Page 101 of Equilibrium
“Keep Hell warm for us.”
I braced myself for the necessary hit, but the door smashed open, and Felix ran inside.
“We have company!”
“What—” My momentary distraction gave Logan time to move, and as his leg connected with mine, and his hand smacked mine away, the gun went off. I fell to the ground, trying to gather my wits but I could already see him running away. I fucking had him. I had him, right there, right in front of my gun, and I lost him.
“Fuck!”
He was almost on the other side, his guards covering his back. I aimed my gun and shot, the bullet barely grazing his shoulder. But he yelled in pain and started falling forward but they took him by each arm and held him up.
They started firing at us, bullets like a thunderstorm around us.
Several guys dressed in black from head to toe entered the church with semi-automatic rifles in their hands.
“Hide!” I yelled to my guys as I tried running toward the same door Logan just disappeared through. But the guards formed a semi-circle around, shooting at us and I had no other choice but to hide.
I shielded my head and fired at them while I ran behind the altar. Their bullets were getting lodged into the walls of the church, the floor, around our heads. I saw Indigo and Atlas hiding behind the statues of some saints that were left behind, firing back at them, too close to them for my liking.
Felix somehow ran all the way to the altar, hiding behind the pipe organ, covering my ass.
Just a few steps more. A bit longer. The door was just there. But I didn’t manage to run there because Atlas beat me to it. It felt like slow motion, his body moving through the air, trying to reach Logan, shooting at the lone guard that was left behind. Indigo yelled after him, and Felix shot again, hitting another guy at the door, but none of it mattered because the next shot didn’t end up in the wall.
It ended up inside Atlas.
“No!” I roared as he fell on the ground. A cacophony of voices rang around, the gunshots echoing in my ears, but my eyes were solely focused on Atlas’s unmoving body. The last guard slipped through the door, leaving us with a handful of the new ones that were brought in as reinforcements, but as Hunter started shooting, joined by Felix, they fell one by one, until nothing but silence greeted us.
Indigo was already kneeling next to Atlas, holding his head in his lap. I could see his lips moving but there was no sound.
“Storm!” somebody yelled, and I wanted to answer, I did, but I couldn’t move from my spot. “Storm, we need to move him. We need to go.”
But I couldn’t move. The only thing I could see was the blood spreading over Atlas’s chest and a frantic Indigo shaking him.
“Storm!” A hand landed on my back, rocking me back to the present, and when I turned around, Felix was standing there with panic written over his face.
Fuck, fuck, fuck. “Fuck!”
I ran toward Indigo, joined by Hunter and Felix, and tried to assess the damage. “Is he breathing?”
“Barely,” Indigo croaked out. “We need to get him to the hospital.”
Atlas’s eyes were already closed, his lips slowly turning blue, and I knew we couldn’t waste time. “Get him up,” I ordered. Hunter and Indigo lifted him and started carrying him toward the entrance. “We need to get to the Old Casino.” The three of them looked at me—a confused Felix, an angry looking Indigo, and a calm Hunter. “Trust me.”
I pulled my phone out and started dialing the old friend that still lived in the area. Atlas had to be okay. He fucking had to.
I stoodin the middle of Storm’s room going over the things I would need in order to get out of here. The tears that threatened to spill earlier were dried up now, taken over by the anger coursing through my body.
I wasn’t even sure what I was angrier at—Storm and his betrayal or my stupidity and fragile heart that wanted to believe that somebody in this world could actually care about me—not about my father or the skeletons I hid in my closet, but only me.
What was that saying?Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, well, shame on fucking me.
Getting out of here would be nearly impossible, but if I managed to sneak out during the barbeque, I could hit the road, regroup somewhere in Vegas, and hopefully get to Chicago by the end of the week.
I could’ve knocked half of these men on their ass and simply marched out of here, but no. Oh no. Little Ophelia wanted to play house. I lost three months of my time, and for what? Because Little Ophelia thought that she could be understood, maybe even loved.
There’s no such thing as love in the world I lived in. There never was and never would be. Fucking fairy tales dancing around my head were just that, fairy tales. Silly stories I used to hear and wanted to believe in.
Sometimes we hide our hearts from the fear of getting hurt. But apparently, when we finally open them, the same shit happens again. Somebody rips them apart. Shatters them, steals them away.
