This Is My Love

"No!" Pete shouted, looking desperately back and forth between Vicky and I. "Please, Vicky, keep it pointed at me!"
Vicky simply smirked and continued to keep both her eyes and the gun trained on me. The cold, dead look in her eyes, sparked only by a hint of vengeance, told me she wasn't fucking around. Very slowly, very carefully, I raised my hands away from my sides and up at shoulder's height. The thought that I had to stay alive not for one life, but for two bombarded me and my heart thudded harder still. I don't think it could take much more of it. Vicky's eyes grew more and more determined, and the smirk on her face said she was thoroughly enjoying herself.
"Vicky! Look at me, damn it!" Pete pleaded, his eyes still going back and forth between Vicky and I. Vicky finally rolled her eyes and tore her gaze away from me to land on Pete. She looked utterly annoyed.
"What?" She asked impatiently. "Listen, Peter, we'll have plenty of time to talk later. When this is done. Okay, baby?"
My heart practically stopped. If I didn't know for sure before whether or not she was going to kill me, I knew it now. And Pete knew it, too. A helpless whimper escaped my throat as I watched Vicky enjoy the flood of emotions on Pete's face, but at the forefront was anger. I watched as he struggled to reign it in for fear of egging her on, but his posture shouted it loud and clear. He was bristling.
"You don't want to do this," he tried, going for reason, but there was no reasoning with her. She was already dead inside. Something had snapped off, a part of her, and she was out to snap something off of me.
"Pete," I called out in a barely audible whisper, causing both of them to look at me, Pete having to turn his head over his shoulder. I shuddered at the helplessness in his eyes, the shimmering of tears fresh in his bottom lid. His eyes went wide as I gave him a look that silently told him goodbye.
"No," he whispered. "Ano, don't give up. She won't do it."
I bowed my head and gave it a curt, sad nod.
"Yes she is," I confirmed before looking back up to Pete. Out of the corner of my eye I could see Vicky smile triumphantly.
"Not as dumb as she looks, ladies and gentlemen," she announced. Pete and I both ignored her.
"I love you, Pete," I squeaked. He opened his mouth to voice further protest at goodbyes, but Vicky interrupted.
"Yes, yes, and, though I still have no clue why, he loves you, but in a minute, you won't be you, but I'll be here..." She smirked at me before cocking her head slightly in thought. "But first, I would like to torture you a little. Mentally, of course. I don't think I have the stomach to do the physical torturing to you I've always dreamed of." She sighed and waved her free hand through the air in a faint gesture next to her head.
"Vicky, please," Pete tried again. Vicky sighed, annoyed once again.
"Now, hush, Peter, I'm trying to talk to your wife," she said the word bitterly, obviously repeating what Pete had yelled at her the evening she came to our house to try to trick Pete into caring and/or leaving me for an illegitimate child.
"Damn it, Vicky, I swear to God-" but Pete stopped when Vicky's trigger fingers tightened just a hair. After a moment of staring at Pete, she seemed c
confident that he would stay silent.
"Good boy, now," she turned back to me, "would you like to know how I seduced your then fiancé?" She asked me. I glared slightly and stayed silent. She seemed to ponder her choice of words for a moment before continuing. "Well, when I, like thousands if not millions of others, heard about his cocaine addiction and saw all the awful things people were saying about him," she glanced over to Pete and gave him a sad look, saying the last six words like how an adult would speak to a wounded child before turning back to me and smiling again, "I knew he would feel just down right horrible."
As she spoke something caught my eye. In the bushes across the street, a paparazzi peeked his camera in and out. Someone obviously saw Vicky come to the door and think a big, juicy story was bound to be here, and, damn it, I was never more happy- scratch that, I was never happy to see a paparazzi in my life until I saw one in that moment. Knowing for definitely that Vicky would not get away with killing me, not for a moment, was only a very cold sort of comfort to me, but a comfort none the less. The entire thing would be heard. She would never escape.
I made sure not to look directly past Vicky and out the window so as not to draw her attention to it as well, but I didn't think it really mattered, for she was too absorbed with self satisfaction to notice, I was sure. But Pete saw me glance that way and very carefully, very slyly he looked as well. Luckily years of being followed by paparazzi made it easy for him to spot the camera lens in the foliage, and he seemed to get an idea. He glanced over at Vicky to make sure she was still focused on me and telling her story before taking his index finger to invite the paparazzi closer before putting it back down into his fist and looking back over to Vicky.
