“Honey, you’ve got it baa-aad!”
Sam, tailing the twitchy little barefoot bitch, coulda’ puked when the woman in a wheelchair told her that. He knew what he was looking at. He’d known since he was a teen that anyone who didn’t react that way to him really wasn’t interested in men. He wouldn’t mind banging her, if he could just cover those thin, twitchy lips with the proverbial paper bag, but she was fucking up government business with all this dawdling.
Oblivious to everything, including the fact that the love of her life wasn’t more than ten feet away, she had now stopped to…oh fuck, what a cliché!…smell the roses. Sam rolled the beautiful green eyes with which he’d broken a million hearts. Sure, he could take Alex on without resorting to using this idiot as a distraction. Sam knew how good he was. But he had also seen more than enough special ops to know the one thing even a consummate martial artist such as himself was no match for: complete unmitigated insanity. He had done his homework on Alex; he knew what he was dealing with.
Finally, finally, Ms. Twitch approached Alex’ front door…just as a rather hideous female scream could be heard.
So much for the homeless woman…
Ms. Twitch, obviously oblivious to another person’s agony…and her own bare feet…straightened her clothes. She looked puzzled when she fished a broken stiletto heel out of one pocket, then shrugged and crammed it back in her pocket.
Not a bad weapon, thought Sam. And you’re going to need it.
Ms. Twitch rang the doorbell.
I would have waited till the screaming stopped, he thought. But then he prepared, positioning himself to dart inside when Alex let the seemingly harmless Ms. Twitch in.
The silence that followed the doorbell ringing was…ghastly. Ms. Twitch, predictably, stamped her feet and rang it again. Sam amused himself with visions of Bela Lugosi in some ancient Dracula flick answering.
Alex creaked the door open a sliver. Not enough yet for Sam’s purposes.
Ms. Twitch started right in: “That stupid homeless woman you kidnapped…and don’t tell me otherwise because I just heard her scream…stole my phone. If you don’t give it back to me right now, I’m going to call the cops right this second!”
Sam could tell from Alex’ face that they were both wondering with what phone she planned to call the cops “right this second.” But Ms. Twitch hadn’t exactly whispered her demand. He couldn’t imagine Alex choosing to continue this conversation out in the open, so he braced himself for what he assumed would follow.
Alex opened the door wide.
