Let Me Go (41 page)

Gretchen's face materialized next to him. Her skin shimmered, bathed in a silvery slight. A golden glow framed her head like an aura. Her expression was serene, like a painting of a saint. This was all proof, he thought, that his brain was shutting down. “Do you want my help?” Gretchen asked again sweetly.

Archie pulled away from her and tried once more to stand, but he was so shaky and feeble it was no use. He sank back to the floor, useless and weak. He couldn't do it. But he had to get to Susan. No matter what it took.

“Yes,” Archie said in a voice barely above a whisper.

“What's that, darling?” Gretchen asked.

“Yes,” Archie said.

He groped for the wall, and his hand found it this time. He leaned into his palm, trying to get enough leverage to stand, and he managed to get a foot on the floor in front of him. The seams and eyelets of his brown leather shoe were caked with mud and blood. The shoe looked foreign to him, like it belonged to someone else's foot. Tiny drops of blood dotted the toe. He blinked and the dots swam before his eyes.

Gretchen was crouched next to him, her shoes even bloodier than his. She shifted the deadweight of his arm over her shoulder and Archie surrendered, letting her support his weight. She held his hand by his wrist against her breast. He could see the gun in his hand, the barrel pressed against her dress, but he couldn't feel his own fingers around the grip. His hands were too numb. Gretchen moved her other arm around his waist. Her blond hair brushed his forearm, and through everything, through all of the pain and the shakiness, he could still feel that—he could feel the gentle thrill of Gretchen's hair against his flesh. She tightened her hold on his wrist.

“This is going to hurt,” she whispered.

He inhaled sharply as she lifted him to his feet. The pain from the gunshot felt like the crack of a whip. Even his tears stung. His vision blanched. His stomach turned. His legs felt bulky and anesthetized. But when his vision came back into focus, he was upright. The toe of her bloody white pump pressed against the outside curve of his shoe. She loosened her grip on his wrist and he lurched for the wall with his hand, to help stabilize himself. He was sweaty and fighting for breath, his body ringing with pain. They were standing, bodies still entangled. Gretchen's face was flushed from the effort of lifting him. She smelled like blood, like a slaughterhouse, or maybe, Archie thought, he was the one who smelled like that. Her expression was one of gentle patience, the devoted caretaker.

Archie's arm was still slung over her shoulder, his gun hand resting against her breast. He cleared his throat and lifted his chin, honing in on the open door that was now so close. He could feel a pulse where Gretchen held his wrist, but he couldn't tell if it was his heartbeat or hers.

As he focused on the pulse, he began to make out sounds coming from behind the door—drawers being opened, papers thrown, the sound of glass breaking on the concrete floor. Whatever Karim was doing in there, he was leaving a path of destruction.

Archie started toward the door. Gretchen held him up, taking all of his weight, their bodies moving together. Underneath the destructive ruckus, Archie could still feel the pulse that beat between them. It was louder than the shattering glass, louder than wood cracking. It was the beat that kept him moving. He could feel it in his body. The pulse was rapid and thready and he knew it must be his. Tachycardia. Hypovolemic shock. Gretchen knew it, too. He could feel her fingers pressing into the soft inside of his wrist, monitoring him.

They were four steps from the door. Karim was cursing on the other side, throwing objects against the wall. Gretchen paused. Archie's momentum was so committed to moving forward that he nearly fell over, but she caught him and then turned him and set him gently against the wall. Archie didn't understand. They were so close. He needed her help, the rhythm of their pulse.

But then she let go of his wrist, and the rhythm stopped. His body went quiet. He knew that the concrete behind his back was supposed to feel hard, but it felt doughy, formless, like he could sink right through it. Gretchen touched his ear. Her face took up all the space in his vision. There was no one and nothing but her. He could still hear the havoc behind the door, but inside—in his head—all was mute. It was like he was physically disassociating from himself. He wasn't going to make it through the door. He wasn't going to get to Susan. He was going to die, as he always knew he would, at Gretchen's feet. Archie smiled at the irony, as his head lolled back.

