Till Deceived Do We Part

I needed to get out; I needed air; I needed freedom, but most of all, I neededZane.

I had always looked up to Jake, even as a child. I may not have always agreed on his actions, take now for instance, but I had always followed his orders. When I was a child, if he told me to jump, I may have grumbled and complained, loudly, but I still did it. I didn’t bend over backwards for him, or ask how high, but I did it nonetheless. For he had been my guide, my mentor, my teacher, my saviour, and of course, my father. He had been my hero as a child, and my inspiration. I wanted to be just like him, in every way. There was a time that I even mimicked his walk. But that was when I was really young.

Every child goes through a rebellious phase, or an off form of it. For anyone who is trained, and brought up around guns, and is going to kill for a living, they don’t have that many things to rebel against. Unless, of course, as Zane did, you rebelled against the rules. I, however, didn’t. I liked the rules. I liked the guidance, the order. Call it a strange thing about myself, but I liked everything fitting into boxes. Even if sometimes you had to shove, and push with all your might, to get it in. I liked things to fit, it didn’t have to be neat and organized, but it had to fit.

My rebellious phase was against Jake. I still looked up to him but... I can’t explain it, but some part of my mind urged me, begged me, to disobey him. This happened when I was thirteen, and I followed those urges. I didn’t do anything major, nor did I go out of my way to make his life difficult, but I did do enough to get his annoyance.

Most were little, petty things. Taking an extra cookie, doddling when he said to hurry, or even just ignoring him as he talked to me. Petty things. Insignificant things. They didn’t matter, and Jake didn’t really care. But one day, a particularly bad day for Jake, when one of his men had been killed, and he had personally took a beating, he snapped. My little acts just toppled the pile, and he yelled. While it wasn’t the first time an adult yelled at me, for I had fun trying to get the other adults to yell at me, it was the first time Jake had yelled at me.

That led to my first true break of the rules. For I left. I left the base.

I wasn’t thinking clearly, for I was angry. And my anger always got the better of me, but it had been what I wanted to do. And I’m glad I did it. For if I hadn’t, I wouldn’t have realized how much I needed the base.

I slept in an alley. And when I woke, expecting to find some creepy homeless guy leaning over me, I found something different. A warm meal, three- not the usual two-cookies, and Jake leaning against the opposing wall. He didn’t say anything, just let me eat. And when I finished, he handed me a box. Again no words. It was his version of an apology.

Part of my mind wanted to stay mad, but the other part, the thirteen year old part, wanted the gift. So I opened it. And hence my fist gun. My first gun I ever killed someone with, my first gun that felt truly mine, and my gun that was missing. But strangely, that seemed insignificant now.

So for the second time in my life, I contemplated leaving. But I knew Jake would drag me back. I saw the look in his eyes.

My body jerked again, and I walked in the other direction. Pacing. Repetitive and annoying. But effective. It let me move and think at the same time, not having to pay attention to where I was going. However, a shooting range would have been better. A lot better.

My fist lashed out, and down went my lamp. My room was a mess, but I was going to be gone soon, so what did it matter? And pack? Who did Jake think I was? I would go naked just to prove a point... however, the concept of having the men staring at me, including Flint, stopped me from actually doing it. So I would go with the clothes on my back, nothing more.

I should have been more specific in my deal. It was a stupid mistake, a rookie mistake, and Jake took full advantage of it... which bugged me more than it should have. Jake wasn’t suppose to play low, he wasn’t suppose to hit below the belt, metaphorically speaking. And the fact that he did, just... just irked me.

This time, when my phone went off, I lunged for it. My leg brushed a broken piece of my lamp, but not hard enough to draw blood.

“Hello?” Hello? Yes, Linkin, hello. Nice to talk to you too, mind if you give me back Zane and allow me to rip your throat out? What was I thinking? Hello?

“Hey.” Oh. For the first time ever, my heart dropped to hear Dane’s voice. “You get home okay?” I nodded, before realizing my own stupidity, and voiced it. “Good. Have things gotten any better?” How was I to answer that? How was I to tell him I was being sent away, without my own consent, and wouldn’t see him, probably ever again? I just... I couldn’t.

“Not particularly.” He paused.

“I’m sure th-“ he was cut off. Not on his end, or on my end, but by my phone. It began to beep, and this time, my heart did drop.

