Kreichek can’t help sneaking a peek in the rearview mirror. “Now what?”
She struggles into a new black turtleneck. “The woman.”
They are parked just down the block from Kate’s house.
“Someone’s having a party. I guess we weren’t invited,” he says. It is a lucky turn, allowing them park on the street unnoticed.
“You take care of her,” she orders from the shadows. “I need a break.”
“And the family?”
“That’s up to you.” She hands him a gun. “Either way, you have enough rounds in here.”
He checks the magazine, just to be on the safe side, then takes a deep breath. “Whatever,” he tells her, getting out.
Elayna watches him walk up the block and smiles. Her money is on Katrina. After all, the fix is in.
Up the street, alone in the darkness, Cinderella waits for her prince. Sitting on the bed, listening to the running shower. Her own existence feels drained like an empty pool in winter, where only leaves and murky water remain to remind her of the memories of summers past. It is a dark and dismal place, suffocating with regret and dread. But there is one place left where she can go, a place of solace and comfort. There she will find a true friend, a shoulder to cry on, as long as she could put up with the “I told you so.”
It is there that Katrina waits for her silly little ballerina.
The water turns off with a squeak. She hears the sliding glass door open followed by the soft rustle of a towel. It is as if a mist has settled in her mind, obscuring her reality, turning everything whitish grey. The door opens and McDowd emerges from the steamy brightness into the darkened room. He’s futzing with his phone and doesn’t notice Kate.
“Hi there…” she says, making him jump despite the softness of her voice.
“Jesus! Kate!”
She leans back suggestively on his bed. “Sorry, I didn’t think you’d scare so easily.”
He recovers quickly. “I don’t. I’m just a little jumpy. I’ve only been back a week, you know.”
“I didn’t think I was that much of a threat,” she smiles.
“Either did I.” he laughs, and then glances back to his phone. He’s missed several calls from Edwards, and a text message saying ET phone home. He tosses the phone onto the bed. “Guess I was wrong,” he says, sitting down on the edge. He needn’t ask about what’s up, he’s already feeling it. He has very hot and hungry looking cougar in his room, and he’s on her menu.
Kate sits up next to him, getting close. “You don’t have to worry. I don’t bite…” she says quietly, bringing her mouth close to his. “Unless you want me to.”
Their lips meet. The kiss is soft at first, but the flame of passion is slowly fed by the fuel of lust. Her hand finds his leg and slides up under the towel. He shudders ever so slightly when she grips him and begins to stroke downward again and again from the top of his increasingly slippery shaft, but neither of them can endure this for very long.
Kate gently pushes him onto the bed. He doesn’t resist. She opens the towel and straddles him under her flowing costume, rubbing herself slowly against him. McDowd reaches under the skirt with both hands to find the line of her tights and panties. His touch is light and easy, pulling them down and one leg at a time, she wriggles out of them. Now nothing is in their way. As she rubs slowly against him, he feels coarseness of pubic hair, tickling, teasing at first, then giving way to her softness. He lets her direct the choreography, seeing the perplexing pleasure and pain on her face, for as long as he can.
As her sweet spot finds him, any apprehension Kate had about what she was doing vanishes. A tear rolls down her cheek as all of her troubles fade away, replaced by the warm flush, kept from her, taken from her, first by her sobriety and then her husband. She does all she can to relish it, slow sips, trying hard not to gulp.
McDowd has not been in this position for quite a while. His ability to maintain control is beginning to buckle. He wants to do this right for her, not wanting to jump the gun. He needs to slow things down. Gently he rolls her off him and onto her back, but instead of diving headlong into her, he makes his way south for now, leaving a trail of kisses along the way.
Her tears become the renewing waters to her parched existence, and everywhere, everything is in bloom. She wipes her eyes before pulling him to her.
The cell phone goes off just as Kate reaches to guide him in. He freezes. She can see the angry hesitation on his face, torn between what he wants to do and what he has to do. She touches his cheek, trying to pull him back into the moment. When the phone stops, the ruse almost seems to have worked, until it starts ringing again.
