'Was it for redemption?

Was it for revenge?

Was it for the bottle?

Was it for the ledge?

Was it for the thrill of pushing my hope to the edge?

Why did love, why did love put a gun in my hand?'

"The bar?!" I blinked my wide eyes at the now-familiar neon sign, waiting for the last black dots to vanish and making sure to take all the details around before jumping to conclusions once again.

But no, I recognized the washed-out gray facade, the large windows letting glimpse already the crowded interior, and the shadows of the street that had sent shivers down my spine the first time I'd been there. I was sure we were at the 'Drillin' bar, and I let my stomach fall down lower.

It wasn't disappointment, just the weight of everything I'd kept pushing back and that hadn't got to lift with the too-quick motorcycle ride, along with the flutters of curiosity dying down. Maybe I also hadn't expected this kind of surprise from Blade...

He'd always been reluctant to bring me here, and nothing that had happened there was arguments to change his mind. So a surprise here?

"Yeah, the boss isn't around, so I've a last-minute job to do for him, and then, we beat feet." He shrugged casually, too casually when his dimple was peeking out. "Don't tell me you thought my surprise was here?!"

"You made me close my eyes and parked god knows where!" I gasped, my arm gestures widening, just like his smirk with each of my words, and he was wearing his full Cheshire cat's grin when I finished, "And you carried me all the way, saying I had to hold tightly because the ground was sloping!"

I didn't need to mention the road was flat all around, and that he'd held me by my butt, my legs wrapped tightly around him. The bad intention was already shining enough in his clear eyes.

"I've never promised anything," he defended with both his hands up, which looked everything but innocent, even now that he'd taken off his bandage.

"You're..." I shook my head, searching for the words.

Unpredictable, tricky, devious, crazy...

"My evil genie."

There were no better words as he threw me a wink, opening the door for me, and my stomach fluttered with the tickle of laughter. It was once more his bad intentions, his magic powers, that made the mess I was flying high.

He was already making me forget, and our date hadn't even started. So I followed him with a smile and our hands intertwined as we walked into the bar.

"It won't take more than three minutes," he explained, probably noticing my attention going straight to the same corner.

I'd been there quite a few times already, so my eyes barely skimmed over the scary-looking people in leather jackets scattered all around, not even widening anymore at the couples already making out on some booths, and I avoided the dark backside as the shivers down my spine weren't fading as fast as the marks on my skin.

The room wasn't as crowded as Friday, but still well-filled for a Sunday early night, and I smiled at a few familiar faces, while Blade nodded around, his dangerous aura making everyone notice us – unless it was the red stain on my white shirt?

"And while I leave you– Fuck! I forgot my gun." He stopped in his tracks, freezing my movements at the same time, though I wasn't sure if it was because of his sharp words or just because he dropped my hand to pat the pockets of his jeans and around his white tee-shirt before he quickly came to the obvious conclusion that he'd left it in his leather jacket with another curse.

"Y-you need it for the job?"

"Yeah, no, not for the job. For you, while you wait here."

It probably wasn't more reassuring, yet I still heaved out a breath of relief that pulled my muscles back into motion as I waved my hand. "Oh, it's okay then. I don't need it here."

He didn't even have to say anything; I saw all the times I'd found myself powerless in his eyes as his eyebrows went from a deep frown to a passive lift.

"I mean if it's only for three minutes. It would take you longer to go back to your house, and I'm fine here," I added, glancing around, but from his unwavering gaze to last week's blood stains on the floor and the many illegal substances everywhere, I was losing my arguments. "And I'm not alone, there's Kurt and Clinton." I pointed to the two men drinking at a table near our corner, and it didn't even make Blade's cocked eyebrow waver.

Okay, I didn't sound more convincing after Friday's incident. But it was different, and I didn't want to make him lose time for his job, and our date – even if I wasn't grounded anymore, I still had a curfew. So I tugged on his hand to lead him to our usual corner, stopping between the jukebox and the pool table.

"I won't move from here. I promise I'll stay here, safely, and nothing will make me move. I'll put a song, and you'll be back before the next one."

"I don't think they have 'Blue Moon' here."

He was hard to convince, though this time, his sly grin was slowly coming back.

"But you can find me another one, something badass for background music of my future success."

I didn't know if there existed a song that could fit his contrasts when just the mere gesture of his left hand brushing back his quiff was already full of nuances and contradictions, and the best music to accompany it was his raspy chuckle.

However, I still squinted my eyes at the buttons on the machine, my fingers grazing a few words 'running', 'prison', 'again'... before glancing back at him.

