-5-
A phone was ringing and for some reason it was pissing me off even though it had just started to ring. It was the kind of ringing that was so badly timed it was either signalling something bad was about to happen, or even worse, had already happened. It was the king of ringing that made me want to punch someone.
"I wouldn't worry about Beatrice," the King said and all at once I knew exactly was coming. He was reaching for the annoying phone, the one I desperately didn't want him to pick up but knew there was nothing I could do to stop it from happening. Sometimes, events just have to play out.
"Why shouldn't we worry about Beatrice?" Sammy asked and she was suspicious. I threw a glance at her and Jaime wondering if they were feeding off the vibes I was throwing, but they both seemed intent on the King.
The King smiled and pulled out the phone from his pants, and glanced at it; I wanted to smack it out of his hand. He looked up at me, motherfucker looked me right in the eye and answered Sammy's question.
"The Gentlemen are here," he said and I knew it was all over. The King put the phone to his ear as all feeling abandoned my body in sheer abject terror. "Hello Mister Flynn," the King said into the phone. He listened for a moment. "Yes, he's right here and the girl is with him... No, I'm afraid I can't do that. There are limits to which I am willing to betray my friends."
The King hung up and sighed deeply.
"It's going to take them at least seven minutes to get up here from the lobby," he said. "I suggest you get moving as quickly as possible."
Sammy broke first.
"WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?"
Jaime got it though, and she really didn't look surprised. It was just that kind of day for her.
"Your boyfriend sold us out Sammy."
Sammy threw herself at the King, trying to scratch or kick or punch, but he lazily blocked her attempts to hit him and then in a move that surprised us all, lazily hit Sammy in the chest, sending her flying back through the air to crash into a wall.
"NO!" he yelled. "You do NOT get to hit me!" He tried to settle himself, but was obviously boiling over with emotion.
"That's it: I'm out." Jaime turned and headed to the elevator. I just watched, and I wanted to do something, to say something, step forward and be the hero, but Goddamit! Why did everything have to be so complicated?
The King got himself under control.
"I have been a good host and what I had hoped was a good boyfriend to you Sammy, but there are limits to what I am willing to do. I'm not going to put up with you throwing a tantrum just because this dumbass here is determined to ruin us all." He turned to me then. "I like you Bob, but I'm not putting my neck on the line for you more than I have to--"
I was nodding but Goddamn I was angry.
Sammy picked herself up, shaking with rage and without a word, stormed off into the apartment.
"I get it King. I really really do and all I have to say is: fuck you. You don't get to be the good guy in this. You don't get to come out looking good, while you sit back and convince yourself you're blameless and that this was something you had to do. You're not the nice guy you want the world to see and I don't hold that against you, because you're not exactly a bad guy either. You're just a guy trying to get by in this world that keeps changing on you and in order to adapt, you have to change, you have to compromise and sometimes you have to screw your friends over."
"I like you Bob, but we were never friends. I have more in common with Harry than I do with you. He and I have a history that goes back over a hundred years! He and I, along with a handful of others saw the future coming and we stepped up and did what we had to do in order to be part of that future."
"So you got tired of being the monsters in the dark and decided to come out and stand in the light where you can feel good about yourselves? You know what that makes you? Human!"
The King advanced on me, much faster than I expected, and I almost stepped back in the face of his anger... but only almost.
"Nobody likes the monsters Bob! We've been monsters for thousands of years, and you know why? Because humans feared us and we let them define us, we let them name us and that gave them power over us. We have a choice goddammit!"
The elevator dinged and Jaime turned to me.
"Come on Bob! Let's go!"
Sammy emerged from the bedroom, a pump-action shotgun in her hands, another slung over her shoulder. She was loading shells into the rifle as she walked and for a second I thought she was going to point the gun at the King and blow his ass away. She looked like she had been crying, but she looked more pissed and betrayed than anything else.
"You're goddamn right we have a choice King and I've already made mine. Just so you know, I won't be bringing the guns back."
If it had been a movie, she would have racked the slide, giving that distinctive CHA-CHUNK sound we all know and love, but either she was going off-script or was too pissed off to notice that perfect dramatic cue.
"Don't do this Sammy. You will die if you go up against the Gentlemen. They aren't like the rest of us vampires. They're still allowed to be monsters--"
Sammy tossed the shotgun to an impatient Jaime.
"Then I guess we're going to need more guns."
