The Mafia Kidnapped Me

(36) The 911 Call.

"No," she said aloud to herself. If she did, it could be unsafe. Besides, the feeling of being watched hadn't quite left her.

But why should she wait for him? She took out her phone and checked the time. It was past nine. Past nine and Devlin hadn't called, past nine and Devlin hadn't returned. The fact that he was not home meant she should go ahead and call the cops. Waiting for Peter was going to waste time, time that was too precious.

She unlocked her phone and was about to dial it when she saw that there was no reception. Of course, there wouldn't be a reception, they were literarily in the middle of the Bahamas rainforest. This was frustrating. Had she known sooner, she would have applied heat to the paper earlier and by now the cops would have arrived to help save her husband - or do whatever he wanted them for. But now that there was no reception, his goose is cooked. Despair gnawed at her insides as she looked once again at the signal pyramid at the top of the screen and begged it to bring out, even if was just one bar of a network.

Then it hit her again.

A 911 call is an emergency call, and when there's no signal, the phone says emergency calls only! Without wasting time, she dialed 911 and sank back on the chair in relief when it started to ring. It was answered on the second ring.

"911 what's your emergency?"

She became tongue-tied. She hadn't been prepared for what to say. Was she supposed to start with, "My husband is a mafia and he is in a war with another mafia that almost kidnapped me but it was my mafia husband that did kidnap me to save my life and now he's in danger"?

"I need the cops, ASAP."

"Why ma'am?"

"There -" She hesitated. "- has been exchanging of fire around me. Please, you need to hurry."

"What's your name?"

Pamela became irritated at how calm and unbothered - one could say bored - the operator seemed. She couldn't blame him, though. He had probably received about ten thousand calls today alone, and some prank calls too. It was a good thing that prank-calling an emergency number was considered a federal offense. But this was not a prank call or any usual emergency call for that matter; it was a call to save her future, one that her whole existence depended on.

"Pamela Ki - Gusev. Pamela Gusev."

"I am finding it difficult to get your location ma'am, are you in a remote area or -"

The line went off.

"Hello?" The beep of an ended call had never sounded so ear-splitting. "Oh my God, no." She looked at her phone and saw that the battery had gone flat. Why now? Why at this moment that she was finally doing what she should have done a long time ago. Frustration and anguish welled up in her.

She needed to look for Peter and use his phone, but how would she find him? Her phone was dead so she had no light to guide her, and she certainly couldn't start bellowing Peter's name in the hopes that he would hear her calls. Or should she use the lighter? No, the lighter wouldn't provide enough light to illuminate her path. She needed to do something, and fast.

Just as she sat there in worry, the door to the driver's seat was forcefully yanked open and she shrieked in terror and shrank back against the door as a figure plopped down heavily on the seat. She sighed in relief when she saw that it was Peter, but her relief was short-lived.

Peter was bleeding profusely.

"Peter!" She exclaimed and reached for him. Blood had started to pool on the car seat.

"Put pressure, please." He said with great effort, through gritted teeth.

Without hesitating, she reached out and placed both hands flat against his stomach where he seemed to have been injured. His breathing was forced and strained and his pupils were getting dilated.