Amid the Roar - Sequel to M.A.L.

Chapter 17

Chapter 17

Charlie’s wrists were secured together by Jason while Gabrielle sat in the back seat next to them, watching intently. Her cousin took the silver duct tape and wrapped it several times around. Charlie’s eyes look hopelessly at his love but she couldn’t return his gaze. Her soul was having a war inside her.

What she was doing was wrong and yet right. She wanted to feel nothing for him but she did. The choices she had most always been black and white until Charlie came along. Now that she had to sift her way through the wonderful grey, she wasn’t sure whether she wanted to thank her kidnapper or kill him that much more.

Her heart chose gratitude while her common sense chose the latter.

“Car keys. Now,” the younger boy commanded.

Charlie didn’t answer. The cousins looked at each other with a knowing stare. They talked about their plan before heading over to the apartment complex. Gabrielle was to finish the man herself and he was there for backup. Jason knew there was something troubling her and that she wouldn’t be able to pull the final trigger. He would be the one to do the dirty work. The boy already did it once before.

Jason pulled a pocket knife from the side of his boot and flipped it open. “Let me make this clearer,” Jason said with a hateful tone. He pressed the blade against the throbbing vein on Charlie’s throat. “Where are your car keys?”

“Back pocket,” Charlie answered at last.

Gabrielle quick pulled them out with her free hand. When Jason was done with the last piece of tape wrapped around Charlie’s mouth, he was tossed the keys and headed for the front seat. Jason started the car but took one last look at his cousin in the back seat. Gabrielle nodded, holding the gun tighter. It was time.

Following the same road they had run a little while earlier, they headed for the riverside. Gabrielle pointed the gun at her kidnapper the entire way. The girl stared at him, tracing his features with her gaze. Charlie had the same piercing blue eyes and the same tiny scar above his left eyebrow. He looked exactly like the man she fell in love with at the Kingdom, the one that kept her safe. He was the one that showed her what it meant to feel. Charlie made her want to be someone and to do things for herself all while wanting nothing but her love. He would always be in the back of her thoughts, just waiting to be remembered.

His eyes pleaded with her as her breath grew shorter. She couldn’t do it. She’d never be able to kill the man she unwillingly fell for. She loved him too much. The gun she gripped so agonizingly in her hands lowered.

“Jason,” she whispered as he parked the car next to the river. The journey there took much less time with the car, giving her little chance to come up with an excuse to keep Charlie alive. As Jason opened his car door, Gabrielle tossed the gun beside her on the seat and began to undo Charlie’s wrist tape. “Jas, I can’t do this.”

“You’re strong, Gabby. Remember what he did.”

“I know but…” Gabrielle paused when Charlie’s tied hands covered hers. She looked back at his hopeful expression with the same tingling feeling as the night before. He was for her. She would always belong to him. “Charlie,” she said breathlessly. “I don’t—”

Jason interrupted their moment, pulling her kidnapper backward out of the car where he fell to the ground. Gabrielle shrieked. The man landed with a loud grunt and continued to moan as Jason dragged him away from the car. It was all leading up to the final decision of his lover keeping him alive or letting her cousin kill him.

Gabrielle hurried to get out of the backseat while Jason kneeled beside his almost second victim. His tongue ran over his lip ring nervously but his adrenaline made him feel more in control. Jason anger took control again. Eagerly, he took the knife from his pocket and again held it against Charlie’s throat.

“The bad men of the world need to be stopped,” he yelled back to Gabrielle.

 “Jason, no!” Gabrielle screamed at the top of her lungs.

Time stood still. Only the rush of the river water and the mud squishing under Gabrielle’s old Converse protruded the silence. Jason had heard that tone from his mother before. He chose not to listen then but this time, it was different. Jason heaved up his shoulders and sighed. His cousin didn’t understand, she would never understand. The eyes of the man on the ground were wide with fear though he did nothing to fight back. Charlie knew he was not worth saving unless it was for his Gabrielle.

“You and me,” he said. He smirked at Charlie nodding at his self-righteousness. “Remember?”

Jason glanced back at Gabrielle who stood beside the trunk of the car and gasped. Never in his life had he felt more betrayed. Holding his hands up and putting the knife on the ground, he surrendered to her. Gabrielle wiped her tear away with her free hand. The other hand was aiming the handgun at Jason.

“H-he’s the monster,” Jason started to rationalize with her. “He’s the man that took you! Why the hell are you defending him?!”

“Because I… because I can’t let you do this.” Gabrielle’s bottom lip was shaking and her sweaty palms made the gun more unbearable to hold. Jason inched nearer until he was close enough to console his weeping mess of a cousin.

“Shh, it’s okay,” he soothed her. “I’m so sorry. We’ll be fine.”

 Jason took the gun from her feeble hands and let her cry into his arms. Gabrielle found her lungs constricting at the relief in Charlie’s face. The three of them would be okay. They had to be, for Gabrielle’s sake.

“Don’t worry about a thing, Gab,” Jason continued. His lips gently brushed against his cousin’s black hair and hugged her tighter. “I’ll kill him for you. You’ll see. You’ll get it when this is all over.”

“No! Jason, I love him!”

As the boy aimed at Charlie, who was frozen with a mix of joy from her proclamation of love and a fear for his life, Gabrielle slammed Jason against the car. Her hands clamped on his wrists and she struggled to bang his arm on the wing of the trunk until he gave up the weapon. But Jason was stronger than she had anticipated. He held on as her strength barely kept him at bay. Neither of them noticed the man scrambling up in desperation on the ground for his safety and that of his love.

Jason finally shoved his cousin to the ground. The girl tripped over her feet and fell into the mud, finding one of the only rocks and accidentally crashing her head against it. Her entire body exploded with agony. The blood thumped in her skull creating a heightened sense of the muscles in her body while the rest of the world felt muted. Through blurred eyes, she turned back to Jason.

“Fine,” he cried angrily at Gabrielle, not caring for her pain. He was glad for it. Now she was vulnerable and he was in control. Lust for power was a family trait. “You can both go to hell for all I care.”

Jason took up his weapon and Gabrielle shut her eyes from the pain in her skull. The moment it took her to regain her bearing was the moment her life drastically changed for the second time. The gun fired into the quiet of the late afternoon. Its deafening power rang though her ears. Her eyes opened immediately and Gabrielle watched as she saw him fall to his knees, blood dripping from the hole in his shirt.

He was dead.

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