Charlie Ford Meets Secret Agent Man

  "Sure." She nodded and I felt like a member of the Mission Impossible team.

  For the next hour or two, I drew the dining area, the exit that they had taken us to, the floor number, which was three. It was odd to me to have a dining area on the third floor of a hotel. I knew the hotel had five floors because there were five little buttons that lit up when we were on the elevator after lunch. I knew that we were on the second floor and that we didn't have much time. I knew that Bella clearly heard 'two days,' but I preferred to give myself a day's head start from the bad people who were coming to end me. If dinner went well tonight and we got all the information we needed, then first thing in the morning, we could possibly be home free or at least out of the hotel. Saying we'd be home free in the middle of Armenia would be a great exaggeration. We would still have a long way to go, but I was thinking baby steps.

  "What's that?" Bella looked over my shoulder at the little heart I was doodling. I scribbled it out quickly and she grinned and smacked me with a pillow. It had been a long time since I had a pillow fight, so I smacked her right back and giggled like a twelve-year-old. "You're in love," she cooed like a girl, and jumped around holding the map and made kissing noises. "S.A.M. Who does that stand for?"

  I blushed and plopped my head back onto the pillow.

  "None of your business."

  "Charlie? Do you have a boyfriend?"

  "No," I said. Now was not the time to be talking about boys and French-kissing. I wasn't about to play truth or dare.

  "I don't have a boyfriend. Boys are gross."

  "What's it like to kiss a boy?"

  "Yucky. Don't do it until you're twenty-one. Promise me."

  I could tell by the shameless grin on her face that she couldn't wait to kiss a boy and my little lame attempt at making it sound uninteresting failed miserably.

  "When I get home, I'm going to call Gary Walker and I'm going to kiss him."

  "When I get home, I'm going to go to Hawaii."

  "Oh, I'm going to Disneyworld," Bella said and I smiled.

  "That sounds like a perfect idea."

  "With Dad and Mom…." She looked out the window and sighed. "Why do parents get divorced? Why can't they just be happy?"

  "I hate to say it, but I don't think that a lot of people in Hollywood are truly happy. I think they run around like selfish assholes, milk the media attention for as long as they can, and then break up and start all over with someone else."

  "Is that what you think my mom did?"

  Wow, I never thought I'd be having that conversation. How was I to answer that one?

  "I don't know. I've never met your mom."

  "A couple years ago, she ran off with my dad's old assistant. They went to the Bahamas and when they got back, my dad cried and screamed a lot and I thought everything was going to be okay."

  Hussy--hussy--slut--whore. I didn't respect that tramp, Nicole; not one bit.

  "I'm sorry, Bella. I know this is hard on you, but remember, they both love you very much and I'm sure they want what's best for you." I lied. Nicole Harrison wants what was best for herself and her career.

  "She's a selfish bitch," Bella said, then burst into tears and ran for the bathroom. I guess she read my mind.

  We changed into new clothes for dinner. I had only the clothes on my back, a new shirt, and one sundress, but only one pair of underwear. Next time, I will remember to pack extra undies in case I ever got kidnapped again.

  Bella's eyes were still puffy and red from her crying bout, so I tried to lighten the mood.

  "Want to play screenwriters again?"

  "Okay," Bella got serious and crossed her legs Indian- style on the bed. "We're going to get saved by Jason Bourne. I don't know how, but I feel like he's watching through my window, so I write him a note and tape it to the glass, then when we eat dinner, he comes in and kicks everyone's ass. Then he kisses me because you are too busy kissing Cute French guy, who turns out to be his long lost brother."

  "Ewww," I scoffed dramatically. "As if?" I giggled and felt truly sad that I hadn't taken the time to have friends, have sleepovers, and do all those fun, girly things that I had passed up. I sure missed out as a child. I wasn't normal. I was always so busy trying to prove that I was better than boys were that I never enjoyed being a girl, but I was a girl. I hated dirt, I hated blood, and I hated fish guts. Why couldn't I have just been normal in other areas? Then again, if I had grown up to be normal, we wouldn't have been alive right then. Funny how life turns out.