*   *   *

Gretchen is on
top of him, straddling him, and he is deeper inside her than he has ever been in anyone. He gazes up at her, his senses painfully exquisite. Her hand is knotted in his hair, pulling so hard at the roots that she has bent his head backward into the pillow. He can barely breathe. Strands of her own sweat-soaked hair stick to the sides of her face, but she has never looked more beautiful to him. The bedroom window is open, and he can hear the wind moving through the dry leaves in the trees, the box spring moaning beneath them, each time Gretchen catches her breath. His skin prickles with heat. Pain blazes where her fist meets his scalp, blotting out his guilt and self-doubt. There is just the pain and her and sex and the black wall of bliss that slices through him like a blade. Her face comes in and out of view. Her hard nipples graze his chest as her breasts swing forward, then back. Her mouth is open, the upper lip twitching as her breathing quickens. Her skin glows. Her eyelids flutter. She grinds against him harder, knotting her fist tighter in his hair as she does, so that the pain and pleasure intermix until they are indistinguishable. He drives himself even harder and deeper inside her, desperate for relief. He can see her shoulder move as her other hand works her clitoris. She opens her mouth wider and moans and spots of color appear on her cheeks.

“Now,” she says.

Archie flings an arm out, feels blindly for the Taser on the bedside table, and finds it. She is writhing on top of him, half mad, and his body is consumed by pleasure, her fist in his hair, his neck jammed back. He can hear the snapping sound of his hair severing from the roots. His head is twisted at an angle that allows him to look at her. He never let himself imagine he would be with someone who looked like Gretchen Lowell. Every part of her is perfect. He holds the Taser a few inches out, pointed at the dip of her waist. She makes another sound, a gentle mewling.

Archie's eyes move to the Taser. The gun-shaped grip, the yellow safety logo. The laser sight glows red on Gretchen's flesh.

She curls over him then, her eyelashes brushing his Adam's apple. Then she lets go of his hair.

The sudden absence of pain is almost disorienting.

“Do it,” she pleads.

Archie pulls the trigger.

All of her muscles seize as the two darts make contact, sending fifty thousand volts of electrical current coursing through her body, incapacitating her. As her muscles contract, her pelvis and legs tighten around his cock. He comes instantly, and powerfully, inside her. She jerks and falls against him, and he pulls her into his arms, staying inside her as she twitches. He clings to her, counting down in his mind, waiting for the thirty-second energy burst to pass and her central nervous system to come back online. Slowly, her color returns and the rigidity of her body softens. When she lifts her head, she is out of breath and he can feel that her heart is beating as furiously as his. But she is grinning at him, a sheen of saliva on her chin, her eyes bright with pleasure.

He can never stop, he realizes. Everything has changed. It is like having sex for the first time.

He can never have enough of her.

He wants to snatch the moment back, to undo it.

Then, somewhere, far away, he hears something crash and break against a wall. He pulls away from Gretchen, sits up, and turns his head toward the sound.

“Archie?” Gretchen asks.

*   *   *

“Archie?” Gretchen's voice
was a hoarse whisper. Archie blinked and his head jerked up, and she came into focus. Her blue eyes met his gaze and then moved over his face, a small frown line appearing between her eyebrows. He had passed out for a second. Now she was examining him, Archie realized, her eyes roving over him, finger on his pulse, medically assessing him to see how much time he had left. Not long, he figured. But his interest at this point was purely academic. He only needed long enough.

Gretchen took his hand in hers. The gun was somehow still in his fist. Gretchen peeled off his fingers one by one from the grip. He let her do it. It was like he was watching it happen to someone else. It didn't occur to him to resist. He couldn't have, even if he'd had the presence of mind to want to.

It was all so slow, so foreign. His fingers were stiff and sticky with blood. When she had the gun free she ejected the magazine and held it up in front of his face. “You've got two bullets,” she told him. She caught his eye. “You hear me?” she asked. “Two.” She waited for him to manage a nod and then she reinserted the magazine into the handgrip. It fell into place with a familiar metallic click. Then she disengaged the safety and handed it back to him. This time, as he folded his hand around it, he could feel the weight of the metal. He was no longer numb. The grip of the gun was electric against his flesh.