“I’m sorry,” he says. “Let me try to get rid of them.”
He moves off her and takes the call.
She stares at the ceiling as the mist of the dream drifts away. It is gone, never meant to be, and never to return. Kate rolls away, hearing the shouting caller on the other end. She doesn’t need to hear any more.
“I just got out of the shower…I’m getting dressed now…Ten minutes. I’ll be there in ten minutes,” he says, turning to Kate, but she is gone.
Just down the block, Elayna’s neck is still throbbing, but at least the Tylenol has taken the edge off. The pain of doubt is an entirely different matter.
“What if that dumb bastard actually does his job? I’d hate to have to kill somebody I just fucked.”
She dismisses the thought. “Impossible, he’s not even in the same league as her, poor slob,” she laughs.
Then she spots someone walking out of the party and raises her night scope. “It looks like we’re about to find out,” she smiles, recognizing Katrina. Suddenly, she is not alone.
“Shit! Holy shit! It’s the boy toy!”
She double-checks, just to make sure. “Ebitskaya sila! If he goes inside with her...”
After throwing himself together, and getting a weird look from his sister as he dashed out the door, he catches up to the dark hooded figure down the block. “Kate! Kate, wait!” he calls charging after her.
She doesn’t stop, forcing him to gently grab her. “Kate, hold on…I’m sorry.” When she turns around, he sees she’s crying, shattering his heart. “Oh Christ, Kate, I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be,” she says, trying to choke down the tears. “It was a crazy idea anyway. I’m the one who should be apologizing. What I did was wrong. I shouldn’t have been there.”
“No, what you did was wonderful!” he soothes. “It was just the wrong moment. I want to do this right, together.” He pushes back the hood of her cloak, thinking how beautiful she looks, even in the face of sorrow. He places his hand beneath her chin so he can look at those knockout eyes. “What do you say?”
“Of coarse. I shouldn’t be so upset. It’s just been a rough week. I don’t seem to be able to catch a break.”
“We’ll talk about it tomorrow.”
“You have to go,” Kate tells him, finally returning to the now and its sobering possibilities.
“Ten A.M. meeting, right?”
“Right,” she says, managing a smile.
He kisses her, but not like before. The kind of kiss a husband gives to a wife as he goes out the door.
“Tomorrow…” he reminds, reluctantly backing away, until he turns to run.
Kate stands on the sidewalk until she sees him drive away. “Good-bye, Dan.”
Turning to her home, she thinks of her sons and the heartbreak yet to come. “You wasted the little remaining time you had with them trying to get laid, you selfish cunt,” Kate tells herself. She thinks of how easily she could just end it all, remembering how she once had made that choice for her and her sons.
The plan is simple: spend the last few hours she has left with her boys, then slip away after they’re asleep. They would never know the truth, which was better than believing a lie. Besides, if her orders were legitimate, the outcome wouldn’t mat
ter anyway. “Help me, God,” she begs, walking up to her front door.
Elayna starts breathing again. “By the czar’s whiskers! That was close,” she exhales with a laugh. “This is the most fun I’ve had in years, and to think I wasted all that time as Kurtsin’s office girl!”
She laughs at all the twists and turns that seem to have no regard for plans, sitting back to see what happens next and who walks out the front door of Katrina’s fancy house.
Kate shuts her eyes and pushes the door closed with her back, bracing for what lie ahead. She whispers to herself, “God, please help me, give me the strength to save me from myself.”
When she opens her eyes and looks into the dim light of the living room, she sees Tom and Robbie on the couch facing her with duct tape over their mouths.
Sitting in her favorite chair next to the fireplace is a stranger. In his hand is silenced automatic, pointing at her boys.
“We were beginning to worry. Come in, Katrina, we are waiting for you. Please move slowly, and if you do as I say, they will be unharmed,” he tells her in Russian.
She edges away from the door. “Who are you, and what do you want?”