"I'm not killing anyone today, don't worry." He smirked at my finger that had stopped on a Johnny Cash song, although he was pulling out his knife. "It's just the big delivery," he explained, using the blade to fiddle the jukebox. "It should go smoothly."

Yet I noted how he kept his knife in his hand, folded, but within reach, and he must have sensed the chills running down my spine as he wrapped his other arm around my waist, pulling my back flush against his warm chest.

"But... I thought the delivery was last week?"

I remembered too well all the trouble it had stirred, and Gem... I shook the thought away, focusing on this present instant and maybe the next three minutes as I tilted my head back to find Blade's business gaze and smug smile, liking too much how his arm felt around me to switch position.

"It was the supplier delivering us, and now, we have to deal it to clients. I've already sold half of it to regulars, but today's big new one who'll take the rest."

Half a truck? That was a lot to deliver, a lot of 'dope', and a lot of money.

"It's some loaded music producer or something like that," he answered before I could even ask, no doubt close enough to read my eyes as he dived his head down to hover one inch away.

My head was spinning that way, trying to wrap around the reality of his world and all the questions it brought me, and mostly, swirling in the infinite of crystalline.

"You're sure it will only take three minutes?"

"Yeah, the storehouse is just outside, and Wayne's already waiting there." His chuckle tickling the top of my hair and his fingers skimming under my shirt, it sounded so simple and casual. "It's an easy job in comparison to what I'm used to, and it's the last test before the boss steps down."

Even if his whisper was still tickling my hair and the flash of his eyebrows widened the expanses of blue to get lost in, my head came back down to earth, figuratively and literally, and it wasn't because of the first part of his sentence, which implied that he was used to much harder, illegal and dangerous, tasks.

It was the 'boss' part that was becoming too real, Pete's eyes gleaming with hope and worry flashed before my eyes, along with the twinkle of envy and sick intention in Rye's smile, so real that for a second I caught sight of the latter somewhere in the shadows of the back corner. But in a blink, he'd disappeared.

It was surely my dazed eyes and overfilled mind, yet it still brought me a shiver of bad impression and the memory of his 'killer plan'.

With everything, I hadn't got the chance to tell Blade about it and ask how Rye knew Douglas Thornton, and suddenly, something was rushing me to do it.

"Blade, I–"

"Pick the song, baby. His minion's gonna be there in a minute. Apparently, the guy's a freak on the clock." He pointed to the jukebox, and my hand went automatically for the buttons, while my eyes flickered from the back of the room to Blade, probably flashing as much as the jukebox waiting for the next song.

I'd pushed too many things back, and it seemed they were all catching up with me today, already trapping my lungs and all my insides.

"Um, yes... but I..."

The ding above the front door filled the blank of my confused words and of the song I still hadn't picked, and Blade was already pulling away with another wink.

"Gotta go! Put the song, and we'll replay it after, when I'm back."

After three minutes and twenty seconds, that was the time indicated under my shaky fingers, and I told myself it was nothing as my heart was beating each split second, and twangy guitar chords I didn't recognize started echoing through the jukebox speakers. I tried to focus on the humming of the melody, yet all I could feel was the shiver on my skin growing like a trail of powder with the hubbub around and the thuds of steps resonating in my bones as all my being was on the lookout for what would catch up with me, who would catch up with me.

"I'm looking for Blade!"

Even with all my nerves on edge and the hair on my neck arisen, the voice caught me completely off guard. 

It couldn't be... not here, not now.

Yet I could have never imagined such bitter inflection in the voice that had declared so many sweet promises.

"Spencer!" I spun around, my wide eyes finding his brown ones on the other side of the room, and even in the distance, I could see the fire that had grown wilder, engulfing the soft chocolate shades and the warm amber.

"Dorothy, I told you I would fight for you and your honor, and I will."

My gaze flickered to my naked ring finger. It was the same vow as this morning, but it held much more vigor as the spark in his eyes had taken over everything. He was barely recognizable. His white shirt was creased, his hair disheveled, and his bouquet of flowers had been replaced by.... a gun in his hand.

Everything flashed before my eyes at this instant: the past month and everything that I'd pushed back like the disastrous trail that led to the crash of a shooting star, like the path of gun powder sparking too fast until both of my hands clutched my chest with the impact.

Nothing had happened yet, but the sharp pain was already spreading from a hole in my chest, my whole body freezing in a deadly shiver and a metallic taste rising from the back of my throat. It was the worst kind of pain, one that numbed everything, and yet I realized I could still feel more.

"Shouldn't you worry about yours first?"

