by Celia Mulder
“Who cares? It’s just a dress,” Sylvia said through gritted teeth, her voice catching on the words.
“Just a dress? Just a dress?” Lucille repeated. “This is a $56,000 dress designed personally for you by Martín Piero himself. I’d say it’s a little more than just a dress.”
Another heart-stopping moment, the tension so palpable it zinged through the room. Then Sylvia lowered the gun.
Brett let out the breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. If he wasn’t tied to a chair, he’d have kissed Lucille right then and there, in front of everyone. True, she hadn’t figured out how to get them out of the situation yet. Sylvia still had the gun, they were still tied up, and there were still a shit ton of highly trained guards surrounding the house. But that dress move was brilliant. If they made it out of here alive, he wasn’t going to waste any time in ripping it off of her, bystanders be damned.
“I hate you.” Sylvia scowled. “I don’t know who you are, but I hate you.”
“I’m sorry, I’m Lucille. It’s nice to finally meet you.” Lucille gave her a big smile.
“I can’t say the same.”
Lucille nodded. “That’s understandable. Now, there’s something I still don’t get, though. Why are you trying to kill Michel?”
All eyes—save, once again, Michel’s—were trained on Sylvia. It was the question they’d all been wondering, guards and hostages alike.
“For his money, duh.” Sylvia looked at them all like they were stupid.
“But isn’t your father one of the richest men in the world?”
Sylvia’s look didn’t change. “Where have you been? In Saudi Arabia with your head up your ass? My father cut me off six months ago. Some bullshit about not amounting to anything while living off his money.”
Brett spoke up. He’d, after all, almost died, on multiple occasions, for his curiosity on this particular subject, and since death was still an impending option, he might as well get some answers first. “So why try to kill Michel?”
Sylvia turned her how-stupid-are-you look on him. “Duh, he put me in his will? After he dies, I get everything.”
Brett nodded. “Thus the accidents...”
“...so no one would accuse you of murder since you’re the one with the most to lose,” Lucille finished for him.
They locked eyes for a moment and smiled. His last smile from her before they, or at least he, was murdered by a money-crazed bitch.
“Obviously. Only this asshole here”—she motioned to Michel, who snapped out of whatever fantasy land he was in and looked at her in surprise and then looked at Lucille, his face in a crushed, soul-wrenching droop—“added a condition that we had to be married first. So I tried doing the damsel-in-distress thing, only that didn’t work because some other asshole who was supposed to give you a lead on where I was decided to blow up the hotel instead. My only option was to kidnap my fiancé and my dumb ordained cousin here, get married, and then kill them both and make it look like a murder/suicide/lover’s quarrel.”
Michel watched Sylvia with his huge, sad, brown eyes. He looked ready to cry at any moment.
“That may be the most stupidly brilliant plan I’ve ever heard,” Brett said with real awe. She, the greedy ditz willing to do anything to preserve her five-star lifestyle, had played Michel good. Unless something drastic happened, they were, in the simplest sense of the word, fucked.
Lucille sent him a look that said, “Don’t encourage her.”
A radio crackled. One of the henchmen spoke up. “Miss Stanton, we have a situation downstairs.”
Sylvia’s rage amped up a level. “What now? Don’t tell me one of you called the cops or I’ll kill you now and sign the marriage license with your cold, dead hand.”
Lucille gave her another sheepish look. “Actually, that might have been me, but I didn’t call the cops. I was surprised by one of your guys on my way up, and I may have smashed him over the head with an unnecessarily fragile decanter. One of you should go check that out. He’s going to need medical attention.”
Both men looked at Sylvia, worried but waiting for permission.
“Well, go already!”
They both made to leave the room.
“Not both of you!”
One of them left, leaving the three tied captives with only Sylvia and one guard in the room. At least Brett thought they were three tied captives.
After the door closed, but before Sylvia turned her attention back to her victims, Michel, somehow untied, sprang from his chair and tackled her, throwing her to the ground and reaching around to grab the gun from her hands.
The guard made to help his boss, but Lucille, too, stood up from her chair, hands unbound, and kneed him hard in the balls.
Brett had to be honest with himself as he watched his best friend and his new whatever fight: he felt a little left out that they hadn’t untied him too. The two of them had obviously been plotting since Lucille entered the room, but they hadn’t thought to let him in on it. Rude.
He dismissed the jealousy and replaced it with concern. Short-lived concern. Both battles seemed to be going well.
The gun went off. A bullet embedded itself in the chair leg beside Brett’s right foot. “Hey, watch it!” he said to no one in particular.
The gun followed shortly after, skidding across the floor to crash into the chair leg by his other foot.
Michel had Sylvia pinned to the floor, but she was attacking him, thrashing her legs to kick him, straining her head up to bite him, her long nails curling to dig into his skin. Michel looked down at her sadly. “I’m sorry, baby,” he said. “I should have realized this a long time ago, but it’s not going to work out between us.”
“Get off of me, you fucking bastard!”
“I just don’t think you ever really loved me,” Michel went on, oblivious to the venom being spit at him.
