A Little Death

XX

'The 78th floor.' I tell the person sitting at the small, dusty desk in the corner of the small metal hut. He presses a button on his desk and an elevator opens behind him, that, earlier, seemed a part of the rusty metal. But inside, it's lavish as hell. They were pretty smart to rig it up like that. It's way better than the last time I came. Kristin decided to stay back, at the lobby. It's smart of her because she's not exactly the athletic type. OR the fighting type.

We walk in. I fidget with my fingers as the door closes behind us. I pay attention to the numbers on the lift, indicating the floors passing.

1...2...

'It's gonna be fine.' Joshua tells me. I nod reluctantly and bite my lip to get my mind off how my dad is doing right now. 

5...6...7...

His eyes widen at me. 'Your lips are bleeding.' He tells me, I touch my lips to check, and sure enough, there's blood coming out. He looks at me in worry. He wipes the blood off my lips.

8...9...10...

I put my arms around his neck, wanting to be closer to him. He nibbles my bottom lip and pulls me closer.

12...13...14...

He pulls one of my knees up to his thigh. I tighten my arms around his neck. He places his other hand on my face, pulling it closer to his own.

17...18...19

I close my eyes as he makes his way into my mouth and entwines our tongues. It feels like heaven. I can't believe that I'm here for two reasons.

One of them, my dad is kidnapped. My dad. The invincible mafia boss. All because of me. All my life, he's been nothing but kind and loving to me, it was immature of me to leave just because of one mistake, just because it hurt my ego. It hardly matters anymore. If I hadn't left, none of this would've happened.

Here's where reason two comes in. If I didn't run away, maybe I wouldn't have met Joshua. I wouldn't have sneaked out to that alleyway to take a break from life, I had come there to dispose of a body. He wouldn't have met that girl in the alleyway and I would've been alone. I wouldn't be in the arms of this gorgeous man. One who actually cares for me. I believe, somehow, that he won't mess anything up for us. I know I would never intentionally do anything to break this little bubble we have. This relationship, whatever it is. I hope with all my heart that we walk out of this building with the same relationship as when we walked in.

More importantly, both of us in one piece.

He pulls away and I open my eyes.

56...57...58...

He cups my entire face in his hands and grab them. 'It's gonna be okay, Skyler. We're both gonna walk out of this building perfectly fine. I promise.' As if he's reading my mind.

63...64...65...

He kisses me on the forehead, and I pull him into a hug. 

68...69...70...

I let go and wipe the tears starting to form in my eyes before they can fall out. I've been crying a lot lately. I've dropped my guard and let myself be vulnerable near him.

73...74...75...

But that's okay. I trust him. 

76...77...

78.

The doors open. It takes a while for my eyes to settle to the darkness, I can make out some vague figures. There's men with guns, standing behind a chair someone occupies. Someone flips a switch and a light turns on. 

Tomer is sitting on the chair. 'You're', he checks his watch, 'late. Fashionably late, you call it? Like father like daughter.' He's wearing a cast on his arm. There's bandage on his chest, it's visible throw his almost translucent white shirt. His eyes are covered by sunglasses. Why could he be wearing them in the dark? Then I remember that I stabbed them with my heels. Sucks for him.

'And your little friend. I did a little digging, Joshua Hennons? Isn't it?' He looks in the wrong direction and points and smiles. I try not to laugh. 

'You know it's not cool to monologue as a villain? It's too cliché.' Tomer moves his head towards the voice source and tries to hide his embarrassment when he realizes he was looking for Joshua in the wrong place.

'Yeah, yeah.'

'Let my dad go, and no one gets hurt, Tomer.'

'Oh, people were hurt way before, the death of my men is a sacrifice I am willing to make. Someone got hurt that day when you ambushed me, you didn't care then. Someone got hurt when I was going to get,' he does air quotes, 'promoted.'

I remember that day. It was the day when we had the elections for the person who would take over the mafia. My dad had won, but just for the fun of it, everyone had decided to tell Tomer that he had won. He showed up all proud and mighty, but was humbled real quick when he found out what had happened. He left the room and didn't come back for a few months. I was only 4 or 5 then, but the mafia talked about it every now and then, causing Tomer to have an argument and more people to start hating him.

'Someone gets hurt every time an attack goes wrong. It doesn't matter if anyone gets hurt now.' He snaps the fingers on his intact hand. The guards behind him rush towards us.