"So, when he came to New York, I made sure to wait outside the building for him. Of course, being the sweet heart he is, he was simply thrilled to see an old friend!" She smiled over at Pete, and he glared back, before she looked back over to me. "Well, he invited to the after party, and at the party we got to talkin', mostly about you of course." She rolled her eyes. My heart clenched like a fist at the thought. My Pete...
"Well, at one point in the night, I offered him some of the coke I had brought along just for the occasion, and, like a good boy, he declined," I saw Pete's head droop and he glanced at me from the corner of his eye, tears now falling from both of our eyes. I let out another whimper as I pictured beat, broken down but still being the good man that he was, being tricked, taken advantage of by this devil bitch.
I looked back up at Vicky and glared.
"I get the fucking picture," I spat. She giggled.
"That is not the point, missy. Remember? Torture?" She tapped her temple with her index finger and gave me a questioning look. I clenched my jaw. She took that as a sign that I understood and continued.
"Anyway, as we got more drunk, the more I got him to open up about the leak, the more torn up he got, and he finally agreed to do some coke with me. And, the poor boy, it had been so long..." She trailed off and laughed fondly at the memory with her eyes to the ceiling before bringing them back to me. "Well, he got really high! And, this made him feel worse. And who's shoulder was there for him to fuck?" She smirked. I winced as I realized I was digging my nails into my palm from clenching my fist so hard and loosened my grip. Vicky answered her question herself. "Rhetorical or not, the answer is, not... You." She used the gun to point at me on each of the last two words. As I realized she was nearing the end of the story, I realized what came at the end... My death. I quickly glanced at the window to see now three paparazzi across the street, in plain view. Pete got a desperate look on his face as he came to my realization and he looked out the window as well. Vicky went to look at him just as he went to motion to the men again, so I quickly got her attention.
"Vicky!" She snapped her head back towards me and Pete took that chance to motion to the paparazzi. "You're... You're not done, are you?" I quickly came up with a reason to draw her attention to me. She laughed in amusement and shook her head.
"So impatient to die? I'm quite enjoying myself!" She teased. I lifted my chin defiantly.
"Me too," I challenged. Her eyes lit up joyously and she shook her head in disbelief.
"Well, I must say I was expecting better from him. It w over before it started, and he barely touched me! That's how turned on he was, I guess," she said with a shrug. I almost smiled at her ignorance, for it was quite the opposite. Little did she know if Pete wanted to, he could have gone for hours.
If he wanted to...
"So, my plan was in motion. I was already knocked up, which, I guess you know now." She glared at me, bad memories of her public lashing seemingly filling her head and her grip tightened on the gun, making me go absolutely tense.
"But it didn't work, so now you plan to kill me?" I finished for her. She came back to reality then and slowly nodded her head.
"Yep," she popped the 'p' and a slow smile came across her face. I quickly glanced out the window the see the paparazzi on the sidewalk on the edge of our lawn.
Fucking aye, you morons, the one time you keep your distance! I shouted obscenities in my head. Life or death, it didn't matter, the paparazzi were worthless.
"Vicky," Pete whispered, trying desperately to stall what seemed to be the inevitable. She glanced over at Pete with a questioning look on her features. "I'll go with you willingly. Just leave her be."
My heart leapt at the thought. Honestly, I think I would rather have died. I stared wide eyed at Vicky as she seemed to consider it, weighing it back and forth in her mind. After a moment, she smirked and laid a steely gaze on me before shaking her head slowly.
"No, no... She deserves this," she whispered as she gestured with her head to the gun. Pete let out a desperate sob, the tension in the room rising fifty notches. I looked over to Pete with sad eyes... Eyes of a dead girl. And his eyes, well... They were just as dead.
I closed my eyes for a moment as a few tears ran down my cheeks, the inevitability clear and making me calm. I was accepting it, I suppose, the best I could. I just hoped it would be quick. I just had to tell Pete about his unborn child first...
I opened my eyes again to watch the following events in slow motion. Vicky brought her left hand up under her pistol hand and locked her arm in place, eyes focused and determined, ready for what might be. Pete shouted something, I'm not sure what, before bending his knees and twisting his body so he was turned to face the space between Vicky and I. My eyes widened as I realized what he was about to do, and shouted something myself, my hand extending towards him in a futile attempt to stop him. Vicky's eyes widened as well as she, too, noticed what he was doing, but it was all too late. The gun went off in a deafening blast, everyone in motion... Vicky's arms flailing up to try to point the gun away in time, Pete jumping in between the gun and me, and me running towards Pete. Suddenly, everything sped up to real time, and the room was buzzing, and I was on my knees, and Pete was bleeding, and Vicky was shouting...
And the world was upside down again.