The King looked torn and just for a second under his detachment, I could see how much he really cared about Sammy. If he hadn't been sending me and Jaime to our deaths, it might have been heartbreaking, maybe even endearing to see that chink in his armour, that beating heart that wanted so desperately to love and be loved... but you know what? Fuck that guy.
I turned and walked away from the King, not caring if he attacked me but knowing that he wouldn't.
"However!" he said, and I paused. The King continued: "I am under no obligation to hand you over to Mister Flynn directly. Nor am I under any obligation to stop you from taking the keys to my car from the top left drawer in the island, or from stopping you from going down to parking level one, parking space number two and taking my brand new Buick and driving to the address I am writing on this piece of paper and placing on this table right here."
I turned and looked at him, seeing him fold the piece of paper and place it onto the table. The King winked at me then, trying to get into my good graces again, still wanting to be the good guy in all of this, who just had no choice and all I could think was "You two faced motherfucker," but I didn't actually say that. No, what I actually said was,
"You two faced motherfucker."
"Goddamn it Bob we have to go now!" Jaime yelled from the elevator. "We're leaving!"
The King shrugged and walked over to the windows. "I'll be seeing you around Bob."
"Not if I can help it!" I grabbed the paper, got the keys from the top left drawer, exactly where he said they would be and then I ran to the elevator.
Sammy handed a handful of shells to Jaime as the doors closed.
"I'm sorry your boyfriend's a douchenozzle," Jaime said.
"Looks like we have something in common," Sammy grunted.
"Bob's my ex-boyfriend because he is a douchenozzle."
I let their words wash over me as the elevator counted down the floors, but truthfully I was numb as hell as that old familiar feeling of terror came back to flood my system. Sammy had never experienced the kind of fear that Mr Flynn, Mr Bryce and Mr Sinnel generated just from their very presence, and for that I was glad. Most people, when they met the Gentlemen it was usually for the first and last time and I had already had the misfortune to have encountered them twice. As far as I was concerned that meant I had negative luck left over and right now I was completely and truly fucked, especially with Jaime in the equation.
"I'm sorry Jaime, I should have told you about the Gentlemen, but when they didn't come for you I thought we might have a chance--"
Jaime just gave me that look, the one that said she was almost back to hating me again. "What are you talking about Bob?"
"The Gentlemen are the vampire boogey men. I think they work for Harry, but that may be a lie--"
"If we survive this, you need to stop hiding shit from me and just tell me everything."
"Yes, absolutely, in full agreement with you there."
Jaime looked at Sammy and nodded.
"Sammy, where did you do your tour? Army or Navy"
"Didn't do a tour. I just like big guns."
"Close enough. Follow my lead. Bob, don't get in the way. These doors open you go first and go straight for the car. You see these Gentlemen of yours, let us know immediately."
Here's the problem with penthouse elevators in really nice buildings: they're really smooth and more than anything, they're really, really fast. There were two elevators up to the penthouse floor. The elevator we were in went directly from the penthouse to the garage; the other one went from the lobby up to the second floor before skipping up to the 36th floor where the richer residents lived. If you didn't have a keycard, you weren't going anywhere in the building. That elevator was a little less express, but it was most likely the elevator that the Gentlemen were on, which means they would have to go up to see the King first before finding out we were gone.
At least that was what I was desperately hoping.
The doors slid open to reveal the King's Buick parked right in the spot closest to the elevator. So far, so good.
I stepped out and could see both Sammy and Jaime raise their guns to the ready behind me. At least they were ready to cover me while I was brutally murdered. Yay.
My heart was pounding in my chest more than it really needed to be and I suddenly really, really needed a drink but at the same time was finding it really hard to swallow. That's how terrified I was.
"Hello Bob," Mr Bryce said, practically in my ear and that did it for me: I took off running. Or at least I tried to take off. Mr Bryce reached out, faster than I had expected and snagged the back of my jacket. My feet went out from under me and up into the air, and I was desperately trying to keep moving. Somehow, through more desperation than skill, I slipped out of my jacket and somersaulted in the air. I landed awkwardly, facing the completely wrong direction.
Mr Bryce grinned, his sharp fangs much huger than I remembered, but then again that was Mr Bryce for you: never what you expect. He was a huge man, both in size and in presence and was dressed impeccably in a suit that flexed around his muscular form, sending the message that the suit was remarkably well tailored and that no, he wasn't worried about getting any of your blood on it. He assumed a fighting form, ready to take me on.
"I told Mister Flynn that you were going to run. He and Mister Sinnel went upstairs. This means you and I get a little more bonding time."
