Derek

––––––––

I WATCHED IN HORROR as Sam threw herself in front of the bullet. Jacob’s eyes were wild, and it felt as if everything was moving in slow motion. It was like my brain couldn’t process what had just happened. It couldn’t process Jacob with a gun and the words he was speaking. Jacob, and the barrel of the gun he pointed right at my chest. Then him pressing the trigger.

Jacob and his goal to kill us both.

I lunged for Sam, trying to knock her out of the way. I had no idea what she was thinking, but I wasn’t going to allow her to get hurt. After everything we’d been through and everything we had experienced, the last thing I was going to let her do was take a bullet for me. Sure, she probably saw it as something to do with her job, but despite the conversations we’d engaged in, I couldn't see her get hurt.

Because I knew if she did, I couldn’t be held responsible for anything I did next.

“Sam!”

I yelled her name, and she turned her face toward me. I watched the bullet embed itself into her arm as she went down behind my desk. She’d been hit. Holy fuck, Jacob had shot Sam. I was seeing red, literally, as blood pooled on her skin and began running onto the carpet of my office. It looked like a lot of blood, more blood than I thought should be pouring from an arm.

Did arms bleed that much?

“Sam! Sam, look at me. Can you hear me?”

I tapped her cheek, crouching down beside her as I covered her with my body. If Jacob was going to take another shot, he wasn’t getting anywhere near her. Despite the footsteps and the commotion going on, my only worry was her. Sam was not coherent, unresponsive as she groaned on the floor. Her eyes fluttered open and closed like her body was debating between staying and going. Her left arm was limp against the ground, and I could hear Jacob shuffling.

My body was vibrating with anger as I stood to my feet.

I couldn't charge a man with a gun, especially a man who wanted me dead. I looked up at Jacob and saw him fiddling with his gun, mumbling something to himself as he did so. Sam was groaning at my feet, whimpering and wincing with the pain flooding her body. It felt like I was having an out of body experience. Like I was standing in the corner looking in front from a third perspective. It felt like I wasn’t there, even though I knew I was.

I stared down the barrel of my best friend’s gun as he aimed it at my face.

“Fine. Then the both of you can go.”

I heard him cock the gun, and I reached for the nearest thing I could grab. It was a paperweight, and ironically enough, it was a gift Jacob had given me a year ago. A bullshit birthday present before we went out for drinks. It was his way of getting me out after my breakup with Gretchen. Sam had been right. Out of all the women I had dated, Gretch was the one who had influenced me the most. She was strong, intelligent, and never took shit from anyone. She was full of life and passion and spontaneity that rivaled my rigid schedule very well.

She had left her mark on me, just like Sam had.

When Gretch and I had broken up, I swore off women. My business was more important, and my company had grown two hundred fold that year. But Jacob knew what was going on. He knew I was heartbroken and needed to get out. The paperweight I held in the palm of my hand was his way of striking up a conversation before getting me out and getting me drunk.

Jacob. The man I had considered my best friend for years.

“You son of a bitch,” I growled and then chucked the paperweight at his head, knocking him right between the eyes. The gun didn’t fall from his hand, but he did stumble backward. I broke his second pair of glasses as he fumbled with them on his face, and it gave me enough time to try and charge him. If I could get him out of my office and drag Sam into the washroom, I could get us into the elevator and out the back door before Jacob even knew what happened. I knew Sam well enough to know we had this shit on video. Every single fucking camera she had installed would catch this asshole in the act of trying to kill us both.

The only thing I had to do was get Sam out of here alive.

But before I could make a move, I heard a noise. A grunt, followed by a raging scream as Sam catapulted over my desk. Her leg vaulted her off the edge as her body careened toward Jacob, her fist knocking against his jaw with a thunderous crack. They both went falling to the ground as Jacob’s gun rattled across the hardwood, headed right for the toes of my shoes.

I kicked it off into the corner, far away from anyone’s grasp as Sam stood to her feet.

Her skin was pale as blood continued to trickle like a river down her arm. She teetered on her feet as Jacob scrambled to his. Sam lunged for him again, but this time, he fought back. His balled-up hand came down onto her wound, causing her to cry out before he scrambled out of my office like the fucking coward he was.

I sprinted to my phone and picked it up. I pressed the button that sent me straight to building security. Jacob wasn’t fucking going anywhere. The moment I had this place locked down, there was nowhere he could run or hide. The only elevator that would still work would be my private one, and the only access to it was through the washroom.

And he sure as hell wasn’t accessing it from there.

“Mr. Steele, we heard gun—”

“I know what you heard, and you listen to me. Lock down the damn building. No one goes in or out without approval. Jacob Carl doesn’t get off this plot of land, do you hear me?”

“Mr. Carl? Yes, sir. We’ll make sure he’s detained. Are you sure you want—?”

“If you fucking question me, you’re fired. Detain Jacob Carl the moment you see him. He’s no longer armed, but don’t take any chances.”

“Yes, sir. Anything else?”

“Call Doctor Farlow. Tell him to meet me at our space. He’ll know what you’re talking about. And get me a fucking ambulance,” I said.

I slammed the phone down, ran over to Sam as she stumbled around the room. I could tell she was disoriented as she tried to get her balance back. I wrapped my arm around her, pulling her into me as I tried to steady her on her feet. Her skin was pale, and her stance was weak. Her body was being drained of blood faster than I’d ever seen before. I was afraid for her, afraid I would lose her to some well-placed bullet in her fucking arm.

What fucking arteries ran through the human arm?

“I gotta ... he can’t—”

“Don’t go after him,” I said. “We’ve got it on camera. I’ve got building security locking down the building. He’s not getting anywhere.”

