With a Pull of a Trigger

Chapter Fourteen

And then finally, she put a pink carnation on the grave, right above where his heart would be. “I’ll never forget you,” she whispered.

And she finally walked away, her head held high, trying to keep the tears from falling.

“We should have nicknames.”

Catherine looked up from her Trigonometry book and furrowed her eyebrows. “What?”

“We should have nicknames,” said Gil, shrugging. He was on his bed, his Chemistry notebook open in front of him. “It should be fun.”

Catherine grinned. “Do ‘sweetheart’ and ‘honey’ count?”

Gil laughed, throwing his head back. “Not those kinds of nicknames. I meant like, another name we’ll call each other when we’re in trouble or for emergency or something, I don’t know.”

“An anagram?” asked Catherine.

“Yes, something like that,” said Gil.

“When will we ever need those names?” asked Catherine, closing her book.

Gil shrugged. “I don’t know. It would be cool, though.”

“It would be so hard to make an anagram for your name,” said Catherine, standing up and walking towards the bed, sitting down and lying tiredly.

Gil turned to face Catherine. “Then let’s just make a new name for me. It doesn’t have to be an anagram.”

“Okay,” said Catherine, shrugging. “Give me time to make mine.”

Gil smiled. “Deal.”

“We have a problem.”

Reini glanced at the agent who was suddenly walking beside her, arms filled with brown folders. “Good morning to you too, Miss Chase.”

“Good morning,” said Amrie, continuing to walk quickly, her heels clicking on the floor, “anyway, as I was saying, we have a problem.”

“We do?” asked Reini, opening the door to Conference Room A.

“Yes we do,” snapped Amrie, dumping the folders on the polished mahogany table.

Reini sat down on one of the chairs, leaning against the headrest. “What is it?”

“I’ll explain later, once everyone’s here,” said Amrie.

Reini rolled her eyes. Amrie often did that; left them hanging. On more than one occasion, Amrie would tell them something significant, something worrying, or something exciting, only to pause and leave them hanging.

One by one, the agents went inside the room. Greg sat beside Reini, Eena seated across him. Charles was at the left side of Amrie who was seated at the head of the table. Tiffany was seated beside Eena with Samuel beside her. Christian was seated across Samuel and Joshua was seated between Christian and Greg, much to the latter’s pleasure.

Greg smiled and beckoned Reini, cupping a hand beside her ear so that the others wouldn’t be able to read his lips. “Mister McGorgeous is sitting beside me, Reini,” he half-whispered, half-squealed to Reini’s ear.

Reini stifled a laugh and settled for a smile instead. “I know,” she whispered, “congratulations.”

Greg smiled widely, his eyes crinkling, and settled back in his seat after offering a smile at Joshua. Reini looked up to see Samuel glaring at her direction before abruptly looking away as if he didn’t want her to see his glare.