"Mom?"

"I'm so sorry Delilah." She whispered as her gloved hand shook. The gun wobbled with it and I feared if she was only threatening me with the gun, then it might just go off accidentally from her nerves.

"M-"

"I thought you were dead. I thought..." She paused to let out a cry of her own.

My hands had rose in surrender. "Please don't do this.. Money? You wanted money yeah? I can get you it. Whatever you need. Couple thousand? Tens of thousands? Enough to make a new life away from here?"

"I need the pain to stop."

"Drugs.. Its okay. I'll give you the money but I can't do that if I'm dead."

She shook her head "I don't need the money, I have the drugs but I.."

My eyes shot over her shoulder to see the car. "You have to do something to get those drugs."

She nodded.

"I can help with the pain..." I lowered my hand but she stepped forward with the gun making me freeze.

"Don't move!"

"Okay.. Okay. I'm going to twist to the right, my pocket. There's painkillers okay. Take them."

"But you need them..."

"If you're going to shoot me, what good are they?"

She wet her lips and swallowed hard "I don't want to do this."

"Then don't.. Listen to me, I'm going to turn, you can take them from my pocket. I swear I won't move. Do you trust me?"

She nodded.

Holding my hands up high, I turn to the right and keep still as she pulls them from my pocket.

"They are really strong ones. A step down from morphine itself. They are yours. Do you want money as well?"

She shook her head. "I have to.."

"You can't. I'm pregnant." I lied.

Her crying stopped slightly before it got stronger "He said you would say that! He said you would lie to me!"

"Because I'm scared mom."

"I have to do this!"

I bit my lip hard as tears flooded my eyes. "Okay.. Okay but can we not do it right here? Please? As my mom, give me one last wish. Don't let it be here, I don't want him finding me."

"You love him..."

I nod "So much it hurts. I don't know how anyone can cope with this pain.."

"It's the first time you've called me your mom."

"I guess I'm sorry about that too.."

"Delilah I need help. This has to stop, and it stops with you."

"Not here please, please call him over. I'll go without a single noise but please mom. I beg you. Don't let it happen here.." I cried.

"Give me your phone Delilah."

I slowly retrieved it from my pocket and handed it over. I half expected her to smash it against the floor or pocket it. But instead she began dialling.

Lifting my chin, I prepared myself. I had to face the devil himself again and know his face and grubby hands would be the last that touched me.

"Police."

My eyes moved off the car to my mom. "There's a man trying to shoot at us. He's in a black sedan, I don't know the license plate, he has a tail light missing.. E Charleston. His name is Randy Mason.. He is wanted."

She hung up.

"Mom."

"I've messed your life up enough. I won't take it. Listen to me.. He is going away for a very long time. So here is what I need you do it. You need to rush me. Then you run. You run right to that man who is going to protect you.. By the time the police get here. I'll be gone and so will Randy. You don't look for either of us. You stay here. You give the police everything they need. Including my phone.." She pulls another from her pocket. "There's a recording on there of him planning to shoot you. This was my only option, I had to be the one holding the gun because he would have done it with your back turned. You wouldn't have stood a chance. His prints are on the gun. The evidence is stacked against him."

"You mean.."

"I'm a lot of things Delilah. But I'm not a killer. Just promise me that when the time is right, when you have a child of your own, you never make the mistakes I did."

I nod.

"Now rush me."

"I don't think I can. My stomach–"

"He won't wait much longer Delilah. Rush me. Now!"

I look defeated and lift my hands up in surrender before I dart at her. The pain as we collide and crash to the floor is overwhelming but I struggle to my feet and grab my stomach whilst running to the front of the museum. From the pain in my gut, I know I've torn the stitches, and if that wasn't a sure enough sign, then the blood that coated my top was. Getting to the door, I bash my fist against it and fall through it when one of the tour guides open it.

"ZAK!" She yells as I pull her down with me. "NANCY!"

"Police. Ring the police! Now!" I cry.

+++

Zak punches in the code to the office and let's out a sigh of relief "Wow that was a rowdy bunch. Grabby to- Delilah?" He questions seeing the room empty.

He steps back out and looks around the corridor before his eyes fall to the side door.

"Oh you wouldn't..." He speaks rushing to it. Pushing it open, he finds it empty and looks up to see a car screeching away. His breath catches in his throat as he recognises the driver and goes to pull his phone from his pocket when he sees a phone screen light up on the floor. Stepping out, he hitches the door on and steps towards the phone when he sees the wallpaper, of him and Delilah.

Beside her phone is another and a small bottle of pills. Picking them up, he rolls the bottle around in his palm to see Delilah's name printed on them.

But before his mind can create a scenario on where her phone and pills would get left behind, he's alerted to screams coming from inside the museum. Running back through the doors, he follows the shouts of his name.

"Ambulance! Ring an ambulance!" His mom shouts pulling off the scarf around her neck and pressing it against Delilah's stomach.

"No!" He shouts and falls to his knees beside Delilah who is wincing. "What happened? What did I tell you?!"

"Don't shout at her!" His mom scolds.

