kill me.”
Sebastian’s expression hardens at the mention of Katy’s name, and I wonder how much her death affected him too. She was his girlfriend, but first and foremost she was my little sister. The bleeding starts to slow, but so does Devin’s breathing.
“Fuck. How long until the ambulance will get here?!” I cut across before he can respond, and his expression turns fearful.
“They should be here any minute,” he says, and sirens cut through the air in the distance, moving closer.
Walking around his father’s desk and picking up the phone, he barks authoritatively into the receiver. “Security, let the ambulance in and send them straight to my father’s office.”
“Don’t die,” I tell him, doing my best to curb the worry building inside of me.
The door bursts open and paramedics rush in and quickly assess the situation.
“He’s been shot. Through and through. My father too, but he’s dead. Help him,” Sebastian fills them in, gesturing to me and Devin.
The paramedics move to take over and I stand and move away, letting them. Sebastian throws me a grateful expression as he leaves with them. I stand there silently, watching as they whisk Devin away and two more come in to collect his father’s body. I exit the room, feeling overwhelmed and in shock at everything that’s occurred in such a short span of time. I look down at my hands which are red and glistening with Devin’s blood. Overcome by the weight of what I’ve just seen and what Devin did, the image of how he shoved me out of the way of his father’s bullet. I sink to the floor, breathing heavily and shaking as I replay it in my mind. Devin killed my sister, but he just saved my life.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Ethan
My plan to disappear after doing what Devin wanted of me has been put on hold indefinitely. I still can’t stop replaying the incident in his father’s office over and over. He’s still in the hospital, but he’s recovering well. I’ve not been to see him, although I’ve been given permission to. How do I face him after all of this? What could I even say to him?
When Sebastian came to me after getting back from the hospital to tell me that Devin had been stabilized but was still unconscious he grilled me for every detail about it. It was a tense conversation during which I ended up showing him the footage I’d found and saved as evidence in case I needed to blackmail them further. I didn’t end up needing to, Devin had made the decision to turn himself in off his own back. I’m still not sure why I hung around to wait for information, but I couldn’t seem to bring myself to leave without knowing the outcome.
A couple of days after Devin was shot, Sebastian returns home from the hospital in a foul mood and confronts me in Devin’s room, where I ended up crashing after using his shower and borrowing some of his clothes. Luckily, he’s not too much taller than me, although his clothes don’t fit me as well as they do him. Devin is awake and it seems he’s told Sebastian about his plan to go to the cops.
“Devin told me about the deal you two made before coming back to the house. He’s insisting that he’s going to do it as soon as he leaves the hospital. The arrogant jerk won’t listen to me when I try to convince him otherwise. While I hate that he was a part of Katy’s death, and I know you do too, he can’t be held fully responsible for it either. I believe him now that it was an accident. It doesn’t make it better for me though, considering
