Annihilate Me (Vol. 3) (The Annihilate Me Series) Read Free Page A

people screamed.   Shouted.   I looked at Alex, saw that he appeared to be fine—at
least physically—and felt relieved and grateful that he was OK despite my
earlier anger.   I sat up, stretched
my neck in a daze, and looked out the front window while rubbing my
shoulder.   On the street, a crowd
of people was on the sidewalk, all slowly backing away from the scene.
    The driver had hit the black car with such
force that its driver’s side door was unrecognizable.   Smoke started to billow from beneath the hood.   I saw blood on the door’s broken
window—too much of it for me to fully grasp—but there was no sign
of the driver.   No sign of someone
who was hurt and struggling to get out.   My stomach clenched as my mind went to the worst possible
scenarios—whoever had been inside was either dead or ready to act again
despite their injuries.
    “Stay where you are,” the driver
directed.   “Do not leave the car
unless I tell you to do so.”
    With his gun poised in front of him, he
left the car, crouched into position, and slowly moved around to the
front.   All around us, traffic
either darted forward to avoid what was unfolding, or slowed so that passengers
could witness as much as possible before they had no choice but to move
forward.  
    Again, horns blared.   In the distance, police sirens
wailed.   Someone on the sidewalk
must have called 911.   They must
have reported seeing someone standing beside a black Mercedes with a gun
trained on a target across the street.   I turned to Alex, saw the grim expression on his face, and then I looked
at the driver who was approaching the other car with caution.
    “He could get shot,” I said to Alex.  
    “He’s wearing a vest.”
    “ On his head?   Is his chest the only place he could be shot? ”
    “He’s trained, Jennifer.   He’s far more than a mere driver.”
    “Pull him back.   Have him wait for the police.”
    But Alex didn’t reply or act.   His eyes remained fixed on the
driver.   I noticed that his hand
was on the door handle and that he was prepared to get involved if
necessary.   Fear threaded through
me, laced by adrenaline and fueled by instinct.   If he planned to get out of the car to help the driver, I
wouldn’t be able to hold him back.   He was too strong.   And
there would be no holding him back if that’s what he intended to do.   Apparently, he thought that his fists
would be enough to assist the driver if the shooter in the car was alive and
waiting for a clear shot at whomever showed themselves first.
    “Is there another gun in here?” I asked.
    When I spoke, Alex seemed to come back
into himself.   His eyes blinked, he
glanced at me with a fury I hadn’t seen in him before, and then he reached
beneath the seat.   With a firm tug,
he pulled out a sophisticated-looking handgun.   It was sleek with a matte, dark gray metal finish.   Except for what I’d seen on television
or in the movies, I knew next to nothing about guns.   But even that exposure was enough to inform me on some basic
level about how they worked.  
    As for Alex?   He obviously was comfortable with a gun.   With skilled ease, he removed the
bottom part of the handle, which slid out so he could check inside the chamber,
presumably for bullets.   Satisfied,
he slammed the clip back into the gun and watched the driver move closer to the
damaged car, which was spewing so much smoke that I was becoming less worried
about a fire, and more about an explosion.
    “Stand down!” the driver yelled into the
car.   He was on the sidewalk now,
inching toward the passenger-side window.   “Stand down or I will shoot you!”
    Is the person inside alive?
    The crowd on the sidewalk seemed to ebb
and flow, like a tide sweeping in on currents of curiosity before being pulled
away by fear.   But this city was
nothing if not a city of heroes, and I could tell by the way some of the young
men in the crowd were behaving—standing on their toes,