“No. Cameron already took care of that,” I said spitefully.
His smile was gone. This gave me little comfort. He grabbed me by the shoulders and dragged me
to the bed while my limbs flailed in dead air. He quickly resumed his position on top of me and
proceeded to fumble with his belt buckle. I thrashed about while he loosened his pants and I
wished that I would have found pants to wear instead of a skirt for the funeral—at least it
would have delayed him a bit more. As Victor struggled with me and his pants, I felt something
cold fall close to my thigh. Suddenly, everything changed for me. I grew calmer and stopped
struggling, which mildly pleased Victor.
“There. Now that’s more like it,” he said softly. His grasp on my hands loosened as he took
advantage of my change in humor to pull the rest of his pants down. I pulled my hand free and
grabbed the revolver that had slid next to my thigh. I brought it to his head.
With the feel of a cold barrel against his skull, I had Victor’s full and undivided attention.
But he just laughed.
“You even know how to use that thing?” he teased.
I pulled back the lever, removed any doubt. He flinched when it clicked next to his skin. His
eyes grew as big as the bottom of a shot glass.
“Get off me,” I ordered.
He clumsily rolled off the bed and stood in front of me in his underwear with his arms up and
his pants around his ankles.
“Just relax,” he said fanning his hands. “Don’t do anything foolish. One scream from me and
twenty guards will be running in here.”
“And you’ll be dead,” I added. I got up and demanded that he turn around. I placed the gun
against the back of his head and made him walk to the door. He was a lot taller than me, so I
had to stretch on my tiptoes to keep the gun pressed at his head while he walked. We got to the
door, and, not trusting him to give the right signal, I reached my free hand around him to knock
on the door, three times. After a few seconds, I heard someone fumble with the lock and open the
door.
Mickey reached for his gun as he saw Victor with his hands laced behind his head and me peering
behind him.
“Don’t even think about it. You touch that thing and your boss is dead,” I yelled, surprised
by the force of my own voice. I was completely calm. I told him to slowly remove his gun from
its holster using his opposite hand—I saw this in a movie once—and hand it to me. Mickey kind
of chuckled as he followed my orders. Equipped with two guns, I ordered Mickey to walk ahead of
us with his hands up. Victor was hopping and tripping over his downed pants, and I followed him.
With the two large men in front of me, I couldn’t see anything ahead. I looked at the floor and
saw that we had reached the end of the carpet and the hall into the warehouse.
I heard hushed voices as we walked out.
“What’s going on here?” Victor exclaimed.
I tried to peek around him, but Mickey was blocking my view.
“Mickey, get down. I can’t see anything,” I whined. I then remembered that I was the one who
was holding the guns.
Mickey chuckled and got down on his knees with his fingers still behind his head. Victor did the
same, without my order. The view finally opened up, and my knees almost buckled under me. I was
trying to confirm what I thought I had seen, but my vision was being blurred with tears. I
couldn’t wipe the tears away because my trembling hands were still holding onto the two
revolvers.
“Emmy!” I heard Cameron say with exasperation. I didn’t need to see that it was indeed him.
I heard hurried footsteps and through the blanket of my tears saw Mickey and Victor being
brought down to the ground by a group of large figures. I couldn’t move beyond the
uncontrollable trembling of my hands. My legs were as stiff as a board now, and my head was
swimming.
I was still pointing the guns ahead of me, at Cameron’s guards who were cowering away from my
trembling aim as they tried to drag Mickey and Victor off. But I was looking at Cameron, who was
standing next to me.
“We got them. It’s okay,” he said softly in my ear as he tugged my arms down and took the
weapons away from me. He wrapped me in his arms, and I started weeping. I was bringing my hands
to my eyes, trying to keep up with the tears so that I could see his face.
He was joyfully, and at the same time sadly, laughing in my ear. “I came to save you, but I
guess you didn’t need me to save you after all.”
I wanted to tell him that I did need him, always, but nothing but tears came out. I gave up
trying and brought my face to his and pressed my lips against his, grimacing when his lips
brushed the cut on my mouth. Cameron pulled me away and glanced over my face, passing his hand
over my lip and bruised cheek. His faint smile was replaced with anger.