Victoria
Victoria Parker would describe herself as a few specific things. Sexy, street smart, a little bit of an idiot sometimes, and constantly horny. At least, the last bit of that description would be because of how she woke up in the morning, a dull ache in between her legs that could only be soothed using a few fingers on her right hand.
Other people didn’t know about that side of Victoria, though; anyone who picked her off of the street might describe her as a sluttier type of girl in her work attire. Aside from the outfits she wore to the bar, though, she looked about average, and no one would be able to pick her out as any kind of delinquent. Good. She had worked hard to get to where she was, even if that wasn’t very far, and she was happy to have her own apartment. While she wished she had a man to share it with – or even a man to bring it back to, the same one, time and time again – there wasn’t much she could do about that between her work hours, so she made do with some time by herself.
There was one thing about her, though, that just about anyone could agree on, regardless of how well they did or did not know her: a word that could never be used to describe her was lucky.
She smacked her alarm clock as hard as she could, trying to slam it into submission. That did nothing. The pesky thing just fell off of her nightstand, landing on the floor where it continued its incessant ringing. She knew logically that the clock had nothing against her, and was just reminding her of her shift, but it reminded her of what had happened last night and of what might happen again tonight and –
Oh shit.
Oh shit.
Her shift.
Her hand hastened to the nightstand, checking to make sure that she didn’t accidentally throw her phone off it when she attacked her alarm clock. The smartphone was still there, and she went through the lock screen quickly, checking to see if she had any missed calls or texts. None. That was good, right?
Or not. Maybe people were just waiting to tell her in person that she was fired. Maybe Clarissa secretly had some vendetta against her, and this would be the manager’s time to tell her personally never to come back, to burn in hell, to –
She needed to calm down.
She stepped out of bed as quickly as she could, her limbs still exhausted from a full night of no sleep. She hadn’t slept much the night before, either, and the stress it was putting her body through did her no favors. She didn’t have to look at the clock to determine what time it was, like she was constantly having to do on her shifts. Her body told her by the exhaustion coursing through it that she must have only slept four or five hours at the most.
In truth, she’d probably gotten even less sleep. There came a point for Victoria – and probably for others, but she never asked because she, while she had no lover, also had no friends – where she would get so tired, she couldn’t even manage to sleep. How long was her shift tonight? She tried to remember. Of course she couldn’t, though; her shifts were usually tacked up on a board in the supply closet, and she hadn’t bothered checking the hours for today beyond noticing that she was supposed to come in. She guessed that she was about to throw twelve more hours into a pit of tiredness, and she didn’t know if she wanted to deal with it.
Yeah, lucky. Who even got described as that anyway?
Getting ready was misery, but it was a routine she was more than used to. The same could be said for the twenty-minute drive she had to take just to get to work. The commute was awful for such low pay and for such rundown working conditions, but what could a girl do?
The radio wasn’t nearly as distracting as it usually was for her on her way into work, though, and she found it hard to even try to bob her head along to her favorite station. The lines on the streets blurred together as she drove past them, and sometimes she feared that she was starting to drive so poorly that she was drifting between lanes.
She slapped her cheek in an attempt to wake herself up. Eventually it worked, but she still didn’t feel like her old self. Her usual self. Her head was a fog of emotion, and she struggled to identify everything she was feeling. As she pulled into the parking lot of Lanterns, she tried to think of ways she could keep herself up and active for her shift. Someone else must be coming in at the end of it, if she wasn’t getting fired. Her shift ended at 2 in the morning today, if she remembered correctly.
Not that bad, she thought. She could get through it.
The bullets hitting the doors on the other side of her car kept those thoughts from her. She tried to swerve out of the way of whatever she’d run into, but that did nothing. It was following her, it was after her. The bullets weren’t ricocheting off her car, they were imbedding themselves in the doors because they had been intended for her.
“Shit!” she screamed. Maybe swearing wouldn’t help her much in this situation, but she didn’t give a crap. Someone was trying to kill her. That’s what it had to be; unless someone was throwing firecrackers in the shape of circles at her passengers’ doors, she was definitely being shot at.
So she did the only thing she could do. Going into that small, confined back parking lot with people aiming and firing guns at her screamed bad idea, so she stopped right in the lot, her wheels shrieking as she parked unevenly. And then she jumped under the dash.
The bullets kept going. They sprayed for a long time; Victoria wasn’t familiar with guns, much as she’d heard the bar’s patrons brag about them. She didn’t know how long this could go on before whoever was shooting ran out of bullets. It sounded like the bullets were coming from the other side of the street, from the buildings that were set too high when they were first made. Of course! Victoria was no weapons master, but she bet those would be perfect to shoot from.
