45 Incompetent
1703 Words
It was all over the news. It was labeled as a gang war that broke out. It was the biggest firefight that had happened in New York City in recent history. Most of the members in that particular instance were successfully apprehended, save for a few who escaped via the van in the back. It was the woman, and the man named Locke. Immediately, Lina was rushed to the hospital by the masked vigilantes, who remained anonymous. She was sure though that it was thanks to her friends that she was saved. After a few days in isolation and treatments, the media immediately swarmed the hospital hoping to hear her story on the incident. However, there was one person that stayed by her side and kept the media from hounding her. It was from Charlie. She knew that he was the same one that stunned her apprehender, and saved her from even more torture, and maybe even death. In the meantime, she stayed in the hospital.
Lina reached for her water just across the table. It was a mere inches away from her bed, yet she winced at the pain she felt in reaching for it. Charlie saw this instantly and grabbed the glass for her. She smiled and took a few sips of water, before handing it back to him. He put it back on the table and looked back at her. She was smiling at him.
“What you lookin’ at?” Charlie asked.
She shook her head and continued to smile at him.
“Nothing,” she said with a giggle.
The two just sat there for the moment, before Lina ended the silence again.
“Say… It was you, wasn't it?”
“What was?”
“You’re the guy. The one who saved me from that ‘Locke’ person.”
He just looked at her and smiled coyly.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about, Lina.”
She returned that coy smile, before looking back down at her wounds. Charlie remembered that she had been going through intense checks on her mental health. With the trauma she experienced from this incident, what else could he expect.
“You still being checked up by the psychiatrist?”
“Yeah… They say they wanna keep tabs on me for a few months. But I’ll be physically allowed to leave in a couple of days. They just wanna check to see if there was anything in the metal that they used to… well, you know.”
“Y-yeah… yeah,” he replied.
She looked back at him and reached for his hand.
“I’m not talking to you, Charlie… I’m talking to the one who saved me. The one wearing the mask. He is in there right?” she said as he pointed into his chest.
Charlie stared at her. Her pleading eyes were perfectly framed by her frail face. Her red hair draped the sides of her cheeks gently and glowed with the intensity of rubies. Her lips were small and pursed with the serious expression that her face was making. He still thought, even with everything that had happened, that she was still the most beautiful.
“Yeah...” Charlie finally replied.
She immediately reached for him and wrapped her arms around him. For a moment, both of them just sat there and stayed in the moment in which time seemed to have stopped. He felt her breath on his chest as she pressed her face against his neck. It was softer than he had imagined. And she felt just as dainty as he thought she would. Her arms barely exerted any pressure onto his body, and as he wrapped his arms around her, he felt that her body did not resist. It was as if he could break her at a moment’s notice. But she didn’t break. And that was exactly why she was here. This small, dainty girl, in his eyes, was stronger than a Lion. And he knew it.
“You made it, just in the nick of time… didn’t you?”
“Yeah… I guess I did.”
“Were you scared?” she asked, as she tightened her hug.
He let out a soft chuckle, as he did the same.
“I was pissing myself.”
She giggled at the response.
“You were really brave,” she said.
“So were you,” he replied.
“You’re my hero now. Will you always be there to save me?”
“No… I don’t think I like that,” he said in reply.
She pulled away for a moment and looked at him confused. He picked up on this and smiled at her.
“I think I’d rather be your protector.”
She sighed and smiled at him, not letting her eyes lose him for a second.
“I don’t want to be there in the nick of time. I want to be there all the time. I don’t want to save you from danger. I want to protect you from any danger before it gets to you. I don’t want you to have to be strong… not when you’ve been doing so your whole life. You don’t have to put up a strong facade all the time… Lina. Not with me.”
She leaned in and kept her eyes on his. He tightened the distance between their faces as he leaned in as well.
“You’re already the strongest girl in my eyes, Lina. You can take a break with me.”
She giggled and put her hand on his cheek.
“Thank you,” she said as the tears began to well up in her eyes.
She pulled him in and pressed her lips onto his, as he sank into her. His hands were pressed onto the back of her head and the small of her back. Both her arms were wrapped snugly around his neck. It was then that Charlie felt everything. Her lips. Her nose pressed into his cheek. Her hands caressing him. Her hair. It was something that he thought could only be something that could be experienced in storybooks. He realized that all of those stories were true. To the letter.
They pulled away from each other after a little while and were content to just looking into each other’s eyes.
“Wow,” Charlie said, as he looked on at Lina.
“Same… It’s the first time I did anything that… brave,” she said, as she turned red in the face.
“Well… Uh, if it makes you feel any better… I liked it,” he replied.
“Funny… So did I,” she said with a grin.
They leaned in to the kiss again, before they heard a loud knock on the door. Instantly, they turned to the doorway, to find that it was already open. Trae leaned on the door and smiled right at both of them. Jules desperately tried to be cool, but couldn’t contain her giddy excitement. And Max. Max looked at both of them and smiled. With everything that had happened, he was absolutely ecstatic for them. With the warmest of smiles, the group came in for a big, teary-eyed, group hug with the member that was missing for what seemed like an eternity.
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Mr. Locke pounded on the table in a fit of rage, as he aggressively addressed the two people responsible for the fiasco that had happened. He looked at both Emily and Jasper, who couldn’t look the most powerful man in the States in the eyes.
“Do either of you understand what you have done?”
They didn’t reply out of fear that it was a rhetorical question.
“You have both put the Wolfpack… On the f*****g radar!!” he said as he threw his two thousand dollar whiskey glass across the room. “Do you think those bastards will stay quiet?! We already have this damned police agency looking in on the movements of the Wolfpack, and now you let members be captured by police, and interrogated! Interrogated for f**k’s sake!”
He took a deep breath and sighed. He felt faint and sat back down into his chair. Jasper tried to speak, but he was shut down with the mere wave of a hand.
“I’m done with the two of you,” he said, as he had his butler grab him more whiskey. “Leave me.”
“Sir… what do you mean-” Emily tried to ask, but was cut off immediately.
“Exactly what I meant, girl. You are relieved from my services. Normally, I would have had both of you curb stomped, and thrown into NYC sewers. But…one of you is still family. And the other has been in my service for a long time. My last act of respect for the two of you is allowing you to leave. However, tell anyone about anything that we have done, and the streets will no longer be safe for you. Do you understand?”
Jasper gritted his teeth and stormed out of the room in humiliation. Emily quickly followed him. They had the exact same feeling in mind. Embarrassment.
“Damn old man!” he yelled as he reached the large parking lot of the estate.
“Quiet, Locke. The guards might hear you.”
“Like I give a f**k if they hear me!”
He took a few breaths as he calmed down.
“Where are you going to go?” she asked him.
“I have a few properties in Maine. But otherwise, I don’t know,” he said, as he looked down at the floor.
“Well if you don’t have a place to go, then come stay at my place for a while,” she said.
He raised an eyebrow and looked right into her eyes.
“I ain’t f*****g no b***h like you,” he said.
“As if I’d let you anywhere near me in my own home! I just know that you still have your men, who are loyal to you. And I’ll be damned if I give up on our plan to take over the Locke fortune. Did you forget?” she asked.
He looked right at her.
“You still think we can pull it off?”
“Of course I do, asshole!” she yelled as she opened the door to her expensive sports car. “Now get in. We have to figure this out.”
With a chuckle, he obliged and stepped into the car. Within moments, they raced off.
- Writer
