“Takes more brains to not do stupid shit in the first place.” She shook her head stubbornly. “You’re allowed to be pissed at me right now.” Instead of trying to make her feel better about this idiotic fuckup. Anyone else would’ve been yelling at her at this point, surrounded by zombies or not.
Maddie tried to stop crying. She really did. She never liked letting people see her cry, yet when someone did notice the tears, it became that much harder to stop them from flowing. Like a weird reflex or something; cry more because someone’s watching you and you don’t want them to. Hence the reason she turned away from him.
“Not everyone makes mistakes that almost get them and somebody else killed, though.” Her face screwed up with the realization of what might’ve happened if Brandon hadn’t gotten there in time, or if he had and he’d been the one who got killed. “And if they do, they shouldn’t be forgiven like that.” She snapped her fingers to indicate an instant.
There was resistance when he turned her around, but apart from one stumbling step to catch her balance, his strength won against hers. It made her even less willing to meet his gaze. Maddie responded with a smile that lacked any true feeling. In fact, it was more a weak twitching of her lips than anything, but nonetheless it was an acknowledgement of his attempt at comfort.
Now that the immediate danger was past, it occurred to Maddie that she wasn’t sure why she’d contacted Brandon, of all people, to come to her rescue. Probably because he was the only one she thought would be willing. Being a cop and all. Defender of the weak. Whatever. Anybody else would’ve asked a million questions and then said no. Or so she expected. Odd to put her life in the hands of a guy she hadn’t been sure she could rely on. “It would suck if my awesome self got Smashered.” A joke, but not spoken with her usual humor.
“If there’s a next time.” Maddie sniffed and wiped at her eyes. “Soon as people find out about this, they’re gonna do worse than what that Smasher almost did. I snuck out! If my brothers and sister don’t kill me, O’Brien totally will.” She paused when he offered to clean up her face. Yeah, clean up the mess she’d made of herself. She nodded, dropping her gaze. "How bad is it? That zombie threw a shelf at me." Not exactly, but that's what it felt like.