Chapter 60 — Taking Amanda Under the L-Train Bridge to Shoot Guns
A beat-up folding table stood under the abandoned bridge.
On top of it: glass bottles, tin cans, empty beer cans — makeshift targets lined up in a row.
"What… is all this? What are we doing?"
Amanda stared, baffled.
This couldn't be the date. No way William brought her out for a romantic evening just to play with garbage.
Her confusion only deepened.
William saw that curious sparkle in her eyes and didn't bother teasing her further.
He led her to the back of the BMW, took out his key, popped open the trunk—
"Holy— shit."
Amanda covered her glossy, cherry-red lips with one hand.
The trunk was full of guns. M4 carbines. Boxes of 5.56 ammo. Holsters. Magazines. Gear.
No one in school would ever believe that the campus golden boy, William Blake, had a literal armory in his trunk.
There's a saying:
If she's innocent, show her the wickedness of the world.
If she's jaded, show her the carousel.
If he's new to love, undress him gently.
If he's seen too much of life, give him warmth by the fire.
It applies everywhere.
Girls like Amanda — middle-class, well behaved on the surface, rebellious in their bones —
fall fast for danger.
Same as Bianca.
Give them a taste of adrenaline, and they're hooked.
And indeed — her shock lasted only a heartbeat before it turned into fascination.
She reached for one of the M4s, unable to hide the excitement in her eyes.
"Holy crap… is this real?"
The cold metal answered for him, but she still needed to hear it.
"It's real," William said, cigarette dangling from his lip.
"Go on. Try it."
That look he gave her — confident, fearless — gave her the last push.
She grabbed the rifle with both hands and tried to lift it.
She wasn't prepared for the weight.
Her stance faltered — she nearly toppled.
William caught her instantly, an arm firm around her waist.
For the first time, the two were this close.
Amanda looked up — William towering over her, the cigarette glowing between his lips, smoke swirling around that perfectly sculpted face.
Her heart skipped a beat.
Girls like her — the good daughters, the straight-A students, the ones raised too safely —
had zero resistance to this kind of dangerous charm.
Too much stability breeds obsession for the unpredictable.
That's why the reckless types always somehow date the teacher's daughter.
Seeing Amanda inexperienced yet thrilled like a kid in an arcade, William asked gently:
"You okay?"
The question snapped her out of the haze of male beauty she had just fallen into.
"I— I'm fine."
She'd done rebellious things before… but never anything this dangerous, never anything that made her heart pound this violently.
"Come on. Let's give you the full experience."
He didn't tease her further.
William grabbed a loaded magazine from the case — already filled to capacity — and nodded for her to follow.
Amanda lifted the M4 again.
This time she was mentally prepared, so she didn't stumble again… but the weight of the rifle slowed her steps as she walked toward the makeshift shooting range.
"Give me the gun."
William took it from her hands, clicked the magazine in, racked the charging handle, aimed, then disengaged the safety — switching it to single-shot.
A slow breath.
A steady trigger pull.
BANG!
The shot echoed under the bridge, making Amanda flinch hard and cover her ears on instinct — just in time for the glass bottle on the table to explode into glittering shards.
This was the South Side.
A gunshot every now and then was nothing.
Nobody cared — especially with the deafening clatter of the L-train above drowning out most of the noise.
William looked at her and gave the kind of encouraging nod that could melt steel.
Amanda took the M4 back.
Excited. Nervous. Breathing fast.
She raised the rifle again — shaky aim locked on the next target.
William stepped behind her.
Arms slid around her.
Hands over her hands.
Guiding the rifle.
Amanda's breath caught.
One turn of her head — and William's face was right there, sharp features softened by cigarette smoke.
"This rifle doesn't kick that hard," he murmured in her ear, voice low and warm.
"But this is safer."
His hands stayed over hers.
Her back pressed against his chest.
They were almost one body.
Amanda's breath turned shallow.
She forced a few deep inhales.
Then she squeezed the trigger.
BANG!
Another glass bottle burst apart.
She had shot guns before — she was American, after all —
but this was different.
Legal gun ranges were safe, clean, predictable.
This was forbidden territory.
This was danger. Freedom. Chaos.
Her nerves were so overloaded that her body dumped norepinephrine like a waterfall.
Her heartbeat steadied — biologically.
But mentally, the thrill was nowhere close to fading.
Soon she got the hang of it.
William removed his hands and let her run wild.
TAT-TAT-TAT-TAT!
TAT-TAT-TAT-TAT!
Amanda went feral.
Like a beast that had lived its whole life in a cage and had just been set free —
all that caged wildness surged out at once.
The sight made William grin as he sat on the BMW's hood, lighting a cigarette.
She didn't even have a mission yet…
but someone like her would definitely come with a reward once the time came.
He just didn't know what it would be — not yet.
click— click— click
The rifle stopped responding.
Amanda kept pulling the trigger anyway, still hungry for the rush — until she finally realized the magazine was dry.
She jogged back, leaned the gun against the car, and beamed:
"No more ammo."
She looked radiant — genuinely, wildly happy.
"Want to keep going? There's plenty more ammo in the trunk." William asked with a smirk.
Amanda shook her head.
Her eyes flicked to the cigarette in his mouth…
and just like Mandy before her, she snatched it away and stuck it between her own lips.
She took a dramatic inhale—
"—cough, cough, cough!!"
She doubled over coughing.
"I don't get it. How do you smokers make this look so damn pleasurable?"
She flicked the cigarette onto the ground — didn't even bother stomping it out — and then wrapped her arms around William's neck.
She rose on tiptoe.
Her blueberry-flavored lipstick filled his mouth as she kissed him hard.
William didn't hold back — one arm around her waist, kissing her back without hesitation, under the cold steel of the elevated train tracks.
But just as things were about to escalate—
the moment was interrupted.
---