“He can’t get away. Let me go,” Sam said.

“Sam, even if he does get away, it’s not like he can hide in some sort of criminal underworld. He’s just a businessman who got too greedy too quickly. Now come on. I have to get you to a clinic.”

“Derek. Stop. I have to—”

I pulled Sam flush to my body as I picked her up in my arms. Her blood was permeating my suit jacket, warming my chest as I ran into my washroom suite. I strode us into the elevator and pressed the button for the ground floor, not wasting any time in controlling her movements.

She was stubborn to her core, and if she got her way, she would bleed out before she got down the damn stairs.

“I’ve got you,” I said. “Just hang on, okay?”

The elevator was sinking at a snail’s pace like we were moving through Jell-O. I was trying to put on a brave face for her and be the person she needed me to be right now. But she was moaning in pain, and I could feel the life dripping from her body. She felt light as a feather in my arms, her muscles going limp as her eyes finally closed.

“Sam? Sam! Don’t go to sleep. You can’t pass out on me.”

The elevator was still ticking down as I held her close to my chest.

“Sam, please. You have to hang on, please. For me,” I said in a whisper.

Why the fuck did she do that? Why the hell did she throw herself in front of that damn bullet? The elevator doors finally opened as Sam’s eyes opened wide, the pain robbing her of her breath. I stepped out of the elevator and ran for the front doors. The security guards’ eyes were wide as I barreled past them, slamming out the front door and walking down the steps.

“Get the hell out of my way,” I said. “Move! Now!”

The private ambulance pulled up and took Sam from my arms. They began inserting IVs and pumping her with fluids as another tended to the wound in her arm. Sam just lay there, weak and unresponsive as they heaved her into the car that would whisk her away to a private clinic, one that would give her top-notch care.

“Why the hell did you do that?” I asked as I laid my forehead against hers. “Why did you jump in front of that bullet?”

“Kind of my job,” Sam said breathlessly.

“Sam?” I asked. “Sam, can you hear me?”

“Unfortunately.”

I chuckled as I shook my head before I took her hand in mine. “You shouldn’t have done that. Where was your gun? Don’t you have a damn knife you could’ve thrown?”

“Even the greats make mistakes,” she said.

“You’re not great. You’re perfect. What happened? Where the hell was your weapon?”

She hissed as someone started playing around with her arm.

“She’s nicked her brachial artery. Call the doctor. Tell him we’re going to need blood on site.”

“Oxygen. He heartrate is skyrocketing.”

“She’s gonna crash.”

“Crash?”

“She’s gonna have a heart attack.”

“Sam!”

Her eyes shut again as someone shoved me out of the way. The ambulance was rushing at top speeds, jostling us around as her arm continued to bleed. One of the paramedics was calling someone while another was applying pressure on her arm above the wound. I felt her hand go limp in mine as her heart rate monitor began droning.

“Sam! Wake the fuck up!” I cried.

“If there’s someone she would want to call, I suggest you do it,” a paramedic said to me.

I looked up at her as my mind came to a dead stop. Call? What did she mean by that? I sat back in the ambulance as the paramedics fussed over an unconscious Sam as tears pooled in my eyes.

Was she going to die? Was that what the paramedic meant?

Without thinking, I pulled my phone from my pocket. I dialed John’s number and listened as his gruff voice happened on the other line. I didn’t know what to say. What would Sam want him to do in a situation like this?

“Mr. Steele?” John asked. “Are you there?”

“Yes. Sorry. There’s been an incident at my office. Sam’s been shot,” I said.

“Where are you? I’m coming to you guys.”

“You know that’s not what she would want. I’ve got her in the best care money can buy in this city. Hold your position at the house in case something happens there. I don’t see us returning for a couple of days. Sam’s losing a lot of blood.”

“Where the hell has she been shot?” he asked.

“Her arm. The paramedics said she nicked her brachial artery.”

“Shit.”

“It’s bad. Hold your position and—”

“Who the fuck shot her?” he hissed, cutting me off. “Did you see who it was?”

“Jacob Carl,” I said.

“What?”

“Jacob Carl was the one who shot Sam.”

I talked back and forth with John as we pulled into my private facility. The ambulance doors opened after I’d hung up the phone and Dr. Farlow was standing there to receive her. I hopped out and jogged next to the gurney Sam was lying on, her body unconscious and her arm still fucking bleeding.

“I need four pints of O positive blood and a prepped OR as quickly as you can get it for me,” the doctor said. “I also want IV bags with clotting agents as well as blood thinners on standby. I want to be ready for anything this woman throws at us before we can get her stable.”

“She crashed in the ambulance. We shocked her back, but her heart rate’s still unstable,” one of the paramedics said.

“Mr. Steele, the nurse will take you to the recovery room she’ll be delivered to,” the doctor said.

“I’m not leaving her side,” I said.

“You have to for now. I’ve got this. She’ll be back with you in a while. Let me do what I do,” the doctor said.

I stopped jogging as Sam was wheeled through two massive automatic double doors. Everyone was running alongside her as a nurse grabbed my arm. She tugged me in the direction of the best facilities this town had to offer, but I couldn’t take my eyes off Sam.

I watched her disappear around the corner, her lifeless hand hanging off the gurney.

If that son of a bitch killed Sam, I’d wreck everything I’d built to find him. I’d wrap my hands around his neck and watch the life drain from his eyes.

Jacob Carl better fucking pray Sam made it out of this alive. Because if she didn’t, there was no prison that would be able to protect him from me.

None whatsoever.