“Shoot me instead.” The man’s deep voice, strikingly familiar, washed over me as I clung to him.
“How sweet,” the gunman cooed. “I always love a pathetic hero. How about I just shoot you both?”
No. No. No.
“Boss, we gotta get it now or…”
Before the gunman could finish his sentence, another can went flying at full speed, hitting the robber in the head. Time seemed to freeze as the gunman took a few startled steps back almost losing his footing.
Everyone stayed low to the ground, praying the next move wouldn’t end in bloodshed.
Approaching the dazed shooter, my rescuer stepped from behind me and grabbed the shooter by the throat with one hand and his wrist holding a gun in the other.It was Griffin.
“Leave now, or you’ll be leaving on a stretcher!” Griffin yelled at the top of his lungs.
A cry escaped my lips at the glimpse of red and blue lights approaching the front entrance.They had to hurry. Or we would die.
“Time to go!” one of the other robbers yelled, already making a run for it. Fear, panic, and relief crippled me as I started to sink to the dirty floor, my knees officially giving out on me.
Griffin turned, his strong arms wrapping around me before I could collapse, holding me up as the tears flowed freely from my eyes. Sobs racked my chest so strongly it hurt.
I almost died.
Griffin came to my rescue.
I almost died.
I almost died.
Opening my eyes, blinking past the tears, I looked up into familiar gray eyes, my heart squeezing with a different type of fear. Oh god. Griffin.What the hell was he doing here?
“I’ve got you. You’re okay now. You’re okay, Tate.” His deep voice soothed, washing over me, his strong arms still holding me up. Those gray eyes scanned my face and then my body, looking for wounds that didn’t exist.
“Fin?” I whispered, voice cracking with emotion.
He nodded and drew me fully into his arms. I sank into his embrace, crying harder now. Holding me firmly to his hard body, he absorbed my tears and trembles of fear. “Everything is okay. You’re okay.”
“We almost died. There was a gun. A gun. Pointed at me. At you. A gun,” I rambled through my tears, my mind struggling to process and make sense of the last five minutes.
Cops surged into the grocery store, guns drawn, scanning the crowd for the robbers who were long gone. The crackling of police radios filled the air. People began sobbing and crying. Others were yelling. The officers immediately tried to contain the situation.
“You’re safe. You’re alive,” Griffin whispered, his gray eyes holding all my attention despite the chaos around us. His hands ran over my hair before he cradled my face, his thumbs brushing the tears off my damp cheeks.
“Because of you,” I croaked.
I was only alive because of Griffin Silver, this stupid man who, despite everything he’d ever done to me, I loved. He said he never hated me, and he’d stolen my first kiss, and now had placed his body in front of mine to protect me. Because he decided my life was more valuable than his.
Nothing made sense.And I wished more than anything that my mom was still alive so I could ask her what it meant because Millie was going to suggest it meant that he had feelings for me. Which was impossible in the extreme.
I was falling for him.
I was falling for the guy who had been my best friend, and he would never feel the same way, not when he could have any girl he wanted.
CHAPTER 16
GRIFFIN
PRESENT
