I Won't Let You Die Angel (7 page)

The hall was filled with
several armed men. Someone was sitting at the bar. As the butler moved from my line
of sight, I felt the shock of my life, like the universal gravitational constant
had suddenly become zero. My legs felt weak and it took all of my willpower not
to crumple down right on the spot.

The man sitting in front
of us was the man of my most absolute terror. Every day, I pray to God never to
cross paths again with him. It’d been years, but the passing years could not mess
with my memory of his six foot tall physique, black eyes, muscular body, and devil
face. He shot up from his seat with a ruthless smile plastered on his face and stepped
towards us; his every step, making me nauseous, crushing the air out of my lungs.

Neil must have sensed the
change in my posture, because he put his hand on my shoulder, maybe to reassure
me. But I had no strength left even to look towards him. I was losing it, my knees
buckled, and Neil caught me by the shoulders to keep me from tottering.

 I felt a revulsion so strong
that every nerve in my body urged me to flee from the agony of this person’s presence.
He sauntered towards us like a cobra waiting for its ultimate attack. He stopped
a few paces away from us and looked straight into my eyes.

“Hello, sister dear! Missed
me??”

“Your work here is done
Neil. You may leave.”

Neil stiffened beside me.
His hands were still on my shoulders, supporting me. It might seem hypocritical,
but it was Neil’s presence only that gave me assurance that I could do this, that
I could even face my so-called
brother
.

“You are not the one who
assigned this to me. So,
you
won’t be the one who gets the girl”, replied
Neil in a completely professional way, like I was some valuable package to deliver.
Well, I was! I almost forgot that. No, not to him; god can’t be this cruel.

“Neil Neil!! You are as
stubborn as you are known to be in the underworld. But let me introduce myself first.”
He grinned and extended his hand. “I am
Storm
. You must have heard of me.
Your godparents are a little fond of me.”

Neil ignored the extended
hand and snorted, “I don’t care about your reputation in the underworld,
Storm,
but
you
must be acquainted with mine, that I don’t deliver to pawns. The
deal will be sealed either in the presence of
Majestic
or this girl will
be marked as my property.”

I didn’t like the sound
of being someone’s property, but if being Neil’s property could save me from this
horrible person, I would gladly give myself to him. He might be my kidnapper, but
some tiny part of me was not as afraid of him as I should be. I felt safe with him.
I felt drawn to him. Neil’s presence was keeping me sane. If it were not for him,
I’d have sunk in my own sweat.

Now, I can openly call myself
a hypocrite. Go figure. His blatant innuendo clearly made Storm flinch. He must
be an important figure to take this in stride. Storm took out something from his
breast pocket, a sort of a visiting card, and threw it in Neil’s face. I flinched.
Neil now looked outraged. He let go of me, shortening my reprieve, and picked up
the card vindictively.

“See! Majestic’s seal. If
you are as prudent as you are known to be, you must know what it means. Right? So…
I’ll say this again. Your work here is done. Leave the girl in my custody and vanish
before I treat myself with your head for defying our collusion; and, I daresay,
I’ll enjoy it very much.”

For a moment, I thought
Neil was going to punch him, or definitely wanted to, but then he clenched his fist
and let out a ragged breath. Anger radiated through him, malice clear in his eyes,
but he said nothing.

Slowly and reluctantly,
he pried my fingers away from the hem of his jacket, which I just realized I was
gripping, and stepped back. I watched his retreat with the utmost horror.

“Neil….. What?? …. Please…….
Don’t…” I could not shape a sentence. I was terrified beyond measure. I wanted to
tell him not to leave me here. I wanted to go to him, wanted him to keep me safe
in his embrace, wanted to hold his hand for assurance. I silently begged him, channeling
all the fear and sorrow in my eyes not to abandon me to the mercy of the person
who’d made once my life hell.

Tears threatened to come
out. “Neil, please don’t leave me here. Please…. I’ll do anything you say. Just
take me away from here. I won’t ask for freedom, I promise. I won’t irritate you
by talking about science and my passion; I’ll never ask for the right sized clothes,
I’ll even forsake my habit of caffeine. Please, I’ll be your slave.” My voice choked,
dread kept my legs fixed in place.

Something flickered in Neil’s
eyes, maybe compassion, maybe something else. I started towards him; before I could
even walk two paces, I was jerked backwards, Storm’s hand tightening on my arms.

