Prologue

Prologue

You never forget the sound of gunfire. How the ringing drowns the screaming inside your head. No matter how loud, it’s always louder, until the bullet hits its mark in an explosion of pain. Unrelenting fucking pain that sears through the flesh and leaves a gaping hole in its wake. Blackness settles in, and for one fleeting moment of bliss, all is silent.

You become numb, traipsing the fine thread between life and death.

I wish the bullet had killed me.

At least, if it had, I’d be certain of three things:

I could forget the dullness of her eyes as the blood drained out of her body.

I’d no longer hear the promise that I whispered in her ear.

And the barrel of my gun wouldn’t be crammed down the throat of a man who’d begged for his life just moments before I cut out his tongue.

But that’s what happens when you shoot at something impenetrable.

It ricochets.