The Last Widow. Karin Slaughter

to his side. He was clutching his belly, trying to stand up, looking for the revolver.

      Hank told Sara, “You go with us, or I’ll shoot him in the chest.”

      A sob bruised her throat. She reached out her hand as if she could help him.

      Will’s legs tensed as he tried to get up again. Vomit roiled from his mouth. Blood dripped from the back of his head. He got to his knees, but fell flat.

      Sara cried out as if her own body had slammed into the ground.

      “Doc?” Hank finally raised the gun, aiming it at Will.

      Sara walked toward the BMW. She could barely stay upright. Her knees kept locking out. Will was still writhing on the ground. She looked up the street. Her mother was standing on the sidewalk. Cathy had a shotgun in her hands, an old double barrel that had been gathering dust above Bella’s fireplace for the last fifty years.

      Sara shook her head, pleading with Cathy not to interfere.

      Hank dragged Michelle toward the BMW. He threw her at Vale to take care of. He was heading toward Will, his Glock at his side.

      “You promised.” Even as Sara said the words she understood the stupidity of trusting a mass murderer.

      “Drive.” Vale shoved Sara into the driver’s seat. She could see out of the open passenger-side door. Will was on all fours. Vomit and blood dripped from his mouth. His eyes were closed. Sweat ran down his face.

      “Fuck,” Clinton muttered, climbing into the seat behind Sara. “Jesus fuck. Let’s get out of here.”

      Sara watched helplessly as Hank swung back his leg. He was going to kick Will in the head.

      “Will!” she screamed.

      He grabbed the leg, dragging Hank down to the sidewalk. There was no struggle. Will straddled him. He started beating his face; quickly, methodically, furiously.

      “Leave him!” Clinton yelled.

      Vale strained to reach behind him, blindly feeling for the revolver that was stuck down the front of his pants. He was panicked from the gunshot wound in his side. Blood had soaked his shirt.

      “I said fucking leave him!” Clinton pointed his Glock at Vale’s head. “Now!”

      “Jesus, Carter!” Vale hoisted himself into the passenger’s seat of the car even as he said, “We can’t leave Hurley.”

       Clinton. Hank. Vince.

       Carter. Hurley. Vale.

      “Drive!” The Glock banged against the side of Sara’s skull. “Go!”

      She put the engine in gear. She swung the car around. She saw Will in the side mirror. Merle was lying dead on the ground beside him. He was still straddling Hank or Hurley or whoever the hell the man was.

      Kill him, too, Sara thought. Beat the life out of him.

      The shotgun went off. Cathy had aimed for the tires but hit the rear panel instead.

      “Fuck!” Vale screamed. “What the fuck, Carter!”

      “Shut up!” Carter slammed his fist into Sara’s seat. Blood dripped from the slash in his forehead. The handle of Will’s knife was sticking out of his thigh. “Go right! Go right!”

      Sara swerved right. Her heart was pounding so hard that she felt dizzy. Her stomach was clenched. She felt her bladder wanting to release. Vale was sitting beside her. Carter was directly behind her, his shoulder pressed against Michelle’s. Dwight was passed out in the seat behind Vale, but there was no telling how long that would last. She had trapped herself with these monsters. Her only consolation was that Will was still alive.

      “Fuck!” Vale rubbed his face with his hands. He was running out of adrenaline. His body was registering the shock of the gunshot wound. His breath came in sharp, panicked pants. “He got me in the chest, bro! I can’t—I can’t breathe!”

      “Shut up, you fucking pussy!”

      An Atlanta police cruiser was heading straight toward them, full lights and sirens. Sara prayed for it to stop. The car shook the BMW as it zoomed past.

      “Go left!” Carter’s voice was as sharp as the siren. “Here! Go left!”

      She swerved onto Oakdale. Sara’s eyes followed the cruiser as long as she could. The brake lights glowed red as it turned left onto Lullwater.

       Toward Will.

      “I can feel the air seeping out!” Vale sounded terrified. He could help set off bombs inside of a hospital but he was whining about a hole in his side. “Help me! What do I do?”

      Sara said nothing. She was thinking about Will. Bruised ribs. Broken sternum. If the spleen had ruptured, he could be bleeding into his belly. Had she sacrificed herself only to leave him dying in the street? And now this man, this whining child, wanted her to help him?

      “You’re a doctor!” Vale whimpered. “Help me!”

      Sara had never in her life felt so little empathy for another human being. She spoke through clenched teeth: “Seal the wound.”

      Vale lifted up his shirt, hand shaking as he reached to cover the hole.

      “Put your finger inside,” Sara told him, which was bullshit because his chest cavity was filling up with blood. Each time he breathed, he pushed more air into the pleural space, which pressed on the lung with the hole in it, causing the lung to collapse more quickly. Eventually, pressure would build up on the opposite lung and the heart and veins, causing them to collapse, too.

      Her only concern was that it would take him too long to die.

      “Jesus!” Vale screeched. The idiot had actually shoved his finger into the hole. The pain took away his breath. His eyes were so wide that the whites showed. Mercifully, he was in too much agony to complain.

      Vale wasn’t the one she should be worried about, anyway. Carter was angry, focused and prepared to do whatever it took to get them out of here. Sara was aware that at any moment, he could reach around the seat and grab her neck.

      She looked at the time.

      2:04 p.m.

      The golden hour was already ticking down on Will’s clock. Internal bleeding could be surgically repaired, but how quickly could they get him to a surgeon? He would need to be airlifted to a trauma center. Who would take him? Every cop in the vicinity would be responding to the explosion.

      Two bombs detonated on campus. She couldn’t think about that. Wouldn’t think about that. All that mattered was Will.

      “Pass them!” Carter yelled. “Get in the other lane!”

      Sara hurtled into oncoming traffic. Tires screeched. Two cars smacked into each other. Vale screamed again. Sara pressed down on the gas. They were approaching Ponce de Leon.

      “Blow the light!”

      Sara put on her seat belt. She went through the light. Horns blared. The tires lifted off the ground as she struggled to keep the wheel straight.

      Which—why?

      Crash the car into a tree. Into a telephone pole. Into a house. Sara had the airbag in the steering wheel. Her seat belt. She didn’t have a hole in her lung or a knife sticking out of her leg or a gunshot wound in her shoulder.

       Michelle.

      The woman was sitting in the middle of the back seat. On impact, she would fly through the windshield. She could break her neck. Broken metal and glass could rip open an artery. The car could run over her before she had a chance to scramble away.

      Do it, Michelle had dared Hank, staring into the black hole of a gun. Go ahead, you spineless piece of shit.

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