I was speared with another scenario, the rest of my blood leaving my body and the muscles inside my chest writhing in agony when Blade stepped out of the crowd that was already forming.

He was walking confidently and leisurely, yet I still caught the fire in him too when he turned his head to me in a protective nod; it was in his killer grin and... the knife in his hand.

"It's not a gun that will bring it back... But if you have a death wish, it'll be my honor to fight." Blade lifted his chin, both men now facing each other with tense shoulders and narrowed eyes, the same fighting stances as last night, except they were holding deadly weapons.

"Blade! Spencer! Stop this!" The scream sounded torn straight from my guts, and it was as excruciating.

It silenced the whole room until it only remained the rhythm of the song that picked up, two clicks that stopped my heart: the knife being flicked open and the safety switch being turned off, and then, the two voices in sync.

"Stay out of it."

They both knew me better than that.

I hadn't last night, and now that it had all escalated because of me, there was no way I would stay out to watch which one of these two deadly weapons would win.

I couldn't even risk a second for a movement of their fingers. It was the mess I was who had led them to this, and as they both took a deep breath, I didn't. The same mess rushed in the middle of their explosion.

They didn't even see me coming, and I crashed straight in the middle of them, making them both freeze with the gun muzzle by my temple and the sharp edge of the knife at my neck, both points where the sharp bangs of my heart were thumping again.

Yes, as ironic as it was, it was less than one inch away from death that my heart restarted. I would have rather died if these two men were safe, and from the ghostly looks on their faces, it had been closer than I'd thought.

Both men were paralyzed, staring at me through wide eyes as I could feel the blade poke my skin and the imperceptible shakes of Spencer's fingers on the trigger. In fact, I could feel everything more acutely than ever, everything that was coming from Blade and Spencer, nothing else around, as I was squeezed in the middle of them.

My large eyes were jumping between widening brown and darkening blue. My lungs were choking on a mix of wood, spice, and alcohol that I couldn't even distinguish, and my ears were perking up at the sound of a curse word and the echo of a shallow gasp. Everything until the tensions and chills clawing at their bodies was reaching me, and as they pulled away slowly or sharply, I realized something.

We had two eyes, two lungs, two ears, two legs, even two kidneys, but only one heart, and mine was torn apart in this instant.

"DD, oh no, you're bleeding..."

"Fuck, Shooting star, you okay?"

"Can't you see she isn't? You've almost killed her! It's no surprise from someone like you."

"Someone like me?!"

"Yes, a murderer."

"The murderer isn't the one who almost shot her while playing with a toy he doesn't know how to use! But let me show you what a real murder is!"

"Let me show you how well I know how to play with guns!"

Lucky for me, I had two hands, and they were quick to react, contrary to the two boys trying to kill each other.

I didn't know if their grip had loosened with the shock or if I found an irresistible strength; it all happened too fast for me to comprehend anything. 

I only caught flashes: their eyes turning to me with too many emotions consuming them, the beats of my heart skipping in two directions, the same song still playing in the background, what my hands were gripping: the knife and the gun, one in each hand, and in-between all these details a spark must have lit up because the next thing I knew I was taking off like the shooting star I always was.

"Dorothy!"

Exactly as one month before, I ran faster at the call of my name, except that today there were two voices mixing: one seeping in through the way he'd traced over time, and the other cutting straight, both reaching inside my chest, and there, it wasn't emptiness I was escaping; it was an overflow.

Everything I'd pushed back was bursting there, every moment, every emotion, every feeling, every lie, and every truth, and it made me crash faster through the crowd, shoving through scary-looking people, large men, tall women, puffs of smoke, and shadows I couldn't make out in the rush.

I was heading to the back of the room and its labyrinth, and there was no way I would turn back when I heard the two men on my tail, the floor trembling with their steps closer and closer.

Every smallest way between packed people, I took them, every stool I passed by, I knocked them down behind me, and I even pushed some trays and bottles abandoned on tables. It was a miracle that no one tried to stop me, but they probably didn't dare to get in the way of such a crashing disaster, or they saw the weapons I was clutching to my chest.

Either way, it allowed me to reach the first hallway before the calls of my name could catch up with me, and I didn't hesitate one second before stepping into the shadows.

I wasn't scared. My worst nightmare had just unfolded between the two men chasing me, and there was no shiver in my back, not even a skip of my heart, which I'd probably left behind with them.

I only had that surge spinning in my veins and rushing me through endless turns, hallways, and corners.

It may not have been my best idea – if we could even call it an 'idea' when it hadn't come from my brain – to throw myself into this maze, especially when we considered what had happened the last time I'd got lost here.