A bullet hit her window, and the glass shattered, raining down around her. Dammit, dammit. She was going to die. Was this because of what she’d said last night? It must be. That was the only thing that could put her in a predicament like this. Why did she have to keep talking? All she had to do was swallow her words, but she didn’t. And now she was curled up tightly under the dashboard of her car, just waiting for death from unknown shooters.
Except they weren’t unknown, were they? And to think she thought he was hot! Now he was trying to kill her. Not surprising. The cute ones were always a little bit crazy.
That’s when it caught her eye: the piece of paper folded over so many times. She’d thrown it on the floor of the passenger’s seat this morning, but her erratic driving had sent the piece of paper flying towards her. Now it sat on the floor just an inch away from her. She glared at it. The paper itself wasn’t what was ruining – perhaps even ending – her life, but the man who had written on it was surely responsible.
She eyed it for a second more before grabbing it. If she was going to die, she might as well die continuing to give this bastard a piece of her mind.
She reached for her phone. It had fallen, too, and she had to stretch her arm a little to reach under the driver’s seat and grab it there. Of course it was off, and she struggled to turn on the power button while she shook. Victoria didn’t think of herself as the type of woman who was afraid of most things. She didn’t think she was afraid of most anything, actually, but it looked like the list of things she was afraid of did include being shot at from close range, with the intent to kill her.
That was all a guess, though. She had no idea what was actually going on in the minds of the people shooting at her, if they knew who their target was or if it was just random, why they were trying to kill her, or if they actually wanted to kill her, or just wanted to injure her grievously. It was with this last thought in mind that her anger grew as she listened to the phone ring. Darren, of course, wasn’t picking up, and this jerk would probably have to listen to her bleed to death via his voicemail later in the evening. That is, if he ever checked it. He didn’t seem like the type to.
Maybe she should text him. Yeah, that would do the trick.
SullivanHe answered on the third ring. “Who is this?”
Was he pretending not to know who she was?
Oh.
No.
He didn’t have her number. He’d given her his yesterday, and this was the first time she’d tried to make any contact whatsoever with the man. So he didn’t have her number yet, and she hadn’t tried to speak. Why, then, was she so upset that he didn’t recognize who she was?
Oh, yeah. Because she was probably in the middle of dying. She hadn’t been shot yet and she wasn’t bleeding, but it was only a matter of time before both of those things changed.
“Hi, yeah, this is Victoria.”
Darren sounded far more pleased at hearing this than he did when he first answered the phone. Who even called this guy anyway for him to sound so upset at someone dialing him? Maybe it was just a persona he wore, as the leader of the Bloody Saints. Their name seemed like it was just for show; ignoring the violence of their drunken fights, the men never did anything, and it seemed borderline impossible that any of the people in that club had managed to kill someone. They probably had, though; after all, they were trying to kill her now! Darren was definitely a murderer.
“Change your mind, doll?” She could almost hear him stretch his body out on the other end of the line. So had he orchestrated her murder just after kissing her neck, holding her, and giving her his phone number? Did he want her dead so badly that he wanted her to call him while she was dying? Well, it looked like he was getting what he wanted. She bit her lip.
“Cut the pleasantries,” she said. “And wipe that smile off your face. Are you happy now that you’re trying to kill me? Is that it?”
“What?” His voice dropped. He sounded more shocked now, and she could hear him rise as he stood from whatever cozy position he’d been lying in. About time. There were more important things at hand, like the fact that she was about to bleed to death from a gunshot wound before she even turned 30. “What did you just say?”
“I asked why you were trying to get me killed,” she repeated.
“None of my boys would do that.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah,” he said, sounding concerned now. “You were being a bitch and all, but no one should want you dead. And if they do, well…” His voice cut out, but the insinuation was clear. If it was his people, they would be dealt with. Still, though, he didn’t think it was anyone from the Bloody Saints MC. Even though he ran a group of bikers, they still had morals. Enough of them, anyway. “Where are you?”
“Work.”
“The parking lot?” It sounded like he was getting his shoes on as he spoke to her. There was a lot of movement from the other end of the phone, and Victoria strained to hear it from her awkward position beneath the dashboard. Her body was starting to hurt from the way she was positioned, but there was no way she was going to move.
She’d rather be uncomfortable now than stretch out, only to be shot by a stray bullet later.
“Yeah.”
“Hold on.”
“Are you coming? Hello?” She added another question into the call after a few moments of him saying nothing. Maybe only 20 seconds had passed, but that was more than long enough for him to reply if he had anything to say, right? And he always had something to say. Or at least, that’s what it seemed like.
It took a minute for Victoria to recognize that the beep of the phone meant he had hung up. How dare he? He claimed not to be responsible for it, but he hung up as soon as she asked for any kind of help? She wasn’t expecting much from him, but she was still shocked that he would just leave a woman to die in a shady bar parking lot. Sure, she hadn’t actually been hit, but she could’ve been, and she had no way of ruling out that the shooter wasn’t still outside waiting to get her.
Sullivan