Jaime exited the elevator quickly and silently, bringing the gun up to Mr Bryce's head, and that was perfect and so fucking smoothly executed I felt like cheering, but then she did the thing that I would never have done, which you or anyone else sane and reasonable and human would have done: she gave Mr Bryce a chance to stand down.
"Back off pal!"
Understand that I have never seen Mr Bryce in action before. I have never seen him fight first hand. Nor have I seen what Mr Flynn and Mr Sinnel can do, but that doesn't mean jack shit when you understand exactly who and what these Gentlemen were. Just looking at them, being in the same space was suffocating and you knew that they were bringing a certain level of evil with them, an evil that could not be negotiated with. When people talk about vampires as evil bloodsucking monsters, the Gentlemen were the kind they were referencing, whether they knew it at the time or not.
To say he moved fast, is an understatement.
Jaime should have just put the gun to his head and pulled the trigger. No talking, just shooting. Oops.
The gun was ripped out of her hand, taking the skin off the back of her trigger finger, and Mr Bryce roared at her as he broke the shotgun in half with one easy motion.
"You wait your turn girly!"
He closed the distance between him and Jaime faster than I could blink and punched with enough force to drive her into the concrete and break a lot of bones... if she had actually stood still and taken the blow.
Somehow instinct took over with Jaime and she moved faster than she ever had, stepping back from Mr Bryce's world ending punch, and then blurring and she jumped up into the air and punched down with all of the force and sheer power she could bring, right down onto the back of Mr Bryce's head.
Mr Bryce went down onto one knee, surprised more than hurt. He twirled around, amazingly graceful for such a large man, and grabbed Jaime's leg.
I saw what was coming and was already moving from the time Jaime had jumped him. As he grabbed her ankle intending to pick her up and slam her through the nearest wall, I jumped in with a kick that was meant to shatter his jaw.
That didn't quite work out like I had intended.
His sunglasses shattered into two pieces and he turned his head to look at me, but he didn't even pause. He yanked Jaime off her feet by the ankle, and swung her around easily into a silver Mercedes Benz.
He turned--
BLAM!
Mr Bryce's head rocked back as Sammy pulled the trigger, spraying his face with birdshot, blood and flesh stippling the air in an explosion of gore. Sammy didn't fuck around. CHA-CHUNK, as she pumped the gun and once again the deafening BOOM. Mr Bryce took both barrels to his well tailored chest and--
Oh goddamit! He was fucking smiling!
I jumped at him then, landing one, two, three blows, but it was like fighting a mountain than fighting a man or even a vampire. He reached out and grabbed me by the throat, his lip curling as Sammy shot him right in the back.
I got tossed aside into the nearest wall as Mr Bryce turned around to terrify Sammy.
"DO THAT AGAIN!" He roared. "I DARE YOU!"
There as a sudden blur of black and platinum blonde, entering very much like a freight train. The BOOM of the impact echoed through the garage and Mr Bryce went flying down the ramp with a great speed. He didn't even have time to look surprised.
And there was Beatrice, still a little stunned from the impact. She shook it off and looked surprised to see me there. Sammy raised the gun, terrified and ready to shoot Beatrice, who only had eyes for me.
"Oh hi sweetie. Did I interrupt something? I can always come back when you're dead..."
This sums up how I felt about the situation:
"I don't know if to kiss you or run screaming."
"Run now, fuck me later," she grinned. Beatrice winked and started to walk down the ramp towards where Mr Bryce had collided with an coming car.
"I said kiss!" I yelled, as Sammy and Jaime grabbed at me, pulling me to the car. Sammy grabbed the keys and got into the driver's side.
"You're going to fuck me and I'm going to like it!" Beatrice yelled back. "Now get with the running!"
I jumped in the back of the car, a stunned looking Jaime looking down into the garage at Beatrice. Sammy pealed out of there and the last I saw of Mr Bryce and Beatrice was a blur of fists and bodies.
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AUTHOR'S NOTE: NanoWrimo 2015 continues with more chapters, but as part of my pledge to meet my daily word count I've been doing minimal editing (almost none). If anything contradicts something I've written previously, please my apologies. One of the beauties of Wattpad is that you guys actually get to see a work in progress. Please COMMENT, VOTE and SHARE! Your comments keep me going and I really appreciate any feedback about what you liked or didn't like... or what didn't make sense. So don't be shy!
QUESTION OF THE DAY: Do you like how the female characters in this story are written? Tell me your thoughts.