“My name is Kreichek. I am here to terminate your mission,” he says, finally getting a good look at her. “This is the fearsome Katrina? You must be shitting me!”
Her mind desperately tries to process what she’s seeing.
“We’ve already visited with Eddy, Val and Misha. After our time together, we’ll be visiting Stani.”
“You mean the orders were fake?” she asks with relief.
“Yes. They were fake,” he smiles.
“Thank God! I was going to try to stop them anyway,” Kate says, moving toward her children, but a pointed gesture from Kreichek’s gun stops her cold.
“My orders are also to terminate you. As you can imagine, this is a very embarrassing mistake, so they don’t want any loose ends,” he says with genuine sympathy.
“I won’t tell a soul. Nobody has to know. I haven’t betrayed our secret—”
“I wish it could go let you off the hook,” he says, cutting her off, “but orders are orders.”
Kate looks at Tom, then at the tape sitting on the coffee table. Kreichek hasn’t bound their hands yet. The boys look more confused than afraid, thinking that she might be pulling another one of her crazy surprises.
“It’s okay, guys. I’ll treat you to Slurpees after this.” She hopes Tom gets the hint, desperately searching his eyes for the answer. “What about them?”
He rises out of the chair, the gun still on her kids.
“I’m here for you, not them.”
“How do I know I can trust you?”
“You don’t, but you can.” He switches to English. “What’s the little one’s name?” he asks, switching to English.
“Robert.”
“Robert, please take that tape and wrap it around your mom’s hands at the wrists, now!”
“No! Do not make him do that. Robbie, don’t you move from that seat, young man!” she screams like any angry mom.
Kreichek looks at her, puzzled. “Do you want me to kill them?”
“Yes! If you’re going to kill me, they come with me!” Kate says chillingly in Russian.
Her coldness begins to freak him out, and Kate can see it.
“Fuck!” He’ll have to suck it up, but only because he has to. It will make killing Elayna that much easier.
He has made a serious mistake by using the boys. Fear is a great motivator, initiating the instinct of fight or flight. A mother of any species will always choose to fight when cornered with her young, but this one is a trained killer.
Kate knows what she’s going to do. It’s just like riding a bicycle; you never forget how to kill. She sees the sloppy way Kreichek is holding the gun. It is unlikely he’ll be able to place a deadly round on the first shot. She also considers the caliber: a 9mm has stopping power, but one round isn’t going to stop her from attacking him, not with the lives of her children at risk.
All she needs is an instant.
The gun drifts off the boys as he looks at her. When he looks back at the kids, the instant arrives.
Kate slips sideways out his peripheral vision.
He sees the movement and tries to target her.
She rushes him, but she is just too far away.
“Shit!” She braces herself, shoulder first, reducing her profile. He’ll get a shot off.
“CLICK.”
She slams into him, knocking him back but not down. Katrina smirks, focusing all her power into a vicious attack. The first blow goes to his throat, fingers out and right above the Adam’s apple. Stepping into him, she nails his chest with her elbow like a battering ram, right into his breastplate. Then she grabs the arm with the gun while violently connecting with his groin with a scoop kick. Waves of agony crash over him, loosening his grip on the weapon. As he falls backward, she connects with a roundhouse to the jaw. Then Kate steps out and points the gun at him.
From a combat stance, she works the trigger to place one round in his head and two in his chest, but again it doesn’t fire.
Up until now the boys weren’t sure if it was all just a Halloween prank, but the blood is real and their mother’s attack is chillingly violent.
Tom moves, grabbing the fireplace poker without asking his mom for permission. With a big wind up, he smashes the tool into Kreichek’s face with a sickening smack. The hook part of the poker gets stuck in Kreichek’s eye socket, and as he pulls it back, it yanks Kreichek around before it comes loose, making him scream.
Tom winds up again, swinging for the bleachers. This time it sounds like he’s broke something.
Going down, Kreichek’s head catches the corner of the heavy wood coffee table, and he hits the floor out cold, a bloody mess.
Tom prepares for another shot, switching from baseball to golf.
