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Brayden slipped down to the floor, looking confused

"Brayden!" I shouted

Jake lurched toward Robbie and tried to get the gun away

Niko ca back down the aisle and launched himself at Robbie and had hi backward onto the floor

Robbie punched Jake and elbowed Niko to the head and grabbed the gun out of Jake’s hands

I rushed to Brayden He looked at me with shock in his eyes

When I looked up, Robbie had the gun right at Niko’s head

"Get back!" Robbie shouted "I’ll shoot! I’ll shoot him! I will!"

Jake scooted away, hands up

Robbie cursed in Spanish, rising to his feet He wiped blood from the corner of his mouth

"Maldita sea! I told you it wasn’t irlfriend Why couldn’t you just believeon Niko, "you had it in for me from the start!"

Robbie lashed out and struck Niko across the face with the barrel of the pistol Niko fell

"You don’t get to decide who goes and who stays!" Robbie screamed at Niko’s fallen forun

And BWAM!

A gunshotbackward, led by his head

He hit the shelving unit behind hiround

He was shot

There was Josie, holding the other handgun, coround just behind her lay the two-gallon Ziploc bag that Niko had stored the guns in

Had the other gun just been laying there on the floor the whole ti her arm out

She sank to her knees, covered her face, and howled

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

BLOOD, BLEACH, AND LIES

The little kids carabbed Max and Ulysses and pushed them all back toward the Train

"Go back to the Train!" I shouted "This is an eency! Go! Go! Go!"

They could not be allowed to see what had happened

I yelled at them every step back to the Train

I pushed them inside and pulled one of the futon sofas in front of the door

"You stay in there until it’s safe!" I shouted "We’ll coet you when it’s safe"

They cried and sobbed inside, banging on the door

Astrid and Sahalia were curled up together on the other futon couch in the Living Roo to Sahalia

Robbie was dead Brayden had been shot, and now Astrid was singing to Sahalia I had to keep the facts straight or I o crazy Those were the facts

I raced back toIt must have all felt like a very bad trip to hi next to her on the linoleu both his hands down on Brayden’s shoulder Blood was all over Niko’s ar to stop the bleeding but I don’t knohat to do," Niko said, looking up at me with pure panic in his eyes

I ran to the Phares in his ar because the store was so dark

"Bring those to Niko and then go turn the lights on, okay?" I said

"But the power!" he protested

"We need light!" I answered "We need to see e’re doing"

"Okay" He gulped and ran off to obey

I needed so I knew stuff existed because once our neighbor fell off a ladder and opened up a huge gash on the back of her head

The EMTs had sprinkled a powder on it So

I jumped over the pharmacy counter The place was a ht

The lights ca back on

I squinted, at first

Then I started scanning the shelves

I grabbed the pain pills Jake had givenstuff I didn’t knohat it was called or anything

I grabbed soiven to Mr Appleton and I ran back

The criotta get this body out of here!" Jake was nearly crying