Ballistic: Icarus Series, Book Two (5 page)

“Exactly,” Zander said raising my chin so our eyes met. “You say you are not meant to lead; that you don’t know what you are doing. I disagree. True leadership is about more than just strategy and tactics, Liv. It’s about
instincts
, and thanks to yours we have food, shelter, and a way to protect ourselves.”

“I…I just—,” I stammered, lost in the depths of those warm copper eyes of his. When he looked at me that way, words failed me.

“You are amazing, Liv Larson,” Zander laughed softly as he leaned in toward me, “and one of these days, you are going to see it.”

“Liv!” Jake’s panicked cries shattered the moment, just as our lips were about to meet.

“We were just talking.” My heart had crept up into my throat, but the terrified look on Jake’s face sent it slamming back down into my chest. “What’s wrong, Jake?”

He was shaking, and his eyes were wide with fear. “There’s a guy…he has a—.”

“Back the hell up or we will shoot every last one of you,” shouted a gravely and unfamiliar voice.

Before I was even aware I had moved, I was already flying across the lobby. My feet moved lithely, barely making a sound against the old vinyl floor as I raced toward the scuffle. Everyone had gathered in a half-circle in front of the old Carnival game exhibit on the opposite side of the vestibule. They stared at a ragged-looking man with what appeared to be a sawed-off shotgun raised to his shoulder. Bella bared her teeth, growling in the man’s direction.

“Take it easy, Mister,” Ty said as he shoved Christa behind him. “Calm down. We are backin’ up, see?”

“You people need to take your mutt and
go
,” the man growled pumping his shotgun. He swung it in an arc before finally landing on Bella. “This is
our
place now, you hear?”

“Sir, please put the gun down,” Ty said, and the man flinched, his face softening just a fraction.

“Please, you have to go before he gets angry,” the man said looking over his shoulder. “I don’t want anyone to get hurt.”

“We are not going to hurt you,” Riley said softly as she stepped forward with her hands in the air. Ty reached out to stop her, but she dodged his grasp. “We just need a place to rest for a few hours, and then we will go. I swear.”

“Please, just—.” The man stopped short then closed his eyes tightly and shook his head. When he opened them again, he stared back at Riley as a predator would its prey. He pointed the barrel in her face and cocked his head to the side with a smirk as his finger tightened on the trigger. “I don’t think so, girly.”

Riley raised her hands up in front of her face and Ty dove ahead of her. He shoved Christa behind an old metal sign as he went. By the time the man had bent his finger I had flanked them all, knocked Eli to the ground and pushed off the platform of an antique carnival horse launching myself in the air toward him.

“No!” Riley shouted, but it was too late.

Bang.

Chapter 3

Fit to be Tied

My shoulder slammed into the man with enough force that it sent both of us pummeling to the ground in a heap. We rolled over the top of one another a few times before finally colliding with a large, ornate wooden table lined with pamphlets and brochures. My body was buzzing with so much energy and adrenaline that I barely registered the impact. A second later, the table collapsed on top of us, pinning us to the vinyl and sending a shower of multi-colored paper into the air like confetti on New Year’s Eve.

He lost his grip on the gun at some point in the struggle. It lay on the ground just out of both of our reach. Our eyes met, and we both stretched toward it desperate for the upper hand.

“Son of a—,” the man groaned as he struggled to push the table off.

“I don’t think so,” Zander’s boot appeared out of nowhere crushing the man’s fingers into the floor.

“My hand!” The man growled up at him, but Zander didn’t flinch.

“Jesus Christ, Liv. Are you okay?” He reached down and grabbed the back of the gunman’s neck, pressing his face into the floor while the others raced over to free us from the wreckage of the decimated antique table. “Get his hands, Ty.”

“
Sombetch
,” Ty swore under his breath as he wrestled the man’s hands behind his back. “Coulda killed someone, you crazy—wavin’ a gun ‘round like you own the place.”

“I—I think so,” I grunted running my hands across my middle as I rolled onto my back. My stomach was sore from where the table had landed on me, and my head was pounding, but I didn’t seem to have any extra holes in my body. I was putting this one in the win category. “Riley? Is she—?”

“I’m alright, Liv,” Riley said reaching down to me. Her face was tight with worry, and her hands shook as she pulled me to my feet, but she didn’t appear to be hurt. “I thought we agreed you were going to stop trying to get yourself killed.”

