Catching Rainbows

39

When we reached Keith, he wasn't moving. He'd landed face-up on dirt rather than the patio, though whether that was fortunate was up for debate. One leg was twisted at an unnatural angle beneath him, the ladder a foot away from his outstretched arm. 

"Oh God, I killed him," Chloe said in shock, her hands going to her face. I pulled her to me, my heart pounding as she clung to me. "Fuck! I'm going to prison," she added faintly. 

Jared was already dialing 911 as he knelt to feel the asshole's neck for a pulse. "He's alive," he let us know without much enthusiasm, standing again and moving away to talk to the dispatcher. 

I turned Chloe away so she couldn't see her ex, hugging her tightly. "Don't look, he'll be okay." He maybe wouldn't walk without a limp for the rest of his life but, karma. "You are not going to prison; he was trying to break in, you defended yourself." Blood began trickling from his left nostril and my stomach turned over. I looked away too.

"Lulu?" Hailie asked from the doorway, where she stood wrapped in her blanket. "I just heard so much noise, like elephants or maybe giraffes running on the stairs, and I need you to get me dressed because I definitely can't be expected to sleep after all that ruckus."

Jared was off the phone and intercepted her. "Let's wake your mom up," he suggested. "Lulu's handling an emergency situation."

"Oh," she said gravely, her little face frowning, hair standing up in places. "Okay, I guess we have to do that then." 

He turned to us. "They said not to touch or move him as long as he's breathing fine, which he seems to be." He rolled his eyes at the observation.

"Hooray," I muttered under my breath. 

He followed Hailie inside. I realized Chloe wasn't wearing much. "C'mon," I said gently, leading her into the house. "You probably want to get dressed so we can deal with the cops."

She hesitated at the door, glancing back at the still form. "Shouldn't we . . . ?"

I snorted. "No one's going to take him, we'll be right back." He made his bed, let him lie in it.

Unsurprisingly, he was still there when we returned a few minutes later. Jared was sitting in one of the chairs with his feet up on the glass table. We heard the siren of the ambulance a block or so away and I braced myself because I knew the cops wouldn't be far behind, and dealing with them is often tiresome.

This was also probably the best time for Chloe to bring up the mayor's house incident and get Keith blamed for that too.

Jared went out front to get the EMTs and they did their thing, checking Dickhead and speaking in code as they prepared to load him onto the stretcher.

He woke up as they began to lift him, no doubt from the agony it induced when his very broken leg moved. He let out a scream that was, admittedly, somewhat satisfactory to hear.

The EMTs tried to get him to be still and somehow got the stretcher up onto the wheels. He spotted us and became irate. "I'll fucking kill you Chloe!" he yelled, focusing on me next. "And I should have burned this whole place down instead of busting your windows!" he added, just before he noticed the two officers from graffiti night joining us. 

"Keep talking, Mr. Randall," the woman cop said wryly, glancing at me with a smug look.

"Shit," he said, realizing his huge mistake. "Shit!"

I smirked too, because in addition to everything else, he'd just made himself look nice and guilty for what Chloe was planning to tell them.

We went down to the station early the next morning as they'd requested, bringing the evidence Keith had saved. She disappeared with the woman officer from the night before, who she had told a mostly untrue version of what had happened at the mayor's house. The officer had made her an appointment to tell it again to more important people, and now I waited nervously for her on a metal chair in the lobby, which smelled of fear-sweat and submission.

Chloe emerged half an hour later, looking exhausted, but the relief when she smiled at me was indicative of good news. 

"They totally believed me, that he did it and said he would blame it on me if he ever got caught," she told me as she buckled her seat belt in the parking garage. "Especially after what he said in front of them. Holy shit, this is too good to be true."

"You did great," I said, proud of her. I leaned over to kiss her, cupping her face and meeting her gaze after. "You're amazing, I promise."

"Says you, the actual amazing one," she protested, yawning. 

"I can hear bed calling," I said, starting the car. We'd only slept a handful of hours.

"A nap wouldn't be amiss," she admitted, yawning again, which made me do the same. "And bed sounds even better since you'll be in it," she added, half-shyly. 

"I plan to prove that to be one hundred percent true," I promised, and we went home.