Yet if I'd run outside, Spencer and Blade would have caught up with me already, while here, the calls of my names, curses, and slams of doors were growing farther like the song that must have been reaching its bridge by now, and when I was sure the only thuds of steps I was hearing were mine, I slowed down a little, trying to swallow the dryness in my throat and catch my labored breaths, the most silently possible.

It was impossible, just like finding a way out of this labyrinth and out of the chaos inside my chest. But my only priority was to keep Blade and Spencer away from these deadly weapons and from the mess I was. As long as they were away, they were safe.

As for my own safety, I didn't worry about it as I walked fast through the darkness without searching for a light switch, and I even tried a door that looked familiar.

"Please, let me go... You're hurting me."

The déjà vu in the words, the cracking cry, and the gloomy surroundings hit me with my first step into the room, yet it was only the impact of the taunting voice that stopped my rush completely.

"That's what makes it better. Now, stop fighting, negress!"

Paralyzed, I blinked my eyes in hope to dispel a blur of tears and memories that could be deceiving me, but there was no wetness along my cheeks, and my eyes were taking too clearly the silhouette several meters away like watching a flashback from another perspective.

Even if the voice held the same power, bouncing against the tall concrete walls of this courtyard, the words were different from the ones that had been imprinted in shivers into my bones. The lighting was different with only the faint dimness of the sun setting that couldn't reach this dark place, this same dark corner, near the same trash container, and it might have been the same unmistakable silhouette, but I caught no tailor-made jacket, only a pale shirt.

Most importantly, I wasn't the one trapped today; it was the small silhouette that I finally caught sight of behind the hovering figure, and there was no dark savior to rescue the girl like I'd been saved when the clink of a belt buckle echoed through her growing sobs, and a large hand disappeared too low between their mingling silhouettes.

"No, p-please... I b-beg you... I've n-never... let... let me go!" 

Wasn't there anyone to hear her wailings in this whole maze? Or at least the slapping sound that silenced her and that was so violent that it made my eyes pinch closed. "I won't t-tell... I–"

There was only me; I realized as the girl's head jerked to the side, and I met her wide eyes. 

In the distance, I couldn't recognize them, nor comprehend what they were pleading me, but the powerlessness they emanated still reached me in a well-known shiver, a shiver that this time didn't end up in my guts. It sparked from there, gaining intensity through the overflow of my chest, and moving my body in an automatic position until it ended on the trigger of the gun.

There, all it took was a second, an instinct, the memory of those dark eyes drinking in power that came with his superior tone, and...

"You won't–"

BANG!

The deafening detonation reached deep inside my chest, and probably a mile around.

The silence following was deadly, or maybe it was just me as I was crippled with the impact of everything that had happened hitting me like a bullet. I wasn't moving. I wasn't breathing. I wasn't feeling anything.

Yet even if it felt like all the blood had left my body, the red spreading on the beaten earth didn't belong to me, but to the lifeless body collapsed on the ground.

I was the one with the gun in my hand, staring with wide eyes at the life I had taken, a life just like mine, young and full of promises, surely even more than mine, and with a beating heart that I had hit precisely.

Looking into my eyes not long ago, I was sure they wouldn't have guessed I would shoot them in the back – I wouldn't have myself.

How had I ended up in this position?

As I seemed to regain consciousness, a billion questions rushed through me, and I blinked at the lifeless body like it could give me an answer.

When had I chosen to pull the trigger? Where did this gun come from? What had led me to this place at this exact moment? Who was I to do something like that?

But maybe it all came down to one question: Why did love put a gun in my hand?

I replayed backward every second that had led me to this instant, and it took me as far as one month before. Yet the only answer I got was the thumps of my heart restarting with footsteps rushing here, familiar voices, and the faraway humming of sirens.

Here we are! 🔫 It only took us 48 chapters to get there 😅

Did you expect this? 👀 And can you guess who she has killed? It's easy if you pay attention to the description 😉

Please tell me all your thoughts on this chapter because we've been waiting for so long for this one, and it makes me so nervous and excited at the same time! 🙈😁 

Plus, it's even better because this week is the week of my Wattp'anniversary, and on Friday the 13th, it'll be 3 years since I first hit the 'Publish' button for Law of Attraction. I feel it's so special ✨ and it makes me so emotional to see how far I've gone with my writing and these stories, but also all the love and support I get from you, my little shooting stars 🌠😭

Anyway, I'm not gonna cry because we're far from the end here, and next week, it's a special POV coming 😈😏🤫

PS: I just wanted to add that even if the song didn't exist in 1962, it's Gun In My Hand that was playing on the jukebox 😉