This is a double update, plz make sure you have read the previous chapter !

It could have been either one of them. I was running and thinking literally the worst of what could have happened.

I get closer to the door when I see that Adam is with an officer already. He's standing on his own two feet and he doesn't look injured at all. I keep going.

I make it past two other men of Giovanni's sitting off to the side in cuffs. There was the one that was holding Adam and the other was Donny, the one that was sent upstairs for Declan and Cyrus.

Declan and Cyrus who I still don't see. And I don't see Marcel in those cuffs.

I make it to the doorway ignoring some officers calling for me. Cyrus is just now making it down the stairs. I look him up and down, accessing for any type of injuries. It looks like he's struggling to breathe.

He looks up and sees me as I make my way over to him.

"Rowena I-" He struggles to speak like the words are too big and his throat is too small.

"Cyrus, are you okay? I heard a gunshot," I speak fast. Besides him being out of breath he doesn't look like he's been wounded by a gun. "Where's Declan?"

He motions up the stairs. "He- Row he-" Someone comes up to Cyrus to help him and I can't take another second of what he was trying to say. I let them help him as I take off up the stairs.

I see them in the hallway. There are two bodies on the ground.

Marcel has a gunshot wound in the middle of his chest. There seemed to be blood everywhere.

And then there was Declan, a gun kicked off to the side by his foot as an officer reaches for it. He was sitting against the wall still breathing hard from whatever had just happened.

He notices me at the end of the wall. I walk over to him as he struggles to pick himself up.

I see the drained look on his face like all his energy has withered and then I feel it within myself. All the exhaustion from the past thirty minutes or so threatens to spill out, but I can't let it yet.

I'm watching him, making sure he's not bleeding anywhere but he is. He has a wound on his brow, a stream of blood going down the side of his face. There's a big bruise forming on his jaw and it looks like he's holding the side of his torso. But no bullet wounds.

He's just barely on his own two feet when I reach him. I ignore the ache in my hip, the sting from my split lip, the pounding in my head, and the burn from whatever popped in my wrist. When I practically throw myself into him and he catches me, I don't feel exhausted anymore, I just feel relief.

"I heard a gunshot I thought-" The sound of my own sob cut me off. Declan's arms hold me tighter.

"I shot the gun, Row. He was choking Cyrus I- I thought he was going to kill him."

I pull away to see his face. "How did you get a gun? Marcel left his downstairs."

"That other guy came up with a gun. I don't know, everything happened so fast, I knocked it away from him and then we heard the cops and he ran. But the other guy was still on Cyrus, he wasn't hearing anything he was just on top of Cyrus squeezing his throat."

He shakes the thought and takes a look back at Marcel on the ground. "You think I killed him?" His tone is dry and I can't see the look on his face.

I observe Marcel myself. There's an officer down on the ground with him and applying pressure to the wound. He's speaking on his radio, calling for a medic. Then I notice that Marcel's chest is still rising and falling slowly.

"No Declan, you didn't kill him."

He's silent for a short moment. I can tell he's hesitating with what he wants to say. "Is it bad that I wanted to?" He turns to face me again, his eyes catching the split in my lip.

"You protected your friend. I would have done the same." There's no hesitation with my response. He nods and look at Marcel on the ground again.

When he looks back at me he takes my face in his hands. "Are you okay? What happened out there? How do you feel?"

"I feel that we should both find some medical attention," I say.

"Hey," he says seriously, giving me a gentle shake to get my full attention. "You ever plan to do some shit like this you better talk to me first."

"I couldn't tell you, Declan. I didn't want you here and you would have stopped me."

"Listen to me. I am all about making destructive decisions and causing a little chaos. Hell, I'm sure I'll look back at this and think it was little fun. But when it comes to you, my top priority is your safety. That's what happens when you love someone. So when you plan something this fucking stupid in the future, you can bet your cute little ass that if I can't convince you not to go through with it, then I will be tagging along, no more arguments."

I take a deep breath as I think over his words. He knew I was too stubborn to be talked out of something I set my mind to and I knew he was too stubborn to let me do these kinds of things on my own. "Okay deal," I respond.

"Good." He kisses my forehead and drops his hands from my face. "But you know, in the future I hope we're talking about normal teenager/young adult things."

I let out a laugh at that. "Don't worry. No more criminal interventions after today."

We go downstairs and it doesn't take long for dad to find us. He ushers us outside and we find a medic to attend to us both. Declan grabs the hand that's not hurt and he doesn't let it go. Dad sees us holding hands and he makes a funny face at it before he's being called somewhere else.

Adam found Cyrus and sits with him as someone checks his airways. He seemed to be breathing better. He sees me watching and gives me a lame thumbs up as they take a flashlight to his open mouth.

Declan and I walk over and situate ourselves next to them, all of us too tired to really talk about anything right away.

And then Cyrus speaks. "Declan... thanks, man. I think this means I owe you my life or something."

"Pretty much, yeah," Declan says. Someone is there to wipe the blood from his face.

"I think I owe you all my life," I pitch in.

"Pretty much, yeah," The three of them say simultaneously.

"I really don't know what would have happened if you guys weren't there. Seriously, thank you," I say. Declan gives a squeeze to my hand.

"Yeah well we wouldn't have known if it weren't for Adam texting us," Cyrus said.

"Yeah we saw Adam running off and I kept my phone close just in case," Declan continues. "Then he texts us, Row acting sus, sharing location now."

"I saw you on your phone," I accuse Adam. "You said you were texting your mother." I give him a shove for good measure.

He smiles before waving a hand towards Declan and Cyrus. "I introduce my mothers." Declan rolls his eyes and Cyrus flicks him in the arm.

"I can see that actually," I mumble. "Speaking of mothers, where's Natalie?"

"She actually saw us leaving for you guys and insisted on coming," Cyrus said. "But suspecting what you were up to you, I gave her to Coach and now she's stuck watching practice until her mom picks her up."

"Good. That's good," I said. I didn't want Natalie anywhere near this. I'm glad Cyrus was there to stop her.

As a medic looks over my wrist and asks me questions about what happened, I see my dad walking by again. He comes up next to us giving orders to his colleagues.

Then I see Giovanni being walked by Uncle Lio, his hands locked behind his back. They wrapped his hand for him and now he was being led to a cop car.

Dad looks at the four of us with the smallest ghost of a smile on his mouth. He walks right up to Giovanni before he can be led away.

"Your downfall was a group of reckless teenagers. You let that sink in while you rot in jail," Dad gave him a wink as he smacked him on the shoulder and lets them drag him away.

Giovanni looks back and his eyes stop searching when they land on me. I can feel the anger simmering from that one gaze and it sends a chill through me, but I internally shake it off. He doesn't get to have the satisfaction.

While he's still watching I stick my middle finger up at him. And then I see multiple other middle fingers up in the air as the boys follow suit.

When they have him in the cop car, Adam comes up to dad with his hand in the air, waiting for a high five as he says, "To reckless teenagers doing your job for you!"

Dad drops his smile immediately and glares at him. "My gun is still loaded, back away slowly."

Adam high fives himself and sits back down.

A/N: I feel like the end of this chapter should be paired with the song Teenagers by My Chemical Romance.

Thanks for reading <3