“No, Anne.” Clary cooed. “Stay with us. I haven’t seen you in forever.”
“I know! But maybe we could meet up sometime? I work a lot. I don’t have a lot of time just to hang with the girls,” Anne said.
“I’ve never really had much in common with girls my age, unfortunately,” Clary replied, opening her purse and searching for something in it.
William frowned as he caught the look in Clary’s eye. He’d seen that look once before; right before she’d hopped on top of a boy in boarding school and beaten the shit out of him. At the time, he’d assumed the guy deserved it since so many of the guys at school were such spoiled little shits. She looked like a predator spotting her prey.
William took Anne’s hand. “Give us a moment?”
“Certainly,” Egerton said.
William had half-turned toward the door when Anne reached behind her and pulled a gun from under the ugly sweater.
“Hands up!” she shouted, just as the sound of a bullet rang in the air.
William didn’t think. He didn’t breathe. He just turned to Anne and pulled her against his chest, holding her there as tightly as he could.
Chapter Fourteen
Anne would never forget the look on William’s face as he held her and blood dribbled down his lips. Pain. Shock. Fear. Anger. No words came from his practiced lips. No tricks left up his sleeves. Never before had Anne felt so keenly what it would mean for William to be out of her life, permanently.
Harrold Egerton had shrieked William’s name. Clary had smirked and aimed her gun again. But Anne was a good shot, even with William’s body sagging heavily against her as a grisly human shield. She caught the side of Clary’s arm, causing the woman to drop her gun.
“You shot me!” Clary protested, as though offended.
The scene had been truly surreal.
Moments later, the other officers on the scene, including the captain, had come sweeping up, taking father and daughter in on charges of conspiracy to murder, smuggling, racketeering, and on and on. Clary, however, was going to be facing multiple accounts of murder one. She had smiled all the way to the cop car.
Now, Anne sat by William’s bed in the hospital. He’d been in for surgery to remove the bullets, and the doctor had said William had done well. He hadn’t woken yet, though, and Anne felt almost continuously that she might just vomit everywhere. She couldn’t do that though. Because she was in a hospital. Where William could die from a gunshot wound.
“Wake up, you idiot,” Anne whispered occasionally. She worried they’d make her leave, soon. She wasn’t his wife or anything. When pressed, she’d blurted to the nurse that William was her daughter’s father, and they’d made their own assumptions, or maybe the nurse had thought it was close enough.
She clutched his hand and closed her eyes. She’d cried so much already that she couldn’t imagine having any tears left, but her body clearly had other plans.
“Rude,” William murmured.
Anne looked up and squeezed his hands. “Will? William! Are you awake?”
“Yes. Please don’t shout. Think I’ve got a mother of a hangover.”
Anne clicked her tongue in annoyance. “You don’t have a hangover, you idiot. You were shot. Oh, my God, are you teasing me? You nearly died. How dare you tease me?”
“Think I saved your life, love.” William looked at her groggily. “I’ll tease you if I like.”
Anne covered her mouth and shook her head.
“I’m hard to kill, you know. Plus, I’m sure I’ve got another scar or two out of this. Nice bonus.” William reached up to her. “Don’t cry.”
Anne leaned over him and took his face in both of her hands. “You are not allowed to do that ever, ever again!”
“Who the hell shot me anyway?”
Anne pulled her chair closer and rested her head against him. They held hands as she explained to him about Clary, about his mother’s ring, and about how, she suspected, Harrold Egerton had always been his father, not Anthony Spencer.
“I don’t know how I feel about that,” William murmured, stroking her fingers with his. “Egerton is such a bloody stupid name.”
“Don’t be like that. I know it must be shocking.”
“It makes more sense why he was always trying to get me on his side. I always thought it was some kind of pissing contest between them.”
“I’m not sure if there’s a better man between them, but Egerton at least had the decency to be upset when Clary shot you. I honestly don’t know what to think about her.” Anne looked up at William. “She clearly dropped the ring at the crime scene on purpose. She rolled on Santiago and a dozen other people she worked for. This bust is going to be huge when it’s all done with. I think this is all just a game to her.”