by W. Winters
Click. It opens softly, and two shiny black shoes walk in softly. It’s not Mason. I know it’s not. Fear fills my veins. Violently and with a chill that’s paralyzing.
I can’t stop the adrenaline from pumping through my blood as the shoes leave my periphery. The footsteps thud to my right, but I can’t see him. I hear the bathroom door open and terror runs through me, wondering if I’ve left the light on. If whoever it is that’s come up here will know I’m in this room.
Steam will still be on the bathroom mirror and he’s going to see where I’ve messed the bed up from lying there just a moment ago. My heart rages so hard that I swear it’s trying to leave my body. If he touches the comforter, he’ll feel that it’s warm. He’ll know I was here only moments ago.
“Jules?” My eyes widen and flash to the open doorway as I hear Mason call for me from downstairs. I can faintly hear him walking to the bottom of the staircase, and I can practically see him standing down there. Given his casual tone, he’s completely unaware there’s someone else in the house.
God help me; I want to scream.
The black shoes quickly leave the bedroom but not so quick that the man ran. His steps were silent. He gently closes the door and the click is barely heard. I’m caught between wanting to scream out to warn Mason and saving myself.
Whoever it is that was in this room a moment ago doesn’t answer Mason and he doesn’t go down the stairs; instead he goes to the left, farther into the house.
I didn’t think it possible, but my heart slams harder as I hear Mason start to climb the stairs.
Move! my inner voice begs me. My palms are clammy against the wooden floors as I drag myself across the floor. Do something! I don’t know who’s here, I don’t know what they’ve come for. But I can’t stay here and let Mason walk into what could be his death sentence.
I crawl out as quickly as I can, the rug beside the bed burning against my forearms and the metal from the bed frame scraping against my back, but I’m out with time enough to open the door just as Mason reaches the top of the stairs. I swing the door open prepared to scream and when I do, the man is standing right there, staring at the stairwell with a gun in his hand. The thin silencer on the end is pointed straight ahead, right at where Mason should be in only a moment.
“Mason!” I yell out his name, or at least I think I do. I can’t hear anything but a loud ringing and my body is so numb from fear and the heat coursing through my body that I can barely feel a thing. As if I’m not even here. As if I’ve left my body, yet I’m still standing where I was.
The end of the gun points straight at me, only feet away with nothing in between us.
My head spins, and my vision nearly goes black from fear. I never imagined what it would be like to know that you’re dying. That you only have a precious second or two left to live.
How time would slow and my body would sway, yet be utterly still.
As I stare at the man’s cold dark eyes, it feels as if I don’t even exist anymore. They’re so brown, they’re nearly black. His skin is a beautiful tan, but it looks pale against the black turtleneck and leather jacket he’s wearing.
He doesn’t look like a killer; he’s too handsome, his clothes too expensive.
But that’s just what he is.
I’d think this was all a nightmare, if it wasn’t for the way Mason screams out and snaps me from this moment, bringing me right back as my own scream pierces my ears.
But the man doesn’t shoot, and instead he turns and runs.
Mason
“No!” The word is ripped from my throat as my body moves forward purely out of instinct. My muscles scream as I move as fast as I can, watching the end of the silencer swing toward Jules.
Not my Jules. Not my sweetheart. Take me instead.
I lunge forward to block her, but I already know it’s too late. The strike of a bullet doesn’t hit me and I can barely stand to open my eyes, my body pressed to Jules, expecting the bullet to have already found her. It’s her wide eyes and heavy breathing that hammer the message into my thick skull that she’s all right. I search her body for any sign of an injury, but she pushes my hands away. “He’s running!” she screams in my face.
He could have killed her. I saw it happen. In that split second, she was dead. It takes more than a moment to come to grips with the fact that she’s still here. She’s alive. She’s okay. And the prick who pointed a gun at her is getting away. With his back to us, he sprints toward the end of the hall and into the last bedroom.
My muscles coil as I stand up, hell-bent on killing the bastard. “Stay there!” I scream at Jules as I chase after him, my heart pounding.
He slams the door behind him, but the palms of my hands smack against it and my shoulder shoves the door open.
It all happens so fast, I can’t think, I can’t control what I do. With my hands still on the door, a fist crashes into my face, catching me off guard.
My jaw cracks as my head snaps back and he lands another blow before I’ve recovered from the first.
I bring my fists up, ready to fight, but he shoves me back, even as I strike him hard in the shoulder. He yells out in agony but doesn’t stop. The push gives him enough room to get by me. I can’t let him go. He’s fucking dead.
Fisting his jacket, I grab him with everything I’ve got, ripping at it and ignoring the shit that falls from his pocket. My nails scratch at his slacks, ripping down the fabric but I get ahold of him, tripping up his right leg and the man falls hard to the ground.
Adrenaline courses through my veins and all I can see is my fist pounding into him over and over. But then I hear her scream.
Jules cries out, terrified, and I stop to look at her, my heart leaping up my throat. I stare at her and search for the threat, the danger that’s scared her. There’s no threat that I can place. She stands there in the doorway, her hands over her mouth, pale with fright and looking so frail. It’s only when I feel the man beneath me buck his hips, lunging with all of his strength and moving so fucking fast I can’t pin him down that my attention leaves her.
