“You don’t look like a killer.” Dizziness threatened to black out everything.You’re losing it. Pull yourself together.
“See, that’s what I always thought. I was a medic in the Iraq. I had a gun, but I seldom fired it. Hated the idea of killing someone. Even a haji.”
“So, you’re not going to kill me?”
“Nope. I need to figure out what to do with you, though.”
“But you told Scarlett you would kill me.”
“You heard that.” He rubbed his hand on the back of his neck through his scraggly hair. The man was definitely fighting some moral dilemma. At least, I hoped he was. That might be my only hope of escaping certain death.
“Yes. I heard that.” I scooted back on the futon as far as I could, as if cringing. “You could just let me go.”
He turned his back on me and stepped to the desk. After removing a small case from his inner suit pocket, he laid it down on the desk. He pulled a syringe and a vial from the case and began filling the syringe.
“I did tell the pretty red head I would kill you. And she’s going to pay me a lot of money.” He flicked the syringe with his finger, forcing air bubbles to the top, which he ejected with a push of the plunger. A tiny amount of liquid dripped out of the end of the needle.
“What’s that?
“Just some morphine. It will help you sleep so I can move you.”
“Move me where?” Fear surged through me.
“Someplace where I can…”
“Look, you don’t want to do this. You’re not a killer. You said so.” The words rushed out of me like water spilled from a glass.
“I spent four years in Iraq. I spent more time patching up soldiers, many of them bleeding out faster than I could plug holes. My job was to keep them alive. Half the time I didn’t. The last two years were with Lieutenant Baxter. He saved my nuts more times than I can count.”
“And yet, you killed him. Today. You injected him with… that.” I gestured to the syringe in his hands.
“Morphine? Yeah. A wonder drug, really. The right dosage can relieve pain, put you to sleep, make you feel wonderful.” He glanced from me to the syringe and back to me.
“And the wrong dosage kills you?”
“You’re pretty smart.”
He strode towards me, syringe in hand.
“Which is that?” I tried to push myself through the back of the futon—through the wall behind it, but I couldn’t get any farther away from him.
“This is just a dose that will put you to sleep. It feels fantastic. Amazing, really. You’re going to love it.” He approached me with syringe in hand like some villain in a Bond film.
When he stood directly over me, I kicked him in the groin with the leg that had been hiding the unlocked cuff. It hit solidly in his lower belly, forcing him to exhale with a loud grunt. He bent over at the waist but didn’t drop. I kicked again and connected with his crotch.
He dropped like a stone and dropped his syringe. It slid under the futon.
I jumped off the couch and searched for the syringe. It had slid so far under that I had to drop to the floor to reach it. I probably should have run, but I didn’t want him chasing me with the morphine.
I reached and just couldn’t grab it. Scooting forward under the futon, I grasped it and crawled backwards.
Suddenly, a hand grasped my hair and pulled my head back. I hid the hand holding the syringe behind my back.
“Fucking bitch!” He stood and pulled me up with him. We faced each other and his anger caused his face to turn various shades of red.
“I was going to give you just enough to put you to sleep, but now…”
I positioned the syringe in my hand and then slammed it into his neck. I plunged the morphine into his neck as he staggered back and away from me. The syringe pulled loose from his neck, and the rest of the morphine squirted out as I continued to press on the plunger.
