Until Fools Find Gold (Providence Gold 1)

As I went through the front door, I kept my gun in front of me. We’d been taught to shoot from a very young age. Some people might have thought it was stupid and perhaps irresponsible of my dad to do that, but respect for guns and for the damage that they could inflict needed to happen early in life. If I was blessed with kids of my own, I’d be doing the same damn thing with them too.

We were confident marksmen, we knew how to operate our weapons, and we really knew the damage that they could inflict on someone after Tate accidentally... let’s just say we respected our weapons.

And, until that day I’d never wanted to hurt anyone with a bullet.

Not until I found my wife hanging in a tiny closet desperately trying to get oxygen into her lungs.17 LunaDesperation makes us do things we’d never normally consider or think of doing. Well, at least that’s what I’d be saying after today.

Using the shoulder that was on the uninjured side of my face, I trapped the slippery plastic of the bag in place and tried to open my jaw enough to nip the plastic between my teeth.

The good thing about being cuffed like this was that the position of my shoulder, and the fact it wouldn’t move with my weight hanging from it, kept the plastic in place enough for me to nip and pull back slightly.

Unfortunately, plastic was slippery and I was desperate for air.

With a savage tug, I ripped a tiny hole in the bag. Not letting go of the piece between my teeth, I repositioned and tried again. With each tug, the hole got bigger until it was wide enough for me to position near my face. I wasn’t getting nearly enough air, but it was better than what I’d had before.

Not wanting to move and end up losing the oxygen hole, I lifted my leg up and swung it back so that it hit the door behind me with a thud ignoring the screaming pain in my foot as best I could. If I could maybe open the door, then I could at least see enough to make more holes and try to tear what plastic was left between them.

Just call me MacGyver!

Nothing about my predicament was funny, not one bit. But for some reason, this made me want to laugh– not that I could with the damage to my face. Plus, I figured maybe laughing wouldn’t help the lack of oxygen predicament I was in.

It was on the next kickback that I hit something that felt different from what had been there previously. My foot slipped off it after the initial hit which meant that it was narrow.

Was the door narrow? No, it was a fucking door, Luna!

I’d accidentally shifted on the last lunge and lost the tiny hole I’d made. I really wasn’t getting enough oxygen now, and my gasping was pulling the plastic into my mouth with each breath inwards.

I thought I heard my name, but people hear and see hinky shit when they’re dying, don’t they?

And then I felt cool air rush over my face as the bag was ripped open from the back.

“Luna,” someone bellowed, but I was too busy drawing the air into my lungs.

Now I knew how those people who dive down deep under the sea with no oxygen tanks feel when they come back up again. Who would willingly do this shit?

“Luna,” the voice shouted again.

With my head hanging limply as I gasped for air, I did my best to answer them.

But with a broken face and my arms cuffed above me, I couldn’t do much apart from nod.

I heard another voice bellow my name, and then I was swung around to face the door as much as the chain between my wrists would allow me to.

Why the shit didn’t I think to at least try to do that? Oh, because I was trying to breathe. Priorities!

Looking up, I saw the beautiful blue eyes of my husband as he reached for me and gently held me against his chest.

“Baby,” he rasped, close to tears. Not Noah Townsend? I don’t think I’d even heard of him ever crying!

And then the massive behemoth who had been with him did something that shook me to my core– he grabbed the rail I was hanging from and tugged it, hard.

The movement of that tug on the steel traveled down my arms and into my jaw. It was like an explosion went off in my face.

I couldn’t scream, obviously, but I could kick– so I did.

“What the fuck?” my brother snapped, tugging again.

I squeaked out a noise and pulled my head back from Noah’s neck to look at him, begging him not to do that again.

That was when they both saw the state of my face, and their already murderous expressions got worse.