[Georgia 03] Fallen

hair. Skin a yellow wax. His arms wrapped around his body like a child playing a spinning game. No gun on or near him. The back of his head was a bloody pulp. Brain matter speckled the washing machine. She could see the hole the bullet dug into the wall when it exited his skull.
    Faith pivoted back to the kitchen. There was a pass-through to the dining room. She crouched and swung around.
    Empty.
    The layout of the house came to her like a diagram in her head. Family room on her left. Large, open foyer on the right. Hall straight ahead. Bathroom at the end. Two bedrooms on the right. One bedroom on the left—her mother’s room. Inside was a tiny bathroom, a door that led to the back patio. Evelyn’s bedroom door was the only one in the hall that was closed.
    Faith started to go toward the closed door, but stopped.
    People and doorways.
    Her mind saw the words engraved in stone: Do not proceed toward your downward threat until you are sure everything behind you is clear .
    Faith crouched as she turned left, entering the family room. She scanned along the walls, checked the sliding glass door that led into the backyard. The glass was shattered. A breeze rustled the curtains. The room had been ransacked. Someone was looking for something. Drawers were broken. Cushions gutted. From her vantage point, Faith could see behind the couch, that the wingback chair was clear of extra feet. She kept her head swiveling back and forth between the room and the hall until she was sure she could move on.
    The first door was to her old bedroom. Someone had searched here, too. The drawers in Faith’s old bureau stuck out like tongues. The mattress was ripped open. Emma’s crib had been busted to pieces. Her blanket was ripped in two. The mobile that had hung above her head every month of her life had been ground into the carpet like a pile of dirt. Faith swallowed the burning rage this ignited inside of her. She forced herself to keep moving.
    Quickly, she cleared the closets, under the bed. She did the same in Zeke’s room, which had been turned into her mother’s office. Papers were scattered on the floor. The desk drawers had been thrown against the wall. She glanced into the bathroom. The shower curtain was pulled back. The linen closet gaped open. Towels and sheets spilled onto the floor.
    Faith was standing to the left of her mother’s bedroom door when she heard the first siren. It was distant, but clear. She should wait for it, wait for backup.
    Faith kicked open the door and swung around in a crouch. Her finger went to the trigger. Two men were at the foot of the bed. One was on his knees. He was Hispanic, dressed only in a pair of jeans. The skin across his chest was shredded as if he’d been whipped with barbed wire. Sweat glistened on every part of his body. Black and red bruises punched along his ribs. He had tattoos all over his arms and torso, the largest of which was on his chest: a green and red Texas star with a rattlesnake wrapped around it. He was a member of Los Texicanos, a Mexican gang that had controlled the Atlanta drug trade for twenty years.
    The second man was Asian. No tattoos. Bright red Hawaiian shirt and tan chinos. He stood with the Texicano in front of him, holding a gun to the man’s head. A cherry-handled Smith and Wesson five-shot. Her mother’s revolver.
    Faith kept the shotgun trained on the Asian’s chest. The cold, hard metal felt like an extension of her body. Adrenaline had pumped her heart into a frenzy. Every muscle inside of her wanted to pull the trigger.
    Her words were clipped. “Where’s my mother?”
    He spoke in a twangy southern drawl. “You shoot me, you’re gonna hit him.”
    He was right. Faith was standing in the hallway, less than six feet away. The men were too close together. Even a headshot carried the risk that a pellet would stray, hitting—possibly killing—the hostage. Still, she kept her finger on the trigger, the shotgun steady. “Tell me where she is.”
    He pressed the muzzle harder against the man’s head. “Drop the gun.”
    The sirens were getting louder. They were coming from Zone 5, on the Peachtree side of the neighborhood. Faith said, “You hear that sound?” She mapped their path down Nottingham, calculating the cruisers would be here in less than a minute. “Tell me where my mother is or I swear to God I’ll kill you before they hit the door.”
    He smiled again, his hand tightening around the gun. “You know what we’re here for.