Midnight Daffodil (Poisonous Petals #1)

Chapter 46Luke

forty-six

LUKE

I knew I should’ve stayed the fuck home.

The niggling feeling in my back crept up my spine like acid through my veins as Aidan, Rev, and I ran out of the car.

“You go that way.” I took off after the gunman, who bolted in the opposite direction as the other. “I’ll page when I got him!”

“Got it, bossman,” Aidan called over his shoulder, whipping his baton out into his hand. His feet pounded the asphalt as he took off through shrubbery after the culprit.

We got the green light to show up to this shit show, and I planned to put a damn end to it as fast as possible. Oxygen saturated my lungs as Rev and I closed the distance on the shooter. He zigzagged through the streets, hoping to take cover behind cars and run down houses that lined the block.

“Get on the ground with your hands up,” my voice cut through the night without wavering as Rev’s yips and growls filled the air.

I demanded my body move faster to keep up with Rev, urging my muscles to power through the chill that saturated my joints. Rev stole a glance back at me, ensuring I remained on his heels. The man ignored my warning, the cool metal of my Glock seared into my palm, and the crack of a warning shot rang throughout the air.

He ducked on instinct but continued to run. Rev’s teeth grazed the filth of his jeans.

“God dammit,” I grunted, leaning my upper body forward, catapulting myself with all the energy I had. My lungs burned as sprinkles of rain kissed my skin. “I said get on the fucking ground!” The bullet whizzed through the air with a high pitch buzz, landing smack in the back of the shooter's calf.

Tires burned rubber in the distance, droning on in the background, and I hoped to God it was back-up.

The motherfucker wouldn’t go down; he kept running with a bullet in his calf, for Christ’s sake. Rev savored the moment, latching onto the man’s ankle. The agonizing scream that tore out of him pierced my ears as Rev whipped his head back and forth, shredding the skin through the flimsy material of his clothing.

Rev relentlessly gripped the man as he fell to the ground. I aimed my weapon at him, ready to call the dog off. I reached for my handcuffs to make the arrest and get him to treatment, then to intake, when headlights flashed in the distance.

Between my shoulder blades tingled as an engine revved. Thick bass from an approaching car rumbled through the night, vibrating through me like one of the many clubs Olivia liked to go to.

My neck swiveled toward the massive black SUV, tearing through the night towards me. My heart dropped into my stomach.

That was not back-up.

They careened down the road at such a speed my lungs clogged, no longer able to get air.

Fuck! Rev!

My dog's yelps echoed through my ears as I grabbed him by the scruff of his neck, tearing him and the flesh of the mangled leg off of the man in time to throw him out of the street. Momentum carried me, turning me face forward to the approaching lights that blinded me. The radiator’s heat burned my bare flesh, replacing the warmth of Rev’s body as he left my hands.

Screeching metal. Burning flesh. Cracking bones.

My vision blacked with the rigor of the impact that threatened my being. Was I falling? Was I flying?

Existence seemed fleeting as the world around me turned. The flash of a head collapsing under a tire assaulted me, pulling nausea up my esophagus, only to strangle me. The squelching sound of blood pouring out of a no longer living vessel rang in my ears as the world around me gleamed brightly.

I felt my flesh separating from my muscles; iron graced my tongue, leaving nothing but a bitter taste. Haze settled over my mind like the thickest fog as my once powerful heartbeat faded to a weak throb, clinging on to any life it could.

My brain played memories shrouded and silenced before my eyes as if sleepwalking. My body betrayed me with every agonizing gasp that escaped. The pain of my heart stopping in my chest reminded me of my mortality like a prison I couldn’t escape from, the darkness grew ever closer.

Fuck me for being so fucking fragile.

An unrecognizable wheezing sound surrounded me. Or was it coming from me?

The lungs I had always relied on now seemed to cruelly abandon me, refusing to inhale the air that once sustained my existence. The heart I treated with such violent disregard at times refused to beat.

Warmth settled over me.

Olivia.

She leaned in next to me, smiling. “I love you, Luke,” her disembodied voice said as she appeared beautifully transfixed in rose gold tones.

Far away.

I reached out to touch her with a hand that didn’t feel like my own. Her breath hitched as she dissipated into thin air. Like a feather taken by the wind, she was gone. Leaving me with nothing.

Alone. Like a shipwreck lost at sea that would never return, I sank.

If only I could’ve met her beautiful eyes one last time to see all the love we both ferociously fought for.