Chapter 5
Days passed without them speaking. Katniss didn't even know why she stayed. Because being with Peeta is better than being back with Cray…. a voice insisted in her mind. She brushed it off.
One Friday afternoon, Katniss was just closing up shop behind the counter. Peeta was back in the kitchen cleaning; all the other employees had gone home for the day. The bell tinkled, signaling a customer.
"Sorry, we're closed, please come back….." Katniss looked up from wiping the counter and her face drained of color.
Cray was standing in the doorway, smiling evilly. "I knew I'd find you, sweetheart. Thought you could get away from me, did you? Trade in your appointments for orders?" He chuckled and then his face hardened. "All right, time out's over! You're coming back with me!" He stalked around the counter, but Katniss flinched away.
"No! I don't want to go back to that life! I won't go back! I've given it up!"
"You do what I tell you, you bitch!" Cray snarled.
"Katniss?"
Katniss froze, wishing this nightmare would end, before glancing over Cray's shoulder. Peeta was staring at them, specifically Cray grabbing her wrist. "What's going on here?"
Cray was frozen as well. Katniss could practically see the gears turning in his walnut-sized brain, trying to figure out how to talk his way out of this. She smiled at Peeta gratefully, but her fearful eyes communicated all that Peeta needed to know. He mouthed back to her, 'It's OK.' His presence alone gave her the comfort and strength to yank her hand away from Cray.
"We're through, Cray. For good!"
She tried to slip around to Peeta, but a stunned and enraged Cray blocked her. "And where will you go? Where? To him?" He pointed back at Peeta. "To be the wife of some bread rat?"
Katniss twisted away. "I'd rather be his wife than your whore," she vowed bravely. She tried to bypass Cray again, but he grabbed her sides to block her. "No! I said no!" Cray snarled.
There was the cock of a gun and then the angriest voice Katniss had ever heard from Peeta. "You should let her go. It's time for you to leave." Peeta's face was hardened in forceful rage.
There was a silence. Suddenly, Cray spun around and lunged for Peeta. The pimp got his hands on the gun but Peeta would not let go. Katniss watched fearfully, one hand to her mouth, as both men took their fight out from behind the counter, wrestling over the weapon. Peeta stumbled backward into a table, taking Cray with him. The gun flew out of his hands and skittered across the floor. Cray was back on his feet first, stalking toward Peeta. He seized a chair and raised it over his head. Peeta scrambled out of his daze, reaching for the gun.
"CRAY! DON'T!"
POP! POP! Katniss heard two loud sounds like a firecracker. Cray had frozen where he was, the chair still raised over his head. Then, almost in slow motion, he fell backward, the chair tumbling off and away behind him with a clatter. He was dead before he hit the floor.
The only sound now was Peeta's heavy breathing as he got to his feet, gun in hand. His eyes met Katniss's, who was staring at him in stunned horror. Peeta smiled wearily.
"Knew that Special Ops training would come in handy."
Katniss's expression turned to one of adoration. Tearfully, she laughed and then threw her arms around him, sobbing into the crook of his neck.
"Oh, thank you! Thank you! Oh God!" An amazing thought struck her. "Oh my god, I'm free! I can't believe it. I'm free!"
Peeta chuckled, rubbing circles along her back. "Yes, you are, sweetheart."
Another round of hysterical crying from Katniss and she sobbed back into Peeta's neck, her head leaning on his shoulder. Soon, her cries turned to sniffles. She found herself smiling in contentment as she leaned into Peeta's muscular frame. They held each other that way for a long moment.
"Katniss?"
"Hmmm?" she purred.
"Did….. did you mean what you told that little piss-ant? About rather being my wife than being his….." He couldn't bring himself to say the word, which Katniss thought was so gentlemanly. She took a deep breath and looked up into his eyes.
"Yes," she confessed with courage.
Peeta cleared his throat. He did that when he was nervous. "Well then," he responded. "In that case, I must ask you…. Katniss Everdeen, will you marry me?"
Katniss blinked once in utter astonishment and then smiled. "Of course," she murmured. She didn't mind as Peeta took her face in his hands and she allowed him to kiss her on the mouth. Katniss let her hands sink themselves into Peeta's neck and hair. She parted her lips for him so their tongues could dance around each other, deepening the kiss. Peeta's hands now encircled her waist. For a moment, he even gently groped her bum before quickly moving his hands back up, then abruptly stepping out of the kiss. Katniss whined like a small child and plaintively reached for him.
"No, Katniss, we musn't."
"Why not, silly?" she giggled. "We're engaged." She reached up to kiss him but he squirmed away.
"I know you want me, and believe me when I tell you I want you just as much." The last came out as a husky growl, and Katniss nearly swooned, especially when she felt her panties become flooded with dampness. "But, you deserve to have a night of lovemaking better than any other. I want desperately to make sweet love to you, but I want to wait until we are husband and wife. Deal?"
Katniss took his hand and squeezed it. He was so sweet, and she knew in that moment that she would be lucky to be married to him, to one day call him her husband. "Deal."
As Katniss and Peeta embraced and kissed, neither the baker nor the former prostitute even bothered to remove Cray's body.