"I've torn them.. My mom. S-she had a gun. Randy was going to... Shit this hurts."

"Your mom pulled a gun?!" He exclaimed.

"The side, the phone, get the phone." She painted.

"I got them, yours, a spare and your pills."

Delilah let out a cry. "No, no, no! She was suppose to take them!"

"You gave your mom the pills?!"

"Zak calm down." His mom spoke giving him a quick glare. "She needs to get to a hospital, now."

He gets Delilah off the floor and rushes her through the museum "I warned you. I'm chaining you to the bloody bed in future!" He snaps.

"I didn't realise that was a kink of yours." She winced.

"Not the time Delilah.. Not the fucking time."

+++

"Can I stress the importance here?" The doctor asked giving me an annoyed look.

"I swear. It won't happen again."

"No, it won't." Zak added.

"You're lucky that it was just stitches. This could have been a whole lot worse. Any bruising, swelling, sickness or anything that's not present here now, you come straight back in. At this moment in time, I'm confident there's no internal bleeding."

"Thank you." Zak said quietly giving me a glare.

"The police will be in shortly to speak with you."

I nod and settle back against the bed. "I'm sorry?"

"Do not say those words. You don't mean them." He growls beside me.

I roll my eyes "I was only taking out some trash."

"I could have taken it out! You could have had someone, anyone take it out!"

Lowering my head, I accepted his anger, he had every right to be. I promised to keep myself out of trouble when he brought me home from the hospital and yet two days later, I was back here.

"I could bury your mom and that psycho." He growled.

"She is the reason I'm alive.." I muttered.

"She's the reason you're here in the first place. Did we completely forget that the reason Randy managed to stab you was because she came here scrounging for money? For drugs."

"Jack brought her here..."

His glare moved off the edge of the bed to look directly at me. "What?"

"He brought her here, you don't think she managed to find me by chance, did you?"

His fists clenched together and I heard his knuckles pop in stress. "If he comes near you again..."

"Delilah Winters?" A man spoke, stepping into the room.

"That's me." I replied pushing my shirt down.  The man pulled out a badge.

"Detective Wicks, I've come to ask you some questions."

I nod and await them, but he looks to Zak and remains tight lipped. "He's my partner." I confirm.

The detective nods and unbuttons his jacket "I understand there was an altercation earlier this evening—"

"Altercation? You mean held at gun point!" Zak snapped making me shoot him a glare.

"We have apprehended the offender."

"Offender? Offenders. Her mom and boyfriend." Zak corrected again.

"Actually sir, it was just one gentleman."

"Don't tell me you've got the wrong fucking guy!"

"Zak shut up!" I snap seeing there was more that the detective wanted to say, when Zak wasn't trying to verbally bash him over the head.

"A pursuit was made after the black sedan, it was phoned in just before 9pm, regarding shots being made at people.."

"My mom made the call." I answered quietly.

"An impact was made in the pursuit to slow the car down, but upon stopping the vehicle, a woman began screaming in distress. Shortly after, a gun went off."

My heart froze.

"We removed the gentleman from the car with reasonable force to find a lady in the car, believed to be your mother. She was pronounced dead on the scene."

"What?" Zak asked a little quieter.

"Whilst we are unsure what has happened entirely, we believe a... Randall Mason may have shot your mother."

"Had he said anything?" Zak questioned.

"He's taking the no comment route."

"Fucking coward. So he....." Zak voice muffles as I reply the whole incident in my mind.

From the moment I stepped out the door, to the moment I fell through the museum door.

She could have shot me, in the back, like she said Randy would have. But she never..

She called a bluff and made me believe that she was going to shoot me, so that my reaction was real, she was either still trying to decide, or she had planned the whole incident to the last second.

He is going away for a long time...

"It was suicide." I speak causing both men to pause.

"How can you be sure?" The detective asks.

"She was in pain.. She was on heroin, you'll find track marks on her arms. She said Randy had the drugs but she needed to kill me to get them. Like  payment. She was having withdrawal symptoms, the shaking, the pain. I gave her my painkillers, as a bribe. Thought it might buy me some time, you know?"

The detective nodded.

"She took them, then told me that her phone has a recording on, Randy planning to kill me. Only tonight, she convinced him to let her do it, she was trying to warn me. She used my phone to ring you, there was no shots being fired at people. She had the gun, pointing at me. Zak's CCTV can confirm that. After making the call she told me to rush her, knock us both down and I guess for it to look like a struggle, like I had got away. She told me to run to Zak. So he could protect me whilst the police arrived. She said... She said he was going away for a long time."

"And what made you think that she committed suicide? What pushed you to that conclusion?"

"She left the tablets behind, the phones.. But before that, she made me promise that if I ever had a baby, I would raise it right. That I would never make the same mistakes as she did. She wasn't asking me to make a promise, she was saying goodbye. Because she knew that she wouldn't make it past this night. She planned it all. Start, middle and end."

Zak takes my hand and squeezes it gently.

"The only time she acts like a real mother and it's the same night she kills herself..."