“Call you back.” It was said hastily and I cut off his protests as I switched lines.

This was what I wanted, but either way, my gut was still sinking. I began to see red, and I had to take a few deep breaths just to stay calm. This was what I wanted. This had been what I was waiting for, and this was my ticket out, as well as Zane’s.

“Linkin.” There was silence, before laughter.

“And here I thought he was bull-shitting me. You sure you want to do this, sweety? I don’t have a problem with taking candy from babies.” At that I let out a laugh; a short, sadistic one.

“I never have had a sweet tooth. Let’s skip the pleasantries and get down to it.”

“Why such the rush? We have all the time in the world. Oh, wait, it’s not our time you’re worried about, now is it? Does this have anything to do with that bloody ball of flesh in the basement?” My fist clenched around the phone, and I had to lower my shaking body slowly onto the bed. My eyes shut tightly, and my jaw clenched. I took a deep breath in, and let it out slowly. This was my plan, my idea, and I’d be damned if I let him take control. No. This was mine.

“What’s the matter, Linkin, not ready? Still bidding your time before you play with the big dogs?” I sent a mental apology to Zane. He was just as good as I was, maybe even better. But I had to bait Linkin, if anything I knew about him was true. I was going to take him down for Zane, for disrupting my life, and killing the family I never got to know.

“Woof.” Was his reply, along with some laughter. “Listen, sweety, go ahead, do your little taunting game, but wake me when you get to the reason you wanted this call.” I was taunting? He was the one mentioning Zane!

So Linkin liked to give, but not receive. Interesting. Any knowledge on how he worked was good, for so far, what I did know, wasn’t worth much. I still didn’t know what I wanted to do. Heck, how was I to tell him why I got him to call, when I was still working that out? But truth was, he was leading this conversation. He had me struggling to keep up, and that made my blood boil. This was my call, my idea, my mission. So he was going to do it my way... and if not, I’d make him.

“How’s your guy doing? Those glass cuts looked nasty. His ego looked even nastier, taking those hits from a girl.” Silence. A smile found my lips, and I eased back into the headboard. Time to change the tables. “I’m sure it’ll be fine though, since even the big dogs, such as yourself, haven’t been able to get a hold of me, right? There’s a way to console his ego.” My eyes closed again, savouring in the sweet silence of his anger and, undoubtedly, anguish.

“If I wanted you, sweety, I’d have you.” But his voice was tight, strained even. He was lying through his teeth.

“Of course, Linkin. You’re just bidding your time.” I said, in a weak consoling voice that would have had me punching out whoever used it on me.

“I have more feelers, more eyes, than you’ll ever know.” His voice had turned icy. This was definitely in my hands now.

“Trying to console your ego there, Linkin?”

“What’s this call about, sweety?” He hissed. “Because if you don’t mind, I got some torture to attend to. You may know the victim, not that you’d be able to identify him.” My fists clenched the phone tighter, but I kept my voice level as I spoke.

“You know what I want, Linkin. The question is what do you want?” His laughter rang out of the small speaker on my phone, and made me cringe. I don’t think I had ever wanted to kill someone as bad as I wanted to kill him. And talking to him like this was eating at me. I wanted to curse him, to snarl at him, to hurt him, but I couldn’t. Not yet.

“I don’t do bargains over the phone, sweety.” Even if he hadn’t killed my family, attacked me, and kidnapped Zane, I would want to rip out his throat for the sweety part alone.

Here was the catch. Lure me out with the bait. Get me alone, and strike. I knew it, and I’m sure he knew I knew it. So what I had to do was out-smart him, without him figuring out what I was going to do. Yet again, the only thing I was missing, was what to actually do.

“Got a place in mind?” That got me a pause. “Aww, come on Linkin. Surely you know me well enough to know I would never decline.”

“East of town, there’s a-“

”Too far, Linkin. I’m a save-the-environment type of gal. Plus, who has the time? This gets done now.”

“Let me guess, you have a place in mind?”

“Couple. Take your pick.” I listed them off, all abandoned buildings I knew by memory. It paid to know these things. I could hear typing in the background and knew he was checking out the places. I didn’t care, figured he would. So I chose to not comment on it.

“The one down ninth. Two hours.”

“Come alone.” I added. He chuckled at that.

“Never dreamed differently, sweety.” And with that, I got the click of him hanging up.