“Stay in the room!” I shout at her, hating that I can’t be in two places at once. Torn between protecting her by staying close, and eliminating the danger. I launch myself forward, grabbing at him once again but failing to find purchase. My muscles scream in pain as I lunge at full speed after the man I don’t recognize. He swings around the banister and gets ahead of me, but I take the stairs two at a time, feeling my blood get colder and colder as I leave her behind.
Someone else could be here.
The thought makes my foot slip on the last stair. My heel catches the edge and I fall forward. I’m so close to him though that when I reach out for him, I pull him back by closing my fist around his sweater. I reach up with my other hand, ready to wrap my arm around his throat, ready to pull his body to my chest and hold him there until the struggling stops.
I’ll strangle him until he has no life left.
But he’s quicker and has better balance than I do, slipping the thin leather jacket off and tearing for the door.
It’s unlocked. It’s never unlocked. It wasn’t earlier. Not a damn soul has a key other than me.
The door stays wide open as he disappears from view. The jacket flies behind me as I follow after him. The harsh and brutal wind wraps around every inch of my heated skin.
I’m only a few feet behind him, but he’s running faster and with every step I’m reminded that I’m leaving her farther and farther behind.
Someone else could be there. You can’t leave her alone.
The man darts to the right, gaining ground and slipping from my vision behind the row of trees. Fuck! I can’t think straight with thoughts of her.
Closer to the street, the sound of cars passing parallel to us surround me as I sprint after him, but it’s useless. I can’t see a damn thing through the pine trees. I keep running even though I don’t see him. I don’t stop even when the cars flying by lay on their horns.
; Where the fuck did he go? There’s nowhere to hide. I stand on the curb, listening to the cars whizzing by only feet away and searching everywhere. I spin around to my right and left trying to find the man, but he’s vanished.
Another car beeps several times as the cold sinks in, and I realize I’m not even wearing shoes. My bare feet sink into the thin layer of snow and my heavy breath fogs in front of my face.
Jules.
Her name echoes in my head as I race back to the house, breathing in the cold air and letting it soothe my tired lungs.
The vision of her staring down the silencer of the gun is the only thing I can see as I ignore the harsh weather, and the screaming of my aching muscles as I run with everything I have back to the house.
The warmth of the house is anything but calming. It’s too eerie. Too quiet. I barely hold onto the banister as I fly up the stairs, terrified I’ve played into this fucker’s hand. That he outsmarted me. That he came back for her. I don’t know who he is. I don’t know how he got in here. All I know is that he was here, and he was going to kill her.
I don’t stop moving until I’m upstairs. I just need her here, I need her to be safe.
“Jules!” I cry out before I shove the bedroom door open.
“Mason,” she whimpers. She’s worried and terrified, but she runs straight to me, burying her head in my chest and clinging to me.
“Thank fuck,” I whisper into her hair, holding on to her just as tight. Her chest meets mine and she’s pressed against me like she can’t get close enough. I stroke her damp hair with my cheek, leaving soft kisses and rubbing her back over and over.
She’s okay. Thank fuck she’s here. I close my eyes, but the moment I do, the fucker’s face flashes into my mind.
Who is he? And why the fuck was he here?
The answers come easily, making my grip on Jules tighten.
A hitman. Here to kill. Because he was hired to do just that.
“My father is a dead man.” It’s all I can say. “I’ll kill him for this.” My throat scratches with a rawness of pain that touches the very marrow of my bones. Jules pulls away from me, sniffling and looking up at me with a look I can’t make out in her eyes.
She doesn’t answer for the longest time, just staring back at me as I slowly catch my breath. I’m so sorry, Jules. The apology is trapped at the back of my throat.
“He had this.” Jules breaks the moment with her weakly spoken words. She holds out what she found and a chill sweeps over me. A syringe. “It fell on the floor when,” she says and pauses, clearing her throat, then tucks her hair behind her ears, looking past me to the last bedroom. She swallows, wrapping her arms around her shoulders and taking a step away before finishing her statement. “When you were on him.”
She doesn’t look at me, she continues to back away, moving farther into the master bedroom and I follow until the back of her knees hit the bed and she sits on the edge. Is she angry with me? I miss her warmth immediately, my knuckles pulsing with pain at the memory of beating the piss out of the man who would have killed her.
“I had to, Jules.”
Her eyes rip away from the ground and she stares into my own. “I know,” she whispers, but the pain and sadness in her eyes won’t go away. My chest rises with a heavy breath. I don’t understand her reaction.
I close my fist around the syringe as I take a step closer to her. She doesn’t pull away, not even when I cup her chin in my hand. “Are you okay?” I ask, staring deep into her eyes.
She nods her head and pushes her cheek into my palm. My worry leaves me when she leans into me, covering my hand with her own and closing her eyes.
“Mason,” she whispers in a pained voice and it breaks my heart.
I bend down to hold her, to embrace her and tell her that everything’s going to be all right. It’ll never happen again.
