Crystal Queen by T. Blake Braddy

Author:T. Blake Braddy [Braddy, T. Blake]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Crime, Fiction, Mystery, Suspense, thriller
Amazon: B076P19S4S
Published: 2017-10-21T23:00:00+00:00

***

On the way back through the house, listening to the quiet intensity of rampant drug use, I heard someone murmuring at the front door.

The hallway smelled like weed, and I found myself inhaling it to maybe bring down my pulse a little bit. My heart had been perpetually slamming against my chest ever since that first bullet whizzed by my head back at the apartment, and I hadn’t quite recovered.

There was also the whole conversation with Rolson. Having his voice rattling around in my head gave me this whole new perspective on things.

The main stairwell was by the main door, and I was minding my own business, but I noticed the door was cracked. Standing on my side of the doorway was a gaunt figure in a tanktop and jeans. On the other was a gargantuan human being.

The guy with the gun from the apartment. There was not a woman with him, but suddenly my head tricked me into thinking she was in the house, and I was off. I didn’t run, exactly, but I hurried up the stairs and back to the room where we had been staying.

Jerry was half-in and half-out of the bed, in just his faded boxer shorts. He was asleep and snoring and looked almost innocent and peaceful in that moment.

I shook him awake and shushed him. A few of the other junkies in the room turned and looked but then rolled over. By this time, it was very late.

He seemed to catch my meaning, because he got up and followed me wordlessly to the window at the far end of the room.

The window creaked as it opened, and as I looked down, my head swam.

It looked like a lot farther of a drop than I had expected, and so I didn’t know if I’d be able to do it. I tried to tell myself I had to, because the only other option was death, and Death Himself was hanging out on the front porch.

Jerry was tugging on his pants but carried his shirt in one hand. The case was in his other hand, and I thought, Good boy.

“My leg,” he whispered to me. “I can’t. I just can’t.”

“The killer is downstairs,” I told him. “The big guy with the gun.”

“And the lady?”

I just shook my head.

He sighed inwardly, a gesture of defeat. “Okay,” he said.

I took the case from him and held it over some bushes, and with bated breath I let it go. It dropped with a soft plunk into the shrubbery beside the house.

“Let’s hope we’re that lucky,” he said.

“Crossed fingers,” I whispered.

And though I hadn’t done such a thing in what felt like weeks, I leaned over and kissed him. On the surface, it felt awkward and perfunctory, the kind of kiss you get before leaving for work, but the specter of death lingering above us gave it a newfound electricity.

Nothing like mortality to get the old juices flowing.

I positioned myself half-out of the window and looked back one last time.

He smiled sadly.

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