HIS BELLISSIMA

TAKEN

The cold hit her like a wall. The bar's heat and noise vanished behind the door, replaced by the hush of the November night, no bass, no shouting, just her own breath and the distant hum of traffic. It was past 2am. She didn't feel like going back inside, not yet, maybe not at all. Her leather pants and crop top did nothing against the cold, and she let it bite at her skin anyway. She started walking, and kept walking, dragging on the blunt, letting the smoke take the edge off the wind.

She walked down the sidewalk without much of a plan. The club was miles from her parents' apartment. But her feet kept moving anyway. Earphones in, phone in her pocket, hands tucked away, she let Adele fill the space where her thoughts should have been. There was something about that voice that made grief feel almost bearable, almost like company.

The cold had settled over Philadelphia like a second skin. Every breath left her in a pale cloud that vanished as fast as it came. Wind slipped between the buildings, tugging at coats, sending scraps of paper skittering over the pavement. Across the street, a late-night diner spilled warm yellow light onto the people huddled beneath its awning. Cars rolled past on the wet road, headlights stretching long over the asphalt. Somewhere far off, a train groaned through the dark.

A police car idled up ahead. Its headlights were switched on. She was drunk, and the blunt was still on her. She really didn't feel like dealing with that tonight. She knew these streets. An alley branched off just ahead, and she ducked toward it without slowing down. She checked her phone. Almost 3am. Fear clawed at her chest as she hurried into the alley, her footsteps echoing off the narrow walls. She pressed herself into the dark, barely breathing, listening for footsteps that might follow.

The alley was narrow and poorly lit. Most of the old lamps lining the walls had long since burned out, their broken bulbs hanging uselessly overhead. Only two or three still flickered, casting weak yellow light in patches that left most of the ground in shadow.

The shadows shifted every time the remaining lights trembled in the wind. A cold shiver ran down her spine. She glanced over her shoulder, heart pounding, at a faint sound from the street behind her. She didn't wait to find out what the sound was.

She'd made it maybe twenty feet into the alley when a man stumbled in from the far end, sixty feet away, maybe less.

She froze. He moved frantically, glancing back over his shoulder as though something were chasing him. Then came a sound.

Pfft.

It was so muted that for a second, she couldn't place it.

The man jerked, stumbled, one hand catching against the brick wall.

Her heart slammed against her ribs.

Another muffled crack cut through the alley.

Gunshots.

She dropped behind a waste bin a few feet from where she stood, pressing herself against the cold plastic as the realization hit her. The blunt was still burning between her fingers, a small orange ember glowing in the dark like a beacon. She crushed it out against the plastic, hissing at the sting, and shoved it into her pocket.

And somewhere beyond the mouth of the alley, a police car was still idling, close enough that this should have been safe.

Then she heard it.

The low growl of engines.

Three motorcycles rolled up to the alley's entrance, the same end the man had staggered in from, she realized, maybe forty feet from her now. Their headlights cut briefly through the dark before they stopped. Three figures climbed off.

She couldn't make out their faces. Just dark shapes under the broken streetlights.

One of them walked up to the man, who barely had time to look up before another crack broke the silence. He collapsed.

She clamped a hand over her mouth, forcing herself not to make a sound. The three figures lingered a moment, as if checking the alley was empty. Then they turned back toward their bikes.

Don't move.

Don't breathe.

Don't—

Her phone rang.

The sound tore through the silence, obscenely loud.

The figures went still. Her stomach dropped. She fumbled for the phone, hands shaking too hard to find the button, and by the time she silenced it, they were already moving, not toward their bikes now, but toward her, fast, boots striking pavement in a rhythm that was gaining ground with every second.

She bolted the other way, towards where she came in from, her own footsteps slapping the wet concrete. Twenty feet. Thirty. She could hear them closing the gap behind her, closer than she wanted to believe. The alley narrowed ahead, and beyond it she thought she could see the dim glow of the next street over. If she could just reach it…

A faint, muffled pop.

A bullet struck the ground inches from her foot. She flinched, her ankle rolled beneath her, and she went down hard onto the pavement, the impact knocking the air from her lungs.

She barely had time to push herself up on her palms before the footsteps behind her stopped, right behind her, right on top of her. A hand closed around her arm, yanking her up, and something in her snapped past the fear. She twisted hard against the grip, drove her elbow back into what she hoped was a ribcage, and heard a grunt that told her she'd connected. It bought her nothing, just a half-second before a second pair of hands caught her from the other side.She could hear a police siren somewhere past the mouth of the alley, useless, too far away. A sharp pain bloomed at the back of her skull, and the last thing she registered was the smell of gasoline, c

lose, too close, before the dark swallowed everything.