Trouble the Saints: A Novel by Alaya Dawn Johnson

Author:Alaya Dawn Johnson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Tor Books
Published: 2020-07-20T23:00:00+00:00

11

We sleep together and it is relief inexpressible. It is Pea’s head on my shoulder and my arm draped over her torso. It is easy.

I smell smoke. Cloying, like burning trash. My fingers twitch: a warning.

Wreathed in a happier dream, I don’t heed it until my palms are burning. By which time Bobby Junior is walking with killer purpose across our living room. He releases the safety of his father’s heirloom 5mm Bergmann.

Pea is half-asleep. I drag her upright and she follows me behind the couch. Not enough protection, but thankfully Junior’s first shot goes wide. The bullet ricochets against the marble mantlepiece and buries itself in the wall just behind his head.

The shock of that widens his puffy eyes. “Bitch,” he mutters.

Pea stares at me. She heard that vicious echo. A shiver of a ghost passing through. And we might just join him in a few moments—she’s left her knives out of reach. We’re both half-naked. The nearest potentially deadly object is the fireplace poker. Bobby Junior shoots again. The bullet tunnels through the couch and buries itself in the wood beneath.

“It’s you,” I whisper. I point to the French windows.

She blinks slowly. Bobby Junior is muttering something, approaching us again. We’re only still alive because of his shaky aim, but he was raised hunting. He’ll steady if we give him the opportunity.

Pea takes both my hands, kisses me hard, and pushes me away. I stand with her momentum and run.

I scream Walter’s name as I hurtle for the French windows. They open outward. There’s a chance I can jump through and take cover outside. I plan for it, even though I fully expect one of Junior’s bullets to rip through my back.

The next three seconds pass like pebbles through water. One, I’m halfway to the windows. Two, Bobby Junior says, “Murdering bastard.” I am terrified he means Pea. Three, he shoots. I drop to the floor.

Four, five, six: the vase of colored glass falls from the mantlepiece and fractures. The poker clatters to the floor. A moment later, Junior’s head thuds softly against the rug.

“He didn’t hit you,” Pea says. She kneels, two fingers pressed against his neck.

“No,” I say, rolling onto my back. I had felt her movement behind me and known it would be safer to drop in place than go for the window. “You’d had enough time.”

She gives me a brilliant smile. “Oh, baby, imagine what we’d have been together.”

I could tell her that I’d never have killed the people she did. But that isn’t what she means. And besides—I might have.

“Bastard’s still alive,” she says. And then, “Turn around, Walter, let me get my robe.”

Tamara freezes behind him. “Fucking hell, Phyllis, what’s that white boy doing on the floor?”

“Tried to shoot us,” I tell Tamara. I climb wearily to my feet. I need to sleep for weeks. To not be on the wrong end of a gun for at least a decade.

“Will he wake up, Pea?” Tamara asks.

“In a few hours. He probably needs a doctor.

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