Lucille, meanwhile, had kneed the guy a second and third time in the junk and then hit him over the head with a copy of Michel Polce: An Unauthorized Biography that Michel had on display nearby. The man fell to the floor with a grunt and didn’t get up. A small trickle of blood spilled down his face and onto the hardwood floor.
“Jesus, Lucille,” Brett breathed.
“I know,” she said. “I didn’t need to hit him so hard. It was a little overkill.”
Brett shook his head. “It was hot.”
Lucille looked at him sternly. “Brett, a man very possibly might have died just now, and you’re thinking about sex?”
Brett nodded.
“God, I love you.”
Brett froze. He’d been about to quip back, to tell her to come over and untie him so they could screw on Michel’s desk. It died in his throat.
Lucille didn’t seem to notice what she’d said. She leaned down, checked that the man was breathing, and then walked over to where Michel was pontificating to a feral Sylvia.
Brett had so many comeback lines. You can’t just say that and walk away. I love you too. Untie me so I can kiss you. Let’s get out of here. You are my one and only, and I’ve never loved anyone as much as I do you. Those were the best of the lot, but none of them were right. His throat closed off and he gaped, fish-like, tied to Michel’s desk chair with his numb, injured arm and the clothes he’d been wearing when they’d had sex earlier that day.
Lucille convinced Michel to let Sylvia up and to tie her to a chair.
“Just you wait until my men come back. You may think you’re all that, but can you take down five of them at once?” Sylvia was shouting, no doubt trying to be heard by her army downstairs.
Lucille sighed. She walked over, picked up the gun from beside Brett’s chair, gave him a wink that made his confusion worse, strolled back, and pointed the gun at Sylvia’s head. “I think it’s time you stopped talking. We’ll take it from here, thanks.”
“Lucille, what are you doing?” Michel asked. He stood beside Lucille, looking down at his former fiancée.
“Oh, I’m sorry, would you li
ke to do this?”
Michel nodded. “Kind of, yeah.”
Lucille didn’t get a chance to hand over the gun. The door flew open, in charged a couple of guys in police uniform, there was a lot of shouting about no one moving, and chaos ensued. A gun went off. Sylvia screamed. Lucille dropped the one she’d been holding as a red stain began to spread from her right shoulder.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Lucille had never been shot before. Of all the stupid, crazy-assed things that had happened in her life, which was now, annoyingly, flashing before her eyes, she’d never once been shot. It wasn’t pleasant. She heard the ear-shattering bang when the gun went off and the clatter as the weapon she held fell to the floor. She felt something hit her between those sounds. Then she felt nothing. Someone screamed, and it didn’t seem to be her. Her lips were gripped together, her teeth biting into the side of her cheek. Then the pain started. It ripped through her shoulder in an angry, vicious surge. She tasted blood in her mouth and smelled it on her skin. She felt that same blood rushing around inside her, pouring from the open wound, trickling from her bit cheek, rushing in her ears. And the pain. The pain was every kind of torment she’d ever felt and it was all of them at once.
There were a lot of voices, a lot of people saying a lot of things at her. She couldn’t sort them out; time wasn’t going at its usual speed. Then, in a rush, all the voices came closer, time caught up, and she looked over at her right shoulder and nearly passed out at the sight of the blood, her blood, running down her skin. She swore, adding her enraged agony to the cacophony of madness.
The voices were sorting themselves out now.
“Take it off! Take it off right now before another drop of blood gets on it. I’m serious!” Sylvia was shouting.
Michel was frowning, his hand still reaching for the gun as he watched the blood ooze from her shoulder.
She turned to see who the numbskull that shot her was. In the doorway were two policemen, with Matt at their lead. Matt who was rushing over to her; Matt who was trying to get her to sit down in the armchair, whispering, pleading, “I’m sorry, I’m so so sorry.”
From behind her, Brett was asking if she was okay, interspersed with demands to have someone untie him so he could check out her wounds.
Lucille’s mind pieced it together. She shoved Matt off her with all the strength in her left arm. “You shot me? You fucking shot me? What the fuck?” she bellowed at him.
He kept trying to touch her, apologizing in a steady stream.
“No. Do not touch me. I can’t believe you fucking shot me!”
Michel appeared at her side. “Are you okay?” He looked concerned, but not overly so, by the sight of his spin doctor bleeding out on his priceless rug.
“No, I am very much not okay! This asshole here shot me!”
“I meant the arm. Does it hurt?” he tried again, his face growing more worried.
“Yes.”
“We should get you to a hospital.” Now he looked concerned. Maybe it was the close-up of the wound, or maybe Lucille was turning as pale as she felt.
“No shit. First, can you get him away from me?” Lucille had her left arm on Matt’s chest, trying to hold him at bay. She needed her strength for the whole not-bleeding-out thing, not tied up dealing with psycho exes.
Michel nodded and put his arm around Matt’s shoulder, talking soothingly to him and dragging him away.
She turned to one of the policemen, who were both shifting uneasily in the doorway. “You. Stop standing there, pull out your damn gun, and get this bitch to shut up. I can’t hear anything over her whining.”
The man shut his mouth and then did as he was told. He held up his gun and pointed it at Sylvia with a steady hand. She fell silent.
