Erasing Faith(76)
My grip tightened on the gun, my body was poised to leap from the space.
The trunk creaked open…
And I fired.
Chapter Forty-Two: FAITH
PRETTY LITTLE PISTOL
“Fuck!”
I ignored his curse as I jumped headfirst from the trunk and hit the dirt. Instead of executing the perfect roll I’d intended — I mean, they did it in every spy movie, how hard could it be? — I literally landed on my face. This was no lithe, Catwoman-esque tumble. When I finally skidded to a stop, I was covered head-to-toe in dirt and had somehow managed to swallow a large clump of earth as well as several small pebbles. I moaned in both pain and mortification as I spat dust and grass tufts from my mouth. Scrambling to my feet, gun still firmly clenched in my right fist, I tried to stand tall as I spun to face my captor, but that was pretty hard considering I’d lost one high heel in my disastrous leap for freedom and was now wobbling on uneven footing.
I figured he’d have either run for the hills, terrified by my unexpected bullets, or at the very least be cowering in fear, lest I shoot at him again.
Sadly, I was mistaken.
He was leaning against the car, his arms crossed casually over his chest as if he had not a care in the world. His breathing rate was perfectly normal, while I was still heaving in oxygen faster than a freaking vacuum cleaner. Not a speck of dust coated his black-on-black jeans and leather jacket combo, whereas I looked like the creature from the Black Lagoon. But it was that goddamned crooked smile, fixed so happily on his face as he watched me hack up globs of soil, that really tested the limits of my sanity.
“You,” I spat, glaring at him and trying very, very hard to remind the less-forgiving parts of my psyche that first-degree homicide was a bad, bad thing that would send me to prison for a long, long time. The gun twitched in my hand.
“Me,” Wes agreed, grinning at me like we were old friends.
Yep. There was only one option here.
I’d have to kill him.
***
“Give me one reason not to shoot you,” I growled, my eyes narrowed on his face and my hands wrapped firmly around my gun as I aimed it at him. I tried to keep my gaze cool, clinical, but damned if he wasn’t even better looking than he’d been three years ago — a realization that pissed me off beyond measure. Light five o’clock shadow dusted his jawline, making it seem even more chiseled. His hair was slightly longer than it had been last time I’d seen him. I didn’t look in his eyes — I couldn’t bear to see what emotions they held — so I watched his mouth instead.
“Do you even know how to use that thing?” His smile was condescending.
Without taking my eyes off his face, I fired a shot into the dirt, missing his boot by mere inches.
“I don’t know,” I said, batting my lashes like a bimbo. “Do I?”
He lifted his hands in surrender, though his grin stretched wider. “So, the kitten grew some claws.”
“You think I’m joking around?” I took a step closer and my voice went arctic. “You ruined my life. I would be all too happy to shoot you. Honestly, it would be poetic justice.”
His eyes dropped to my torso, as though he could see through my clothes to the ugly, circular scar that lay beneath.
“Eyes up, *.” I gripped my gun tighter when his gaze lifted and met mine for the first time. It took all the strength I had not to react when our eyes locked — dark chocolate flashing against caramel, the connection instantly making the air around us sizzle with electricity. I felt a physical jolt move through my body, like I’d stuck one finger inside a socket, and all the fine, feathery hairs on my arms stood on end as my gaze, full of rage and distrust, burned into his dispassionate one.
His face was a mask, that happy grin he wore concealing every real emotion, just as smoke and mirrors hide a magician’s slight of hand. I could read nothing in his expression.
Some things never changed, I supposed.
He took a step closer to me and opened his mouth to speak. “Listen—”
“Stay back!” I shook the pistol as I moved away from him, keeping a distance of about ten feet between us.
“If I wanted to hurt you, I would have already.” His voice was exasperated.
“You kidnapped me,” I snapped, swallowing forcefully and trying to gather my composure.
“Well, considering you’ve got a gun trained on me right now, you can’t exactly blame me,” he pointed out. “I knew the only way I’d get you to listen was if I cornered you.”
“Except you didn’t ‘corner me.’ You threw me in a trunk.”
“You say potato, I say—”
“Shut up.” I waved the gun menacingly and he stopped speaking, though his grin grew even wider. I took a deep breath. “You were right about one thing. I have no interest in listening to anything you have to say.”
I backed away from him until I reached the driver’s side door, which he’d left ajar. He didn’t shift from his spot against the trunk, though his eyes tracked my every move. When I looked inside and saw the keys were missing from the ignition, I lifted my gaze to glare at him.
“Is there a problem, officer?” he mocked, raising his eyebrows.
“Do you have a death wish?” I shrieked, taking several steps toward him.