“Tom! Stop!” He freezes in mid-swing.
Kate, Tom, and Robbie stand staring at Kreichek on the floor, Kate in her white blood-splattered ballerina costume, and Tom and Robbie still with the tape over their mouths. Tom rips his off.
“Robbie, dial 911!”
“Robbie, Wait, honey,” Kate says. Tom looks at her, bewildered.
“We have to run away first. Tom, go upstairs and get a change of clothes for you and your brother, quickly!”
Like a good son, he does as he’s told. Kate drags Robbie to the kitchen, looking over her shoulder to make sure Kreichek is still down. She sits Robbie down in a kitchen chair, crouching in front of him and, as gently as she can, removes his tape. “Honey, are you okay,” she asks in a calm, even voice.
“Wow! Is this for real?” Robbie asks in awe.
“It’s going to be all right, it’s over now.”
She hears the thudding of drawers upstairs. “Hurry up, Tom!” she yells. He runs down the stairs and into the kitchen with a bag.
“Stay here for one second.”
Kate takes off for the basement, shedding clothes along the way. In the seconds it takes her to get to her bag, she’s naked. She throws on her work clothes, a tee shirt and black coveralls. She hasn’t worn them for a while, but they still fit. She dashes for basement fridge, pulling everything out onto the floor. Under the crisper drawers, she removes the false bottom and removes four thermos containers, stuffs them into the bag, and sprints back up the stairs.
“Mom! What’s going on?” Tom pleads for an answer, but none comes.
“Get your shoes on,” she says evenly while taking out a tab of Valium to give Robbie, then goes to the hall closet for a pair of sturdy hiking boots and a black field jacket. Tom watches in stunned disbelief.
“He was going to kill us, Tom, and he isn’t alone. We have to get out of here fast,” she tells him, closing the door.
From behind the door Kreichek grabs her. Somehow he’s managed get himself up and going again, and the open closet prev
ented them from seeing his coming. He has her from behind, around the neck, lifting her off her feet, trying to find the leverage to snap her neck.
“You bitch! You don’t have to worry about your brats. They’ll be right behind you,” he growls.
She struggles furiously, elbowing him violently, but unable to get free.
“Run! Get out!” She manages to scream despite his vice-like grip, trying desperately to counter the building pressure on her neck, feeling her strength slipping away and the breaking point fast approaching.
Robbie runs off, but Tom freezes in fear.
Kreichek is close now. She knows, she’s done it herself.
She looks into Tom’s terrified eyes, telling him that she loves him without saying it. Kate summons all her energy for one last shot to break free, but the effort isn’t any good. Heartbreak sweeps over her.
Suddenly, Kreichek roars like a beast, but instead of a final burst of strength to finish her, his grip eases. Her feet touch the ground again, and she gets lose. Kate turns to attack, only to see Kreichek crazily reaching behind him. Kreichek drops to his knees, looking at Kate, and then drops face down to the floor.
In the hallway behind him is Robbie, and sticking out of Kreichek’s back is the handle of her extra huge chopping knife.
“Robbie!” she says in disbelief, but she should known better; apples never fall too far from the tree. “Good boy!” she says, hugging him, her voice sounding raspy. “We have to get out of here.”
Elayna is seconds away from going in when all the lights go out. She sees the side door open with a glint of light reflected from the corner streetlight. She raises her night scope, then smiles. “Good girl! I knew you could do it!”
Gun drawn, Kate shepherds the kids into the family truck and tears off, lights out, into the night. Elayna doesn’t have to follow her. She has placed a tracking device on the truck. “See you in a little while, but I hope you do everybody a favor, find a place to get rid of the kids.”
Seeing that everything is calm, she hops out and walks up the street to the side of the house. With one last glance around, she goes inside.
With her gun out Elayna listens to the dark house. She follows the gurgling noises and in the faint orange light from outside, Elayna finds Kreichek sprawled on the floor.
Elayna takes a knee next to him. “My poor Stephan, what happened to you?”