“You want to save her?” Gretchen whispered. She smiled encouragingly.

He
did
want to save her. He wanted Susan to stay alive. Right now, it was the most important thing in the world to him.

Gretchen stepped back. “Then save her,” she said.

Something else crashed beyond the door. Archie felt the pulse of the impact through the wall. Then he heard Susan gasp loudly in pain.

“Wait,” Archie whispered to Gretchen. His vision was too blurry. He blinked, trying to clear it. He cared too much. This wasn't going to work. He was going to fail. Gretchen stepped back in front of him and came into focus again, that beautiful face of hers. She raised an eyebrow. He was too weak. He needed some intensity, an internal switch to be thrown. He was desperate. There was no one else. Karim would kill Susan by the time the others found a way in. Susan was counting on him.

“Hit me,” Archie said.

The corners of Gretchen's mouth twitched up in a smile. Then she raised a hand and slapped Archie hard across the face. He felt a dizzying slash of pain and the impact turned his head to the wall. His face stung. His head buzzed. His eyes teared. But a burst of endorphins cut through the fog in his brain like a knife. The heat on his cheek where she'd made contact burned. He took a few long breaths, his head still turned toward the wall, feeling lighter with each inhalation, as if he had been given more access to oxygen somehow. He was seeing things more lucidly, more surely. He was still alive. He turned back to face Gretchen. Her eyes were spirited. Her nostrils flared with anticipation. She liked to cause people pain. Now she looked at him, her eyes inviting him to hit her back. Archie's hand itched to do it, too. He could break her nose if he wanted to. He could shatter that exquisite bone structure, leaving her swollen and deformed, bleeding into her mouth. No one would blame him. He let that desire live in him for a moment, using it to nourish his strength. He summoned every bit of energy and nerve he had, and then, cheek still hot from her touch, he propelled himself off the wall. He staggered past her without looking back, raised his weapon, and pushed open the door.

 

CHAPTER

43

 

Susan's dislocated shoulder
pulsed with pain. Her wrist ached from Karim's viselike grip. Every time he yanked her arm, jamming bone into the nerve tissue around her hollow shoulder socket, she gulped back a gasp of agony.

Karim kept one hand on her and one around the knife. She'd thought he'd have to put that knife down at some point, but he never did. The knife was like an extension of his hand. He pulled another drawer out of a desk, rifled through it, and tossed it against the wall. The wood split against the concrete and the drawer's contents bounced onto the floor—papers, a plastic calculator, thumbtacks, pens, an orange rubber Super Ball that bounced joyfully across the room before rolling under a copy machine. Susan flinched and Karim twisted her wrist to bring her to him. The pain made her knees buckle and hot tears well in her eyes. He pulled her close and brought the knife to her face. His breath was sour. His face smelled like pungent aftershave. She didn't want to look at him, so instead she kept her eyes fixed on the knife. She could see a sliver of her reflection in the blade, a wet, red eye.

“Are you scared?” Karim asked. His British accent made the inquiry sound almost genteel.

Susan knew better than to answer. Instead, she eyed the gun in Karim's waistband, inches away from her free hand. But she'd done this math before. If she went for the gun, he'd cut her throat; if she ran, he'd shoot her. With one arm hanging limp and useless, she didn't stand a chance at overpowering him.

“You're not scary,” a voice said from the door.

Susan looked over, hardly daring to trust her ears. Archie stood in the doorway, with a gun in his hand pointed at Karim. But her elation deflated as she took in the rest. Archie's pallor was corpselike, and he was soaked with blood from his ribs to his knees. He was braced against the doorjamb as if he needed the support to stay standing.

Karim reacted instantly, moving her in front of him and lowering the blade to the center of her throat, wrenching Susan's shoulder in the process.

“You okay?” Archie asked her.

Susan took a few breaths as the pain subsided. “I think my shoulder's dislocated, but yeah,” she said. He had lost a lot of blood. And he had still come after her. “How about you?”

“Fine,” he said. He gave her a weak smile. “Why?”

“You've just come to chat, have you?” Karim asked, sounding irritated.