45
A shrill ringing dragged him back from somewhere.
Another ring.
Not church bells. They wouldn’t have church bells in Hell, would they? Definitely where he was bound.
A phone.
He was so tired. So cold.
It stopped ringing.
Only slowly did he decide that he wasn’t dead.
But he was wet. Around his neck, down his cheek.
In his hand, on his chest, lay the hard, warm metal of a gun.
Right.
He’d shot himself.
Shot himself and somehow missed. Trying to move his jaw sent a s***h of pain across the whole right side of his face. He didn’t have the energy to scream. The shot had gone in under the chin. Must have exited out through the cheek.
Cold.
Except for the slow, warm streams of blood leaking out of him.
The phone chimed that he had a message. Good luck with that.
He’d bleed out