  "Okay, I like the Jason Bourne twist, but let's, just for fun, say that he kisses me at the end because you aren't old enough to kiss." That earned me a swift smack in the face with the pillow.

  We laughed, hugged and then made up a secret handshake before we set out on our mission.

  I picked up the phone and got the weird guy again.

  "Vat you need?"

  "Are we having dinner in our room this evening?"

  I heard scuffling, some shouting and then he came back on the line. "No," he said and hung up. I tucked the map I drew under the mattress and got ready. Deep breath in. Deep breath out.

  There was a knock at the door, and then a new guy entered. New guy was sort of cute for a scumbag. He, too, sounded French and all I could decipher from his rapid ranting was… "Dinner?" He cuffed Bella and me together and marched us down the long corridor. I saw Bella's eyes glance in every direction. She was clearly concentrating hard on memorizing and translating as much as she could. I kept quiet and didn't make a stink, even when Frenchy stuck his hand on my ass. It might have been an accident when he reached for the elevator button, but then again, he did look happy about it. I scowled, but behaved. If all went well we would be out of there by the next afternoon and my ass would be safe from strange French dudes with hairy hands.

  Dinner that night was steamed fish of some sort, baby carrots and some gunk that looked like rice, but I didn't want to make hasty assumptions, so I left it alone. Bella spoke under her breath with food in her mouth as not to draw any attention to herself.

  "Exit." She nodded with her head while sipping milk.

  "Banquet hall, dance hall and gift shop," she said while I sipped milk. "I can only read half the sign behind me, but the first part translates to 'equipment' I think."

  "Broom closet? Maintenance?"

  "Probably."

  She was good; I had to give her that.

  "That cute one thinks you're hot."

  "Really?" I perked up. "Maybe he will have a change of heart and let me go." I looked over at Frenchy. He was smiling at me, but had a gun in his hand, so I dismissed that thought for… I had better block our door tonight.

  I shivered and finished my roll. "What else did they say?"

  "The older tall one, who just shook his head, said 'it's a damn shame…'"

  Great, they were talking about the end of me again.

  "Says that he'd like to have a little of that before you disappear," she continued, and I started choking that time. I had just inhaled a large chunk of bread.

  "Stop it." I wheezed. "Stop listening."

  "No," Bella said. "He says your ass is sweet like…."

  I put my hands over my ears at that point and sent her a glare. She was smiling and stuck her tongue out at me. What can I say; we were both mature beyond our years.

  "Now they are talking about football…or soccer I guess," she said as she pulled my hands off my ears. "So, did we get it all?"

  "I think so." I looked around and wondered where the stairwell was. I hadn't seen a stairwell yet. There had to be a stairwell.

  I waved my hand at the men and watched Frenchy hike up his black trousers and head my way.

  “Do you think we could take a walk…I mean, just around the hotel? I feel like I ate way too much and I don't want to get fat." I batted my eyelashes.

  He grinned and gave me a thorough inspection before shaking his head and whistling.

  I suppressed the urge to ram my fork into his thigh and smiled
sweetly. "Pretty please?"

  He looked over at his counterparts, shrugged, said a few choice words in French and extended his hand.

  For a second I thought he was just going to hold my hand, but no. He handcuffed me and then did the same to Bella. This time we each had our own pair and they then shackled us with our hands behind our backs. I think he just did it to get a better look at my rack. But what do I know?

  We passed three more signs and I saw Bella's brows scrunch together as she translated the more difficult one in her head. I counted the steps back to the elevator and then counted how long it took to go down one floor. It was almost forty-five seconds later that the door re-opened and we stepped onto the second floor. Forty-three steps later, we were back at our room. I paused and looked up and down the hall before stepping inside. Once we were inside, he took the cuffs off, gave me a wink and was gone.

  I barfed up my dinner, and then barricaded the door with the dresser.

