Shooter (Burnout) (33 page)

“Hayley!” Chris snapped.

She ignored him. “So that’s a pro, you can do it front of me. It’ll just be one more fucked up reel in my late night showing of blood and gore. And I don’t know for sure, but I don’t think it hurts. I mean, I obviously I can’t say for certain since I’m not missing half
my
head. But it happens so fast that I don’t think it has
time
to hurt. So there’s a pro for you, too. I also know I can’t kill you myself. Sorry. I already failed to save someone. Graduating to murder seems like a downward spiral. Can’t do it. So that’s a con. If you’re gonna do this, you’ve gotta do it yourself and accept the consequences of what comes after, if anything does. That’s one thing I don’t know, what’s out there after. If there’s anything at all.

“So I couldn’t save someone who should have been saved, which is how I know that if you do this, it will bother them. Probably forever. It’s been five years for me and I still don’t sleep through most nights. I only have two people in my life who love me. So the math on that is that you have twice as many people who love you. And they’re all in this room. And their late night showing of IED’s and soldiers dying is now going include their brother blowing his head off. So that’s a con. If you care. Maybe you don’t. Maybe that’s a pro for you. You can punish them forever by doing this.”

With her free hand, Hayley grasped the hem of her shirt and lifted it revealing scars crisscrossing her belly. “Jesus,” Easy muttered.

Hayley put her shirt down. “I also know exactly what it’s like to close your eyes when you think it’s for the last time and then wake up later, confused as hell.” She leaned forward and lowered her voice conspiratorially, “And secretly disappointed that it can’t just be over.” She straightened back up. “Because you know you’ll never be the same again, but it seems like nobody else fucking knows it. So that’s a pro. That’s something nobody else knows, that when the life you wanted doesn’t exist anymore, it’s not so fucking easy to just pick a new one off the shelf and step into it. And if you take the gun, you don’t have to try.”

She stepped forward and set the gun down gently on the coffee table next to the remote. “And I’ll tell you the last thing I know. When I woke up, next to my dead boyfriend, who’d recently had his head blown off right in front of me and all that blood came out of his nose, the first thing I thought was, ‘There should really be more stars in the sky on the night that you die.’ I don’t know why I thought that, or I why I even remember it. But I did. So go outside. It’s a nice night. That’s neither a pro or a con. Just some advice. There’s also less cleanup. That’s just a pro for us.”

Easy sat perfectly still, looking at Hayley, and then slowly reached out.

“Jimmy,” Chris said, but Easy didn’t pick up the gun. Instead he picked up the remote and turned off the television.

“Did they catch him?” he asked. “The guy who killed your boyfriend?”

Hayley shook her head. “No. He wrote me letters about falling in love with me that night. And how sorry he was that he thought I was dead when I passed out and he threw me in the grave he’d already dug. His shovel broke when he was covering me up. That’s how I got away. He left to buy a new one and I woke up and made it to the road. He says it was fate. We’re meant for each other. He sent the letters to my parent’s house where I was recovering. I had to run away in case he came for me. He might’ve hurt them. I can’t ever go home unless they catch him.”

“
Well, who is he?!
” Easy nearly yelled.

Hayley shrugged. “I don’t know. No one does. I’d never seen him before. He wore gloves and the DNA from his semen wasn’t in any database.”

“Semen,” Easy bit out.

“He made Jake watch. Told him if he couldn’t protect me, he didn’t deserve me.”

Easy swallowed convulsively. “Jesus Fucking Christ.”

“Then he pulled out a gun. Jake asked me to save him. Begged me. But my hands were tied. There was nothing I could do.”

“How did he get you?” Caleb asked suddenly.

Hayley glanced at him. “We were on a date. Restaurant parking lot. He said he had a flat tire. Asked Jake for help changing it. I don’t really remember much about that. They found stun gun marks on my neck at the hospital. Jake had the same marks on his neck when they found his body.”

“Where did this happen?” Caleb asked.

“Cabin in the woods.”

“But where?” Caleb insisted.

She cast him a long look. “Who the fuck cares, Caleb?” Then she turned to Jimmy. “So the bottom line here, Jimmy, is I guess you’ve got more pros than cons for doing it. But I hope you won’t. Especially if you care about them having to watch and clean up after. ‘Cause that’s a really shitty thing that I wouldn’t wish on anyone else. But you can cross me off your list. I’m going to bed. I’m tired. If you’re not here in the morning, I’m sorry you lost your leg and the future you wanted.”

Hayley turned and walked back the way she had come. In the silence they all heard the soft snick of the bedroom door being closed.

Easy rubbed his hand over his face. “I didn’t know,” he said out loud then looked up at Chris, pleadingly. “
I didn’t know!
” he insisted. “Rough!” he cried. “You said to be nice to her because she’d had it
rough
! You didn’t say
rape
! You didn’t say
murder!
You didn’t-” His voice caught. “
You didn’t say shallow grave
.” Jimmy stood up as quickly as his prosthetic would allow. “Jesus. Oh Jesus I fought with her over the paint! I had her down on the ground!
I put my hands on her
!”

He started toward the bedroom after Hayley, but Doc cut him off and grabbed his arm. “Whoa, whoa, whoa. You didn’t know. You didn’t hurt her. It’s time to go home, Jimmy.”

Jimmy looked pained as his gaze went from the hallway to Doc and back again. “But-”

Doc shook his head. “No. Not tonight. It’s enough tonight.”