As I get closer to her, my cell phone goes off in my back pocket.
She bites down on her lip as I rest my forehead against hers, hating that I’m being pulled away from her. I take it out from my back pocket only to silence it, to give her my full attention and make sure she knows she’s safe, but I see it’s my father.
“Stay here,” I tell her softly.
“Where are you going?” she asks as she reaches out for me, grabbing my hand as if I’m leaving her alone in hell.
“Just downstairs,” I say, letting go of her hand but not before kissing her knuckles. They’re soft and undamaged, unlike my own. I look over my shoulder at her as I answer the phone and pass through the bedroom door.
“Hello,” I say coldly as I shut the door and take each step of the stairs carefully. The thuds of my feet are in time with the beating of my heart, slow and meticulous.
“Mason, I have the numbers and it’s going to be rough,” my father says and doesn’t wait for me to reply. He’s in full-on business mode. As if I would buy that and this isn’t damage control.
The click is loud as I lock the front door. I’m barely listening to the man ramble on the other end. He’s an idiot if he thinks for one moment this call will fool me.
Dragging out the chair at the head of my dining room table, I stare at the front door, my eyes focused on the lock before flicking over to the stairs.
I can’t fucking calm down being so far away from her.
She’s safe, I tell myself repeatedly.
“Stop,” I say into the phone, halting my father midsentence. “Do you think I don’t know it was you?” My tone is menacing.
“What was me? Are you still on about the… incident?”
Rage pushes down the accusations.
“You have something and I have something. I’ll be damned if you’re going to screw me on this deal, Mason. Think with your fucking head for once!” He scolds me like he used to, his anger on full display. “I thought we had a deal after I let her walk out with you. Was the understanding not clear?” There’s silence after the unspoken threat.
“Attempting to have her murdered is a part of your deal?” I ask him evenly, although my pulse betrays any calmness I attempt to maintain.
“Jesus Christ, Mason! Why won’t you get over it?”
“So you wouldn’t hurt her? You wouldn’t threaten her life?” The recent events play in my vision as the syringe in my hand taps back and forth on the table.
He snuck in. He had a syringe. He had a gun but didn’t use it.
“I meant to scare her. But I…” he trails off and the strength leaves my father’s voice. “I made a mistake before and maybe I am a little heavy handed, but whatever she was going to say, she didn’t. You can’t be angry with me for that.”
“The hell I can’t. And if you ever hurt her, I’ll kill you.” I don’t bother mincing my words; we’re well past thinly veiled threats. “If anything happens to her,” I say as my blood runs cold as I swallow thickly before continuing, “I’ll kill you myself.”
All I can hear on the other line is a long exhale. “You control her, Mason,” my father says and continues with business. He carries on like this conversation didn’t include a threat to his life. All the while, I stare at the sharp silver needle of the syringe.
If my father didn’t do this, who did?
“Something happened.” My throat dries up and I lean forward, hating that I’m relying on him. Hating that I’m in such deep shit I can’t get out myself. I take in a heavy breath before saying, “Someone came here.”
There’s a pause on the other end of the line. “Where’s here? Your home?”
“Yes, someone broke in; I don’t know how. Someone with a gun and he tried—”
“Are you all right?” my father asks, not letting me finish, and he sounds genuinely concerned.
“I’ll be all right when he’s dead,” I answer him coldly, and it’s the truth. “And if I find out you had anything to do with it—”
“I didn’t,” he says, his sharp tone meant to assure me.
I don’t respond, not knowing any longer what to believe.
“Are you sure you want to discuss this over the phone?” he asks after a moment of quiet, and I already know I shouldn’t. I pause, and he continues.
“Do you know who it was?” my father asks, but there’s something in his voice that’s off. Something that makes my blood turn cold. “Was there anything on him?” he asks me with a hint of desperation. The line is silent as I look at the syringe on the table.
“No,” I say, my voice falling flat.
“Where is he?” he asks me.
I clear my throat and say, “There wasn’t anything on him.”
“Tell me his location, I’ll take care of this. You don’t have to worry—”
“He’s gone!” I scream into the phone, feeling increasingly angrier.
A hitman. I only know one man who’s ever hired a hitman, and he’s on the other end of the phone.
The front door was locked. Someone made that bastard a key. I was only downstairs in the office to talk to my lawyers about the separation of the business. I was preoccupied as he crept up the stairs.
My father knew about the call. He knew. My vision turns to red and even though, for a small moment, I questioned if it could be him, it has to be.
It was my father. All the logical pieces click together, fitting nice and pretty as my father’s voice comes through the phone. He just happens to call when the bastard got away? I don’t fucking believe in coincidences.
I stare at the syringe on my desk. An overdose of something. That’s why there was no gunshot. Too messy. The gun was for protection only.
He was here to murder Jules in a clean way so that no one would know, not even me.
My father set me up. I grip the phone tighter. He tried to kill her. A dark whisper deep in the back of my head hisses, Just like he killed your mother.
“It was you.” The words come out of my mouth as an accusation. “You’re fucking dead.”
“Me?” My father’s voice echoes with disbelief. “You can’t be serious, Mason!”