  Chapter Ten

  The next morning I felt much better. I had survived the night without being violated by Frenchy. I pushed the dresser back into normal position then I pulled the map out from under the mattress and went to work. My coffee and Annabelle's orange juice arrived at eight on the dot. Bifocal Man was back. The bags under his eyes weren't as pronounced, so he probably had gotten some sleep on his night off.

  I glared fiercely at him when he slunk back out the door and then finished with my work.

  "Stairwell was where again?"

  "I think you said twenty three paces past the elevator." Bella sat up and helped me with the details.

  "Thanks," I said with a genuine smile, and then held her hand tightly. "I want you to promise me that if something happens to me, you will just run. Run like you've never run before and get the hell out. Don't look back." I squeezed her hand. "Promise me."

  All she did was nod. What more could she say? She was a kid for Christ's sake, and this wasn't going to be easy. I knew she was going to have to see blood. She was possibly going to witness me killing someone and I feared that things between us would never again be the same.

  "And don't look."

  "What do you mean?"

  "Close your eyes."

  "How can I run and close my eyes at the same time?" She almost sounded like her usual self. Snotty and pretentious and well—like a twelve-year-old.

  "Never mind, just stay put like we practiced and then run if something bad happens."

  "O-kay!"

  I took a long shower and reined in the surge of adrenaline that was causing my limbs to shake violently. I put on my khaki shorts, blue tank top, and didn't bother with my hair.

  "Let's go over it again," I demanded once we were both dressed. "What is the cue?"

  "You are going to tuck your hair behind your ear and then I'm going to pass out."

  "Okay, show me again."

  Bella did her best dramatic performance and fell backwards onto the bed.

  "Now, there isn't going to be a bed and I don't want you to give yourself a concussion, so be careful when you fall onto the floor. Go down smoothly, but roll your eyes back like this."

  I did my best imitation of myself passing out and Bella laughed.

  "You did that in the airplane…in Kenya. It was gross."

  I rolled my eyes and grinned to keep the mood light. "Okay, so when you are down on the ground, what do you do next?"

  "I keep my eyes shut the whole time."

  "I'll do the rest and don't be scared."

  "Do I get a gun?"

  My head snapped around so fast I got the spins.

  "What?"

  "Do I get a gun? I could help you."

  "No, you don't get a gun."

  ***

  Breakfast that morning consisted of scrambled eggs with green onions, sausage patties and English muffins. I looked around the room and to my surprise; only two men were stationed nearby, sipping on lattes and laughing.

  "I love you," I said to Bella as I finished my juice. "I really do."

  "I love you, too," she said without a smile, because there wasn't much to smile about that morning. We were about to go up against impossible odds and neither of us particularly wanted to.

  "S.A.M.," I said with a sappy grin. "It stands for Secret Agent Man."

  "I knew it." She giggled helplessly.

  Two minutes later, Bella stood up and dramatically said she didn't feel good. I stood up with a gasp, knocking my chair over in the process. I saw both men approaching us from the corner of my eye, so I tucked my hair behind my ear and Bella gave an award winning performance if I do say so myself. She went down with a thud and had her eyes rolling back into her head.

  I was proud.

  I was also quick. Bifocal Man was the first to lean over her body and when he did, I pulled the gun from his hip and took a couple steps back.

  "Drop it," I said to the tall French guy and leveled the gun on his chest.

  He hesitated, looked around for help and then did what I told him to do. The gun dropped from his grasp and I demanded that he kick it to me. He did and I kept my gun trained on him while I picked it up.

  Bifocal Man was speechless and trembling. He started muttering something in dumb-shit. Bella perked up and moved away from him.

  "What's he saying?"

  "Something about you not knowing what the hell you are doing."

  "Oh yeah?" I wanted to blow his head off, but I didn't want to get blood on Bella, so I moved back and glanced around before I made a move for the door.

  I should have known that I wouldn't be lucky enough to get away with such a diabolical plan. I grabbed Bella's hand, moved back three or four steps and felt a shooting pain in my lower back.

