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“Leave me? You can’t leave me!”
Behind the store, beneath a tree, she saw his car, with its
Massachusetts plates. The heat from the fire scorched her face,
singeing the hair on her arms. Kevin was raging at her, his voice
slurred and raw.
“You’re my wife!”
In the distance, she could faintly make out sirens, but they seemed
so far away.
When they reached the car, she tried to fight again but Kevin
slammed her head onto the roof and she almost passed out. He
opened the trunk and tried to force her in. Somehow she turned
and managed to drive her knee into his groin. She heard him gasp
and felt his grip loosen momentarily.
She pushed blindly, tearing out of his grasp, and started running
for her life. She knew the bullet was coming, that she was about to
die.
He couldn’t understand why she was fighting, could barely
breathe through the pain. She’d never fought him before, had
never scratched at his eyes or kicked or bitten him. She wasn’t
acting like his wife and her hair was brown but she sounded like
Erin… He started staggering after her, raising the gun, aiming, but
there were two Erins and both were running.
He pulled the trigger.
Katie gasped as she heard the shot, waiting for the flash of pain,
but it didn’t come. She kept running and suddenly it occurred to
her that he’d missed. She veered left and then right, still in the lot,
desperate for some kind of shelter. But there was nothing.
Kevin staggered after her, his hands slippery with blood, slipping
on the trigger. He felt like he was about to vomit again. She was
getting farther away, moving from side to side, and he couldn’t