Always?

Chapter 2

Amber ran a hand through her hair, pacing around the apartment as she waited for the boys. She had recently redyed it rose gold, and while she loved the colour, she often forgot about it until she looked at herself in the mirror. She locked eyes on the mirror in the lounge room, staring at her reflection, her rose gold hair covered in blood. The dried blood on her dark skin was on her jaw and her chest. She tried to wipe it away, but it was too late, and it wouldn’t come off without a shower. She wanted to know how much blood she had on her clothes, but the black attire hid it well. She looked down at her shirt, pulled it away from her body and saw nothing.

“Oh, we’re so screwed,” Alice muttered as she stared at her, her arms crossed over her chest. Her dark hair was tied up, and the blood had also stained her face, and she had droplets on her neck and chest. Alice bit her lip as she stared at the couch.

“I told you to leave him there,” Ani said as she emerged from the shower. Her hair was wrapped in a towel, but she wore a black oversized shirt and sweats. Amber traced the droplets of water cascading down Ani’s neck with her eyes, where they disappeared underneath her clothes. She looked away.

“He was dying; We were being shot at. I wasn’t thinking straight,” Amber replied. Now that the adrenaline surge had started wearing off, she realised how big of a mistake she had made. They had never done something like this. Ever.

“Like that’s ever stopped you before, Miss let me shoot him six more times to make sure he’s dead,” Alice deadpanned as she untied her hair and redid it.

“Oh, he was a s**t, and he deserved it,” Amber replied, knowing exactly which job she was talking about.

“We almost got caught-”

Ani sighed, waving her hands around, not in the mood to hear the argument. “Alice, go shower. We’ll wait for the boys and update them. And see what the f**k we’re supposed to do about,” she waved her hands at the couch, frowning. “All of this.”

Alice stared at them, a look of concern on her face, but nodded before walking down the unlit hallway and to the bathroom. Amber finally stared at the problem. A man with light hair also stained in blood and clammy, pale skin passed out from blood loss on their black couch, his legs dangling off of the sofa. He wore a white shirt, the red contrasting it painfully.

She wasn’t sure what she was thinking when she asked the girls to help her. She knew what she had to do; she had one job: to remove the target and move on, but this man. This man had been hiding behind some of the containers, curled up in a corner, with tears in his eyes, muttering something to himself. He had been caught in the crossfire, and he wasn’t their target, so she couldn’t just leave him to die with the rest of the people and simply be labelled as a member of the cartel. So, while Ani walked around, making sure none of the corpses had a heartbeat, Amber had rushed over to where she had seen the man and called the other two over before they not so discreetly dragged him to stand up and lean on them, Ani had given him one of the cartel member’s jacket so they could hide the blood and walked out, claiming how drunk he was that he could barely stand, and they had kept up the charade until they pushed him into the car. They burned the jacket with a standard lighter a few miles down and drove away.

“What’s happening? Why the 911 text, and is that a f*****g man?” Alec asked as his eyes landed on the unconscious man who was bleeding away on their couch. He stared at the two women, a scowl on his face. “Where’s my sister.”

“Shower,” Amber replied, remembering the blood on her skin. She rubbed at it, trying to make it disappear. Ani walked over with a frown and grabbed her hands, staring at her. “Are you okay?” she whispered.

Amber nodded. Of course, she was okay. She just needed to get this blood off of her. She needed a shower to ensure she was clean and things would be fine. Ani eyed her warily before she turned around and stared at the boys.

“So,” Ani said, clapping her hands together, a smile on her face. “We have an issue.”

“I’m here, what do you want?” Oliver grumbled as he walked in, and when his eyes landed on the body, he scowled, looking at them. “What the f**k is this?”

Matt pointed at the two women. “They kidn*pped someone.”

Oliver groaned, rubbing the bridge of his nose as he scowled at them. “This is the first and only time you three are allowed to go on a job together.”

“So,” Alec said, clearing his throat a little. “What do we do?”

“Kill him,” Oliver deadpanned. “We don’t know what he’s seen or who he is. Why is he even here?”

“He was caught in the crossfire. I scanned his wrist. He didn’t have the cartel tattoo, so he’s not one of them. We couldn’t just leave him to die there,” Amber replied. “So, no. We’re not killing him. For all we know, he’s just an innocent bystander, caught up in it.”

“I assume he was at the warehouse. If he were innocent, he would not have been there in the first place.”

“I’ve never seen a cartel member with tears in their eyes as he realised he was dying,” Amber shot back.

“Oh, hey,” Alice said as she walked down the hallway, her hair wrapped in her black towel and also in a fresh set of clothes. “I assume you’re caught up?”

“He is not our problem,” Alec hissed, glaring at Amber. “The police are competent. They would have known he wasn’t a member of the cartel. For all we know, he’s in a different cartel, and now we have another target on our back. And we’re all in danger. Again.”

“Amber, go take a shower. Here’s what we’re going to do.”

“What?” Matt asked, frowning. He was leaning over the man and poked his cheek with his finger.

“We call Damian.”

Amber left them to argue over whether they should have called Damian, and she went to her bedroom, grabbed her dark purple towel and some clean clothes, went to the bathroom, stripped and took a shower.

~*~