Page 102 of Sudden Summer

What the fuck was going on?

Birdie looked at the guy. “You have your daughter, and Janice…you have your granddaughter. You both can go. Be with her. It’s not too late.”

No one seemed to notice as I walked in, staying to the shadows between the door and the first stall. Birdie looked fucking scared, but I needed her to keep him talking.

Before I took another step, her eyes darted towards me. No! That was all it took for the guy to catch on. He smirked, clearly not fazed by the fact that my gun was pointing directly at him.

“This is your guy, isn’t it?”

“Sawyer, quit messing around. Just do what we came here to do so we can get you on the road.” The fucking bat-shit crazy woman handed her gun over to him. Only, Sawyer didn’t point it back at me. No. He still had it trained on Birdie.

“No, Ma. We got a minute.” He shook his head, looking back from his mother to me. My own fucking head swam. This asshole was related to the woman who’d been the point of contact for all of Birdie’s work stuff! Christ, it was all just to get back at her for protecting her patient. “Your girl here has been a real pain in my ass. I’m going to make sure the favor is repaid.”

“You aren’t going to fucking touch her.” My voice was so low, it made the bottom of my lungs itch with the reverberation in my chest. “And you’re not getting off this fucking ranch unless you’re in a body bag.”

“Maybe. Maybe not. But you try to stop me, you try to take me down, and your pretty little thing here gets a new accessory added to her body. One that she won’t be able to live with.”

I took a step closer to Birdie. I needed her to get behind me. My body ached to shield hers.

And then it hit me. He blamed Birdie for Alexis trying to get away. I could use that. I could direct his anger at me.

“You want to hurt her? You want her to pay for trying to take your girl away from you? Then you point that gun at me. What’s the sense in shooting her if you want her to really feel the pain she put you through?”

“Beau, NO!” Birdie screamed. “No, no! He doesn’t mean that. You want to hurt me? So hurt me. He’s a dad, just like you. You want to do right by your baby? Then don’t take our daughter’s father away from her. She can live without me. But she can’t live without him!”

I wanted to vomit. The gun shook in Sawyer’s hand, but it was still pointed right at Birdie.

“Don’t listen to her. If you really want to make her hurt, then have her live with the guilt of losing me.” His eyes shifted away from her, and his body started moving toward mine. “I know what she did. I know how she’s the one to blame for your family falling apart.” I looked over to Birdie, praying those tears running down her cheeks weren’t because she believed the words I was saying.

“Enough!” the woman from the hospital barked.

“Ma, I’ve got this handled.”

“Obviously not. Because we were supposed to be off this damn ranch with her by now. But you fucked it up. So clean up your mess and let’s go.”

“Do you even work for the hospital?” I asked, trying to buy myself more time.

“Of course I do. That’s how I knew what she did.” She pointed at Birdie. “What she took from my son. I accessed the records, and wiped the slate clean for him. No one ever looks at what admins do. Perks of the job.”

“And I was just doing my job when it came to protecting Alexis from your son…”

I shook my head at Birdie. The last thing we needed was her trying to reason with them. I caught her eye, tipping my head toward the office door. I needed her to move. To haul ass in there and lock the door. A new shadow, one coming in from behind Sawyer at the edge of the barn, caught my eye. About fucking time!

“How about this?” I was gambling hard on Hayes making it to this fucker before anything happened. The pressure in my chest eased as I saw Emmett was with him, too. “I’ll put my gun down.” Fuck. It was hard to not look at my brother. I knew they were moving as quickly as possible, but if they would just hurry up, we could rush him⁠—

“On the ground. We’re running out of time.”

I nodded, flipping the safety as I lowered my hand to the ground. Birdie started sobbing the second the metal clanged onto the concrete.

The moment I stood back up, hands held high next to my face, Sawyer’s gun was trained on me.

And I could finally breathe. I was going to keep her safe. Sawyer would shoot me, just like I knew he was planning to since the moment I’d stepped into the barn, but Hayes would put him down. Maybe Emmett would do the same to the bitch standing next to him, too. And Birdie wouldn’t be hurt.

Her sobs turned into a scream at the same time the gunshot rang out. I closed my eyes, waiting for the impact. It was stronger than I thought it would be. Warmer, too. Like being a kid again messing around with a football, and having one of my brother’s tackle me.

Wait.

That’s exactly what it felt like.