As Doc led Jimmy out the front door, Jimmy looked back over his shoulder. “I’m sorry,” he said, miserably. “Chris, I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry. I didn’t know.”

“None of us did,” Doc told him quietly as the door closed behind them.

Chris was still in shock when Tex picked up the overturned chair and righted it. “Just go to her,” his friend said quietly. “We’ll see you tomorrow. Just be with her now.”

Hawk placed a large hand on Chris’s shoulder as he made his way past and out the front door with Tex right behind him. Chris watched as the door closed.

He found Hayley sitting on the bed, with Pepper in her lap. She didn’t look at him when he came into the room. He shut the door quietly and stood in front of it, unsure what to do. He crossed the room and sat down on the edge of the bed, next to her. When he finally found his voice he opened his mouth and said the first thing that popped into his head. “I insulted you.”

************************

Hayley was stroking Pepper’s fur and her hand faltered at his words. Whatever she imagined him saying in this moment, it wasn’t anything like that. It was so far from anything she’d been expecting, she looked up at him, confused. He was staring at her, like he’d never seen her before, or like she was the answer to a question he’d only just figured out. He wasn’t disgusted or horrified or even pitying. He had a look on his face that Hayley was certain she’d never seen on anyone ever before and she couldn’t begin to guess at its meaning.

“When I said you didn’t live,” he supplied. “You...you
live
Hayley. I’ve never seen anyone live like you. The food and the baths and the way you are when you see the stars or a sunrise or have an orgasm. Even when we’re just kissing. It’s like there’s nothing else happening in the world around us. You get so much out of such a small life. All the things I never even think about anymore, you live inside those moments like they’re your last on Earth. It was always like you were living on borrowed time, because you are. I never got it before.”

Hayley tickled Pepper under the chin. “You said in the army they teach you to eat and sleep when you can.” She shrugged. “I grab happiness where I can. Because I don’t know when I’ll have it again. I don’t know if tonight’s the night I have another nightmare and can’t sleep for a week. I don’t know if tomorrow he’ll somehow find me and finish what he started. Or if someone else will come along and do it for him, just for the money in my pocket. There’s so much shit in the world. I can’t think about it, or let it control me. I had so many panic attacks at first, when people got too close to me. Throwing up all the time, just eating broth because I couldn’t keep anything down. Sleeping in closets. Afraid.
All the time
.
That’s
not living.

“I’m jealous of Jimmy,” she admitted. “And I’m pissed at him, too. I know I shouldn’t say that, but I am. Because he had an awful thing happen to him, too, but he’s safe. No one wants to hurt him anymore; no one will. He can be happy, he just doesn’t want to be. For a long time, I couldn’t choose to be happy. I just couldn’t do that for myself because I was so afraid.” She sighed heavily. “I’m sorry I touched your gun. I know you said not to. But he needs to see that he has a choice. Even if it’s not something he can do by himself. Even if he needs to talk to someone about it. It’s still a choice. I had to do everything for myself. Learn to breathe. Learn to eat. Learn to sleep in a bed. He doesn’t even have to do that. He has you. He has help. He should take it.”

***********************

Chris had to take a moment to absorb her words. Of all the things he’d seen and done in his life, he couldn’t imagine going through what she’d been through and surviving. She’d done it alone. And with no training. He’d had years of training, the best training the army had to offer, and even when that bomb went off and things were at their worst, he’d had his team, his unit, his men around him. She’d gone into a hole in the ground, alone, pulled herself out, alone, and stayed alone for five years. The truth of Hayley’s life was so much worse than any of the scenarios he’d imagined. But she was so much more beautiful for having survived it. The fact that she was here for him to touch, and that she let him, welcomed him even, was almost beyond his understanding.

He reached out, needing to feel her again, needing to reassure himself that she was real. As she always did, she leaned into him, needing him just as much. The enormity, the entirety of the girl next to him hit him like a freight train and grabbed onto her fiercely. And cried. He felt the heated drops slide down his cheeks and realized he was fucking crying.

He couldn’t remember the last time he’d cried. Or if he’d ever. He couldn’t think of anything right now. Only Hayley and her warmth, her presence. She slid her arms around him and rubbed his back, comforting him.
She
was comforting
him
. Which should, and did, make him feel like an ass, but he only gripped her tighter. Christ, she was such a fucking miracle. A thing he hadn’t known he’d needed and had no explanation for, but couldn’t let go of now for any price.

Chapter 26

The next morning, Chris wasn’t in any kind of a better mood. He threw his keys on the desk in the office and shut the door harder than he meant to. He’d made a valiant effort, he thought, to hide his feelings from Hayley, but inside he was twisted up and on the verge of rage. Which would be pointless since there was no one to receive the brunt of his anger anyway.

He’d seen action during deployment. It wasn’t a secret. And he’d seen his fair share of violence overall. But he’d also seen better looking
corpses
than Hayley. He couldn’t even imagine the kind of cold-bloodedness it would take to inflict that kind of damage on a woman. Hell, Chris couldn’t imagine raising a
hand
to female, let alone taking a knife and butchering one. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the bright colors of a hot rod calendar on the wall. A yellow Impala with a nearly topless Asian girl spread across the hood. And he’d found a target for his fury.

He grabbed the calendar and yanked it off the wall. And from there he just kept going. He tore every poster off every wall, throwing them onto the floor. With one hand he launched the computer monitor with its racy wallpaper off the desk. It collided into the wall above the filing cabinet. The resulting crash alerted the others, who opened the door.