“Get off me,” the man writhed but Ty had his knee pressed into the stranger’s back, pinning him to the floor.

“Hold him still and I’ll tie his hands,” Jake said.

He raced over and sliced a section of twine free from a nearby display using one of the bright green steak knives we had pilfered from his mom’s kitchen. The man struggled against their efforts but between Ty’s weight and Jake’s quick work with the cording, they had him restrained within a matter of seconds. The rope wasn’t very thick, but Jake had wrapped it around the man’s hands so many times that there was little chance of him tearing it free.

“Let me
go
,” he said flopping about on the floor.

I whistled through my teeth at Bella and nodded toward the man. She trotted over and lowered herself to the ground in front of him, her teeth bared and her hackles raised. When she growled at him, her hot breath moved his hair, and the man went still, his eyes wide with fear.

“Good girl,” Jake said, smiling over at her.

“Thanks, man,” Ty clapped Jake on the shoulder, and the two of them rose to their feet.

“Whatever,” Jake said as he bent to scoop Ty’s hat up off the floor. “Here’s your stupid hat.”

“Get outta my way.” Christa pushed her way through the pack that had gathered around us and ran toward Ty. “Oh my God, Ty, your leg. It’s bleeding!”

“I…what?” Ty’s brow furrowed in confusion. The moment his eyes landed on the crimson saturating the denim above his knee, his face paled. “Aww, hell.”

Zander and I dove toward Ty at once and caught him just as his legs gave out. His body sagged against us, limp and motionless. The weight of his hulking mass dragged all three of us down onto the floor. Blood was dripping from his thigh onto the scuffed tile beneath us.

“Eli,” I shouted. “Eli, get over here. Ty’s been shot!”

“No, I— I’m alright.” Ty’s voice shook, and his eyelids fluttered even as he struggled up onto his elbows. “It don’t even hurt, y’all.”

“Just hold still,” I said pressing his shoulders back down to the ground. “Eli!”

“It’s fine. I can’t feel nothin’,” Ty whispered staring down at his leg.

“I need a belt,” Eli said. Before he had even situated himself on the floor, Jake dropped one into his hand. “Lift his leg and prop it up.”

Falisha dug a towel from her backpack and dropped to the floor next to Zander. He nodded grimly, slid his hands beneath Ty’s thigh, and lifted it a few inches from the floor. He held it just long enough for Falisha to slip the folded towel beneath it. Eli slid the strap around Ty’s leg, a few inches above the hole in his jeans, threaded it through the loop, and jerked it so hard that Ty cried out.

“Sweet baby Jesus,” Ty growled, biting his bottom lip so hard it drew blood. “Okay, I felt that.”

“Sorry kid, but we gotta stop this bleeding,” Eli said. “Light! I need more light over here.”

Within seconds, every flashlight beam and cell phone flash in the room was focused on Ty. He sliced through Ty’s pant leg from cuff to crotch, exposing a pair of blue boxer-briefs and a gaping hole in Ty’s thigh muscle. Riley’s hand shot to her mouth. Tears filled her big brown eyes.

“Damn,” Falisha scowled.

“
No
,” Christa screamed, and lunged toward us, but Jake hooked an arm around her waist. “Let me go, Jacob. Ty!”

“It’s…okay, darlin,” Ty said weakly. “I’m alright.”

Jake looked positively terrified but refused to let Christa free. He did his best to shield his sister from the gruesome scene, but she fought against his shaky grasp, desperate to get closer. Zander held Ty’s leg in place. I smoothed the hair from Ty’s pallid face while Riley dug the medical kit from my pack and started emptying its contents onto the floor. Guilt settled deep into my gut as I sat helplessly by, watching Eli try to fix the mess I had made trying to save them all.

Ty was sweating profusely, but his skin was starting to feel cold to the touch. His breathing was labored, and his body sank further into mine as the puddle of blood beneath him grew. Soon he started to shake.

“Eli, you need to hurry up,” I urged. “He’s going into shock.”

“I’m going as fast as I can without killing him myself,” Eli growled, tying off the tourniquet.

“I’m so sorry, Ty,” I whispered.