  It all went black after that.

  ***

  Under ordinary circumstances, waking up alone in bed, face down in a puddle of my own drool didn't bother me, but when I woke up and all I heard was the dripping faucet in the bathroom, I was mortified. The pain in my lower back was unbearable. It felt as if a heavy-weight boxer had punched me in the kidney. My face also hurt; mostly my left upper cheek. I couldn't move my hands for some reason and I could taste blood.

  That's never a good sign, but I was alive, at least for the time being. I struggled to sit up and when I realized they had cuffed my hands tightly behind my back, I rolled a couple of times until I fell off the bed. I lay there, cried for a couple of minutes, then cussed, and screamed at God. For the first time in my life, I actually considered myself lucky. At that very moment, I considered myself lucky just to be alive. The moment didn't last long but it was nice while it lasted.

  I knew I wasn't in my old room because the horrible floral wallpaper was different and the chenille bedspread was brown instead of white. I screamed out for Bella, but she didn't answer. This was it. The beginning of the end. I just wanted the pain to go away.

  I got myself together and made it into the bathroom. It looked as if someone had beat up my face pretty badly. I guessed no one had told the French that they weren't supposed to hit women. Not that it mattered. I didn't think good manners even mattered at that stage in the game. My nose had been bloodied but all that was left was a couple dark lines of dried blood on my upper lip. My left eye had a monster bruise around it, and I felt as if I was back in the Army again.

  I really couldn't move around much with my hands the way they were. So I laid down on the floor, did a couple of jiggles, heard a popping sound in my elbow that reminded me that I wasn't twenty anymore and then I finally rolled my butt over my handcuffed hands and ended up with my hands in front of my body. Much better.

  I cleaned myself up the best I could and sat down on the bed because my head throbbed and I had the spins. I had never been tranqued before, but I assumed that was what had happened to me because I felt hung over and miserable.

  They foiled my plan and Bella was God knows where. I flipped my wrist and looked at the time.

  "That can't be." I shook my wrist to make sure it was worki
ng. My watch said eleven thirty and that meant that I had been out either for half an hour, or twenty-four-and-a- half hours. I believed the latter because I was stiff and sore and my bruises looked a day old at least.

  At that point, I lost all control and started screaming. I didn't think about the pain that my body would be in the next day because I would be dead according to what we overheard at lunch two days before, so I rammed my shoulder against the door over and over again until I collapsed on the floor. No one can fully understand what goes through a person's mind when she thinks she is going to die, but I had new appreciation for my life.

  My knees were shaking; I had splinters in my butt and a gnawing morbid feeling in my gut. Unlucky wasn't the word that I would use to describe myself anymore. It would be more fitting to say that I have a curse. Cursed is a good word for me. The tears fell as I laid my head on the hardwood floor and thought about Bella. I'd never felt such a protective feeling for anyone in my life. It was odd. I guess it's because I'm the youngest, so I never had anyone to watch over when I was a kid. Both my brothers did a good job of watching over me. I think Josh was a bit more over-protective than Dave was because Dave told his archrival that he could invite me to the prom. What kind of shit was that? I think Dave had a sick sense of humor and thought it would be funny to watch me beat up the prick when he tried something on the dance floor. I was a bit smarter than that and told the guy to go to hell the day he asked me. I skipped all the proms. I did take my best friend Alan to Sadie Hawkins three years in a row, but no one ever asked me to go to formal affairs.

  I started thinking about Bella again and I really wanted her to be okay. It sickened me to think that some twisted fascist politician was using her to make things go his way. I assumed that was what was going on anyway. I still had no idea and right then it didn't matter. I needed to get up, brush myself off and get the heck out of there before they came for me.

  I made it into a sitting position before I heard two sets of footsteps approaching my door. Come hell or high water, I was not going down without a fight, so I quickly scrambled to my feet and stood up behind the door. Whoever they were, they were going to get a heck of a surprise when they came in.