Total pages in book: 78
Estimated words: 77106 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 386(@200wpm)___ 308(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77106 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 386(@200wpm)___ 308(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
Unexpected.
Humiliating.
But sure helped to sell the story we were trying to create, I guess. And I could lean into that if he did something as embarrassing as question me about it.
“He’s not gonna be happy she got away,” I heard drifting down the alley.
Not a minute later, there was the slam of car doors. The roar of an engine. Then a car pulling away.
“Think we’re good,” the man said, releasing my butt. It took just a second longer to remember to release my leg from around his waist.
Freed, the man took a step back.
And it was then that I realized what had been pressed up against my stomach.
A gun.
Not only had he been willing to pretend to bang me in an alley to protect me, but he’d been ready to, what, shoot his way out of the situation, if it came to that?
Who the hell was this guy?
Warning alarms started to go off in my mind, wondering if I’d possibly traded one bad situation for another.
I watched as the guy crept down the alley. No, that wasn’t right. He wasn’t creeping. He was swaggering. The man swaggered.
His arm—and gun—hung down by his side as he reached the mouth of the alley, glancing one way, then the next. Even stepping out and walking a few feet in each direction before turning and making his way back toward me.
Where I was still frozen in the spot.
Well, no.
Not frozen.
I was shaking like a leaf in a windstorm from head to toe. My legs felt too wobbly to keep holding me up.
Without even meaning to, I slid down the wall, the brick pulling up the back of my shirt and scraping against my bare skin.
“Whoa, alright,” the guy said, reaching back to tuck away his gun, like this was some action movie.
But it wasn’t.
It wasn’t.
This was my real life.
And I’d just run for my life with a baby strapped to my chest from men with guns and a clear willingness to use them.
Only to be saved by an equally scary-looking dude with a gun that he handled with a casualness that made me think that he, too, wouldn’t think twice about using it.
Against me, my intuitive little Lainey started to wriggle and fuss.
“Shh. Shh,” I tried to coo, but even my voice was trembling.
Lainey, used to all the stops being pulled out to calm her when she was unhappy, started a full-on cry.
“Alright,” the guy said, moving closer, reaching down, and sliding his hands into the carrier.
“No—” I started to object.
But he was already lifting up Lainey with the ease of someone who’d done so many times before—one hand on her bottom and lower back, the other behind her neck and head.
“Let’s let Mommy have a moment, yeah?” he asked, voice not quite baby talk, but softer than his speaking voice. “I’d be crying if I had to take a run in the middle of the night too,” he told her as he swayed her body side to side. “Just trying to get some damn sleep, and you’re transported into some low-budget action movie. And not even in a fun location. Fucking sucks, man.”
Profanity aside, he was being really sweet.
And Lainey, likely mesmerized by a man speaking to her at all, had gone from a cry to a whimper, to complete silence.
She was okay.
In surprisingly good hands, even.
So I leaned my head back against the wall, sucking in a few greedy breaths, just praying the shaking would stop so I could… what?
What was the next move?
To just leave?
Go home?
Pretend nothing happened?
Or did I call the police? Tell them what I saw? Let my name be on paperwork somewhere? Paperwork that might lead these guys right to me.
But it was wrong not to try to get that poor man justice. Could I just go on, pretending I didn’t see what I’d seen, heard what I’d heard?
I leaned forward, pressing my sweaty forehead against my knees and focused on breathing while the man told my baby all about how he was seconds away from getting in a car with a bunch of “skirts” to go back to the clubhouse and “party their asses off.”
I silently prayed that Lainey’s spongey brain was still too undeveloped to recall anything about the idea of ‘body shots’ and ‘bomb-ass margaritas’ as my body seemed to slowly work to reabsorb the adrenaline that had been surging through my veins.
“That’s a game where two pretty girls sit on the shoulders of some badass bikers,” the guy went on, completely oblivious to me as I turned my head up to watch him. “And they use these giant inflatable Q-tips and whack each other with ‘em. Like this. Bam! Pow!” he said while swinging Lainey to each side, making a gurgling laugh escape her.
“Right? Good shit. They just keep whaling on each other. And if we’re lucky, maybe a tit pops out. And then, eventually, one girl gets a good whack in.” He swung the captivated baby again. “And the other girl goes doooown,” he said, lowering both of them down so fast her belly must have fluttered, but she did a full-on belly laugh at the sensation.