“I’ve got a gun. You need to send someone soon. If he gets to me first, I’ll use it.”
“Ma’am, do not arm yourself. I’m dispatching officers immediately to your location,” the 911 operator told me but I ignored this.
She didn’t know. She didn’t have a clue. And I hoped to God she never would.
Instead of sharing that, I warned her, “He’ll have men. At least one. And trust me, badges and uniforms will not stop them from getting what they want.”
And they wanted me.
Or at least Pol did.
But with the loyalty his men showed him, they’d go down in a hail of gunfire before they’d give up doing whatever they had to do to get Pol what he wanted.
“They’re en route now,” the operator continued. “So find a safe place and please—”
Another thud on the door which included some splintering wood.
They’d be through soon.
Thus there was no safe place. Not in this apartment.
Not anywhere.
Unless I made it safe.
I darted to a corner of the room and hunkered down, eyes aimed through the dark at the door, saying, “Gotta go now.”
“Ma’am—”
“Bah-bye,” I whispered, hit end call, dropped my phone on the floor and shrugged my purse off.
I then lifted the gun to point it at the door.
Shit.
The outside door crashed open.
Shit!
I checked to make certain the safety was off.
It was off.
Could I do this?
I sucked in breath through my nose.
I could do this.
But only because I had to.
I moved my finger to the trigger.
I heard the thumping feet. Running. One man, not several.
Pol wouldn’t be running. That wasn’t Pol’s style. He sauntered, he didn’t run. Not unless he was on a state-of-the art treadmill while making drug deals on his Bluetooth.
Then again, he’d been deprived of his favorite toy for three years. He didn’t treat that toy nice, far from it. But it was still his favorite, he’d want it back and he got what he wanted.
Always.
I sucked in another breath, then whispered, “Not tonight.”
A shadow came through the door.
My throat closed and I froze.
I’d planned for this. Damn it, I’d planned. I’d been psyching myself up for this exact moment for years.
Why was he getting closer and I wasn’t pulling the stupid trigger?
“Stop, I’ve got a gun!” I shouted my warning.
He didn’t stop and was almost on me when my finger remembered my plans and squeezed.
I jumped at the loud sound of the gunshot, heard a surprised, pained grunt and the shadow was reeling back.
Oh God.
I’d shot a man. Crap! I’d shot a man!
God, how I hated Pol.
But I saw now that man wasn’t Pol. I knew it because I could feel it and see it. Pol was taller than that staggering shadow, not as bulky.
And he was right behind that shadow when it fell back.
I knew this because I heard his hated but nevertheless deep, attractive voice that I so never wanted to hear again clip, “Jesus, what the f**k?”
I wasn’t prepared for him to be so close.
So I wasn’t prepared when his hand snaked out catching mine that held the gun at the wrist, twisting so hard the pain shot up my arm, shoulder and even my neck, making my ear tingle.
I’d planned. I really had.
But I’d also planned before.
And Pol, f**king, f**king Pol always got the best of me.
In order to focus on not getting some part of my arm broken, I had to twist my body with it and my fingers let loose around the grip of the gun.
Pol let me go, caught the gun and clearly flipped it to hold it by the barrel because the next thing I knew, the butt was coming down hard on the flesh under my cheekbone.
Freaking ouch.
I fell to one hand at my side, the other one instinctively going up to my cheekbone as agony radiated through my cheek and eye, causing black spots to form in my vision.
Shit, I’d forgotten.
If you told me I’d ever forget how this felt, I wouldn’t believe you.
But three years without it, I’d forgotten how f**king much it hurt.
New thing, though, even though the spots were still flickering behind my eyes, the rest of my vision was turning an eerie, emerald green.
Weird and probably not good.
“You shot Manny. Jesus, Ilsa, you stupid cunt,” Pol barked from close and as usual, he didn’t hesitate.
I felt his foot connect with my ribs so hard, it lifted me straight up and turned me so my back slammed against the wall.
I came down hard on my side just in time to hear a terrifying masculine roar.
Not a shout.
Not a bellow.
An animalistic (but still human) roar of unadulterated rage.
At first, I thought it was coming from Pol and I stiffened in order to brace for the next blow. But when it didn’t come, as I lifted my eyes, that eerie green light was so bright it was illuminating the room so I could now see everything clearly.
Still, I blinked and shoved up to my forearm, the pain in my face and ribs completely forgotten because I was pretty certain as clear as things were in that strange light, I wasn’t seeing correctly.
This was because I was seeing the impossible.
And the impossible was that there were two Pols.
One was the Pol I was used to. Tall. Powerfully built. Fit. Hair well-groomed. Tailored slacks and shirt making him look classy and hot (if you didn’t know what an ass**le he was, that was).
The other was a different Pol.
Still tall and powerfully built, he was, however, more fit. Clearly more fit. Like, by a lot. He made the other Pol look like Pol Lite. This new Pol was a Pol Powerhouse.
His dark hair was also not well-groomed but in need of a cut and it looked like he just got out of bed. And he wasn’t wearing classy, tailored clothes. He wasn’t even wearing jeans and a t-shirt.
I blinked again.
Good God, he was wearing what looked like breeches, tall boots that went up to his knees, a lace-up-the-collar shirt, and a freaking cape of all things.
Yes. A cape!
Apparently, being pistol whipped made you hallucinate. But there it was. The vision before me was Pol in a dude-from-a-romance-novel-cover outfit hammering the normal Pol with his fists, the mighty, nauseating thud of flesh against flesh thumping through the room.
Holy cow.
The Pol I knew was down on a knee. But he suddenly twisted away from the romance-novel-cover Pol and began to lift his hand that was still carrying my gun.
That was when I heard an attractive, cultured, insanely bored-sounding female say, “Apollo, chéri, the other you holds a deadly weapon.”