Lucille shot a look back at Brett. “Hey, can it. You’re not helping either.”
“No shit. No one will untie me,” Brett growled from his chair.
She wanted to roll her eyes at him but felt that an eye roll would cause her to pass out.
She turned to the other police officer. “Will you untie Mr. Jacobs? Oh, and maybe, I don’t know, call an ambulance?”
He hurried to do as he was told.
The room was silent, or close to it. All eyes were on Lucille, waiting for her next move. She wanted to lie down, right there on the rug, and die. It had to be more comfortable than standing here with a bullet wound while a room full of the people she cared the most and the least about in the whole world waited for her to make a decision.
Then, Brett was by her side. He led her over to the armchair and she let him. He pulled his t-shirt off, a little weird and a lot hot, and set to work bandaging up her wounded shoulder as best he could with one arm. He left her side only to retrieve his sling and awkwardly strap it into place across his bare chest and then he was back, crouching beside her and continuing to wrap her injury.
And everyone just watched.
Sometimes inspiring that much fear into people was exhausting.
Lucille sighed and glared at Matt. “Let’s start with you.”
Brett jogged her arm and she grimaced.
“Sorry,” he whispered, and he kissed her skin right above the bullet wound.
“It’s okay,” she whispered back.
“I really am sorry, Lucy. I had no idea it was you,” said Matt, clearing his throat. He’d straightened himself out, stopped muttering apologies, and was now watching Brett like he wanted to tear his head off. It wouldn’t be the first time someone felt that way about Brett, Lucille almost told him. But stopped. Because he’d shot her. There was an awkward silence as Matt seemed to be waiting for her to accept his apology and she didn’t.
“So you normally walk in and shoot the first person you see?” she said instead.
“The first person with a gun cocked who looks ready to fire.”
Lucille did roll her eyes this time. “Whatever. How did you even find us?”
If Matt looked contrite before, it was nothing compared to how he looked now. He turned red and stared at the floor.
“You were having me followed, weren’t you?”
He didn’t respond but gave Lucille her answer in his silence.
“You know what? I’m too furious to deal with this right now. Will you just arrest this woman already?”
“What?” Matt looked confused.
Michel piped in. “And be quiet about it, please. There’s been enough commotion in this house for one night. I don’t want it known that I was almost murdered in my own home by my former fiancée.”
Lucille looked over to Michel with a kind smile. “I was thinking a nice rehab stint for her? You had a domestic dispute because of her drinking problem and the cops were called. She’s hurt you one too many times, so you broke it off. Then she goes to rehab, and you’re free to do whatever you like.”
Michel didn’t take his eyes off Sylvia, but he smiled. “You think of everything, Miss Anton.”
Matt jumped in. “And again, what?”
Brett finished treating the wound and stood up, topless and unabashed. Matt may have more muscles, but Brett’s confident pose right then was far sexier. “Detective, you seem to be off your game here. That’s okay, I’ll fill you in.”
Matt gritted his teeth, glaring at Brett. “I’d rather hear it from Lucille.”
“Lucille’s a little under the weather at the moment because her dick ex-boyfriend shot her in the shoulder.”
Matt actually made a lunge for Brett, catching him off guard and knocking him to the ground. The two police officers pulled their boss off, Sylvia started protesting about her legal rights, and Michel yelled at them all to calm down.
“Hey, hey, cool it,” Michel demanded. “What do you say we take this down to the station and get it sorted out there?”
The sound of an ambulance drifted through the air.
“Right on cue,” Michel said, grinning like he’d engineered the whole thing out of magic and his own charisma. “Let’s get this darling woman to a
hospital and, if I’m not mistaken, this guy and the one downstairs as well. If they aren’t dead.”
They weren’t. Lucille was glad of that. She didn’t want her conscience stained with the deaths of two unnamed henchmen. After the drugs started kicking in, she was glad of a lot of things. Though not glad Brett wasn’t riding with her in the ambulance. Matt had insisted on taking him in one of the squad cars to be questioned. Lucille drifted off from the blood loss and narcotics.
***
Late in the afternoon the next day, Lucille was released from the hospital. The doctors had removed the bullet, bandaged her shoulder, and stuck the arm in a sling, all in record time. A policeman was stationed outside her door throughout the proceedings. Whether he was there to keep people out or her in wasn’t clear but she didn’t have any visitors. The hospital was a lonely place to be in without visitors, stuck in a white bed, in a white room, her clarity coming back and her arm throbbing. It gave her too much time to think. If she had a more positive outlook on life, she’d say it gave her a chance to slow down and find the answers to the questions she’d been mulling over. She did not have a positive outlook, but the answers were there regardless. By the time of her release, she felt crappy and spiteful. The negative emotions, however, had less to do with her introspective insight and more to do with her being taken directly to the police station for questioning, thus explaining the speedy treatment.
“What the shit?” she asked from the backseat of the squad car, where she’d been hustled after the nurse wheeled her out to the curb.
“Sorry ma’am, Detective Adams insisted that you be brought to the station as soon as you were able,” the policeman replied. He didn’t look at her as he spoke, his eyes trained on the road.
At least he knew what was good for him. “Of course he did. Am I being arrested or something?”
