Close Range Christmas by Nicole Helm (ebook reader for laptop TXT) 📗

up and grabbed the flashlight. He pointed toward the voice. Grandma sat in the opposite corner of the room, small pistol in her hand, blood trickling down her head.

“Cecilia,” she said, her voice weak.

It took Dev a minute to think through the shock to realize she was trying to yell at Cecilia.

Dev tried to get up, but his legs wouldn’t hold him. Sarah was groaning in pain. “Cecilia. All clear,” he called.

Immediately thundering footsteps sounded. Cecilia appeared and paled. “God. Nina! Nina, get down here! The girls will be okay. Get down here.”

“Check if he’s dead,” Dev instructed. “Then go out to the porch. Brady is tied up but he’s awake. I’m not sure about Liza. I...” His brain fumbled. It felt like the world was going gray.

“Dev? Dev?”

“It’s okay. I’ll be okay.” He had to be okay. For Sarah. “The baby is coming.”

“Yes. Yes. An ambulance is coming but the roads are bad and there were accidents and—”

“He’s dead,” Cecilia said flatly as Nina flew down the stairs, gun still at the ready.

“Grandma’s hurt,” Dev said, pointing to Grandma in the corner. Nina immediately rushed to her.

Cecilia stood and stalked away from Anth’s body. “Are you sure he was alone?”

Dev nodded. “Yeah. Turns out one person can do a lot of damage with too much time alone to plan.”

“I’ll go get Brady. And the others. Then I’m going to call that ambulance again.” She disappeared.

“Dev, come help me get Grandma up,” Nina said. “We’ll put her in the chair.”

Dev tried to get to his feet. Tried to do anything to move away from where he was sitting next to Sarah on the couch. “I...can’t.”

“What? Why can’t you?” Sarah demanded, hysteria tingeing her words.

Dev took her hand. He tried to tell her everything was going to be okay, but his throat was too tight. He pressed his forehead to her hand.

“Devin, you tell me right now what’s going on.”

He could hear the tears in her voice, hated that he’d put them there. “Anth managed to get a shot off. I’m okay. Just...a little hurt.”

“Shot!” Sarah screeched.

But voices began to echo through the kitchen. Not just Cecilia and Brady. That was when Dev noticed flashing lights. The ambulance and fire department. God, thank God.

Weakness stole over him, but Sarah had a death grip on his hand. She was his anchor. Just like she’d always been. The thing that had kept him alive. Even when he’d been in that horrible darkness, it hadn’t twisted into whatever had afflicted Anth.

Because he’d had her. And his brothers. His grandmother. Anth had been given a mother who had cared, who had tried. But it wasn’t enough.

Dev would make sure it was enough for him. Always. So they all had to make it. Had to.

“She’s in advanced labor,” Brady said. He was leading a uniformed EMT over to Sarah with Cecilia’s help.

“He’s shot,” Sarah said. “Dev’s shot. Grandma’s hurt. Please. Please, look at them. I’m okay.” But the last word came out as if she was speaking through clenched teeth.

“We’ll get to everyone,” the EMT said calmly. “You don’t worry about that.”

The uniforms reminded Dev of what Anth had told him. “He’d befriended and paid off the deputy that was supposed to be our lookout. He’s still out there.”

“No, he’s not,” Jamison said. “I called the department for backup when I couldn’t get a hold of him. He’d tried to speed away from here after the fire. He crashed. No word on his status, but it was a nasty wreck.”

Dev blinked and looked around the room. An EMT was doing something to him he couldn’t quite feel, which was probably bad. But his whole family was here. Bleeding. Dirty with smoke. Wet and frozen with cold.

But here. Alive. Breathing.

So he focused on being alive and breathing too. Pain sizzled through him as the paramedic dealt with his gunshot wound. The medic looked up at Dev. “Going to need to transport you, ASAP.”

“Her first. Please.”

The EMT looking over him glanced at the EMT checking out Sarah. She shook her head. “Afraid not. This baby is coming now.”

Chapter Nineteen

Sarah wanted to scream. Dev was shot. Grandma Pauline was hurt. But they were focusing on her. No matter how she protested, there were people telling her to breathe, and then push.

The pain was unbearable.

“Don’t let him die,” she ground out, pushing with all her might.

“I’m not going to die,” Dev said from somewhere behind her. They’d put him on a stretcher and were doing something to him back there, but she couldn’t see.

She pushed and pushed and breathed when they told her to. She demanded Dev talk to her and she yelled at the EMTs to help Grandma Pauline, though apparently Brady was tending to her. But Brady had his own head wound, and so did Liza.

“What about the girls?” Sarah demanded after another excruciatingly painful push. If she focused on her fear for everyone else, she didn’t think about the fact that she kept pushing and nothing was happening.

“You’re doing great,” the female EMT encouraged her. “One or two more and then the head will be out.”

The head. Her baby’s head. How was this happening? Cody had gotten the lights back on and the Christmas lights twinkled around her. Anth’s body had been taken away. Those who hadn’t been injured were taking turns taking showers and checking on the sleeping girls.

And she was having her baby. In Grandma Pauline’s living room. After having survived a brush with a psychopath.

“Come on, Sarah. Push.”

Nina was holding her hand, squeezing it. Someone was holding her legs, but she’d lost track of who and how. Which was probably for the best. She just pushed. Pushed and pushed and pushed.

“That’s it. That’s it. You’re almost there. Deep breath, one more big one.”

Sarah didn’t know where she found the energy to push more. She would have sworn she was spent, and still she pushed. There was no choice. No way to stop this.

“That’s it. That’s it.”

Pushed and pushed and felt the horrible, painful