“Hush.” Ty’s voice was barely above a whisper, his bloody hand patting mine as if
I
were the one in need of comfort. “Ain’t none of this your fault, Sweets.”

“Yeah,” Christa glared at me through tear-filled eyes. “It is.”

“She’s doin’ the best she—” Ty’s hand went slack against mine and his eyes fluttered closed. His head flopped to the side, and his large body went limp against me.

Panic rose in my chest. “Ty!”

“Calm down. He isn’t dead, just passed out,” Eli said, shaking his head at me as if I were an overreacting child. “Probably a good thing, too, because this is going to hurt like hell.”

“What are you doing to him?” Christa balled up her fists. “You better not hurt him, or I swear to God—”

“I have to get that bullet out, kid, or your little boyfriend here’s going to die,” Eli said. He turned to Riley, jerking his head toward the medical supplies she was laying out. “Got any alcohol in there?”

“Not much,” Riley said apologetically. The bottle was less than half-full. “Will peroxide work? I’ve got plenty of that.”

“Good enough,” Eli said holding out his hand. “Hold on to the alcohol for now. I’ll use that to sterilize.”

She uncapped the brown plastic bottle and handed it to him then stepped back as if he were about to dump gasoline on a fire. The second the liquid hit Ty’s wound it sizzled like cold water on a skillet sending a rush of pink bubbly fluid into a pool on the floor beneath him. His brow furrowed, but otherwise, Ty didn’t move.

“You, with the mouth,” Eli jerked his head in Christa’s direction. “Make yourself useful and hold my light for me.”

Jake let her go, and she dove onto the floor at Ty’s side, tears streaming down her face. She grabbed the largest of the flashlights and aimed it directly at the wound on Ty’s leg, a pained expression on her face. “Like this?”

“Perfect,” he said. “The rest of you get over here and hold him down. You have to keep him completely still. It looks like the bullet is lodged against the femoral artery. If he moves, and I nick that thing he’ll…just hold him still, okay?”

Eli scooped up the last bottle of rubbing alcohol and poured what was left of it over his hands. He ground them together furiously then held them up away from his body. Falisha and I moved into position and held Ty’s shoulders down. Zander straddled Ty’s injured leg pressing it firmly into the towel, immobilizing it. Riley positioned herself on Ty’s other leg while Jake held his hips against the ground, a look of abject horror on his face.

“Don’t do this,” Jake whispered to him, and then looked up at his sister’s tear-stained face. “She needs you.”

“He’s going to be okay, Jake,” I said mechanically.

I was not so sure. Ty’s breathing was shallow, and his face had lost its color. What worried me the most was the peaceful look on his face.

Eli’s face hovered just inches above the bloody wound on Ty’s leg as he worked to free the bullet from his flesh. Sweat rolled down his forehead. Every time his glasses slipped down his nose, he’d pushed them back up with the butt of his wrist, leaving a trail of blood across his face. He didn’t seem to notice the war paint, let alone the terrified looks on our faces. After a few more minutes of digging and grunting, he bolted upright, his blood-soaked fingers holding a wad of flattened metal.

“Gotcha, you little bastard,” he exclaimed tossing the bullet to the floor. “Riley, hand me the lighter, the curved needle, and the thread from the sewing kit.”

Riley sat down and gently pressed her weight into Ty’s leg freeing her hands. She uncapped another brown bottle of peroxide and handed it to Eli, then set to work threading the hook-shaped needle as he had requested. It took her a few shots, thanks to the dim lighting and her shaky hands, but eventually she got it.

“Tie it off, and give it here,” Eli said hastily grabbing the needle from between her fingers. His face was taut with concentration. Sweat poured down his face unchecked, slicing flesh colored trenches through the blood that had begun to dry there. “Grab the lighter and pull a flame.”

Riley flicked the flint on the yellow Bic and stretched her arm out toward Eli. He slid the point of the needle into the loose fabric on his pant leg where he could easily free it then held the tip of his knife over the flame and waited until it turned black.

“Hold on tight, everyone,” he said, grimacing as he moved the hot metal closer to Ty’s open wound.

“Wait, what are you doing?” Christa sobbed and grabbed his arm, her flashlight rolling in a circle at her feet. “You already got the bullet out. You are going to hurt him. Just sew him back up and leave him alone.”

“Do you
want
him to die?” Eli barked at her.