Neil raised his foot to
come forward, but stopped himself. All around us, guards pointed their big guns
in Neil’s direction. Even both Neil and I together couldn’t take all of them on
and I was in no condition to fight. My emotional barrier caused my brain to
cease working and as well as the skills I had learned to use in such situations.

“Now, this is really touching
and all. You two definitely qualify for an opera, but I don’t have time for this.
You better leave, Neil, or I’ll have to call in some of my friends, which I guess
won’t do any good to your eminent reputation.”

Neil did not budge. He was
still looking at me intensely, his eyes speaking volumes.

“Get your arse out of my
house right NOW or do you want to make an irrevocable enemy in the name of
Majestic
”,
threatened Storm.

Neil waggled his legs slowly
for a few moments, looked around and counting the number of guards. He then stormed
out of the room without even a glance towards me. I struggled hopelessly, and Storm
subdued me easily.

“Give it a rest, sister
dear, you can’t possibly think to escape me forever, can you?” His mouth was now
dangerously close to my ears. Aggregating all the strength I had left, I wrenched
out of his grasp and scooted as far away from him as I could.

“Did I say something to
offend you, sweetheart? Oh, please, we have met after so many years, I deserve a
proper reunion, don’t I?” He chuckled at his joke.

“You have surpassed every
stage of being disgusting, Sam.” I spat furiously.

My words didn’t even earn
as much as a frown from him. “Whatever you say,
sis
. I bet your intelligent
boyfriend did not make much of a pleasant date, did he? I assure you, I have much
in store.”

“I’m NOT your sister. Stop
slandering the relationship between a brother and a sister. And I don’t know what
boyfriend you are talking…” then it hit me. Kevin!!!

He must be talking about
Kevin because of the intelligent comment, but he was not close to being my boyfriend.
I stared at him, confusion brimming in my mind. “You know about Kevin?”

“You had a huge crush on
that wannabe young scientist, right? So I granted your wish and made him ask you
out although he wanted some other Barbie doll. This is what a good brother does.
You clearly have no appreciation of the good deeds I do for you.” He made a sincere
face that I hated at the moment.

Barbie doll. I hated the
fact that he had the same sense of humor about people as I do. “Made him? What did
you make him do?” What was he talking about?

He was in his own train
of speech. “You never know the kind of power you get in the underworld, even hypnotizing
a 19 year-old boy. I daresay, it was real fun messing up that guy’s mind.”

I was speechless. “You…..
You… hypnotized him…. Why?” I stared in horror. This was no revenge
reunion
from Storm. It was something big. He had not just abducted me for his amusement
to make my life a living hell. He wanted something else from me, something that
was not personal, something I had no idea of.
Majestic,
that was the word
both Sam and Neil used.

“What do you want from me,
Sam? And what is
Majestic
?”

“Not
what
, sis;
who
.
You have no idea what our mother dragged you into, do you? I won’t blame you, but
I will specially thank mother for this involuntary favor she did for me.”

I must be drowsy because
each word was passing over my head. “Mom!!! What does mom have to do with all this?”
I asked, totally bewildered now.

He took my hands. I flinched
and pulled away. “All right, you want me to go straight to business.” He traced
the hollow of my throat despite my protests. “Where is the pendant mom so lovingly
gifted you? I don’t see it here.”

I was more confused now.
I didn’t know what he wanted with my turquoise necklace but I was so not going to
give it to him. While small inner voice told me to give him my pendant and run away,
my conscious mind warned me that I was helpless here. If I gave him what he wanted,
then he would inflict all sorts of brutalities on me, I had no doubt of that. And
judging from the amount of armed men milling about, I was sure that the words spoken
during our little battle in Disneyland had reached here.

“It’s in the cupboard at
the Professor Collins’s house.” I replied blandly.

He curled his fist strongly
in my hair. An unwanted yelp escaped my lips. “Did that hurt? It will hurt more
and you know what I’m capable of doing to you. Stop bitching around and tell me
where it is?”

“I told you. It’s in my
cupboard.” I whispered, managing to keep myself from whimpering.

He pushed me sideways like
some ragged piece of furniture, and unable to control my momentum (according to
conservation of momentum theory), I collided with a nearby recliner. It took a few
moments before I could steady myself. I rubbed my head where a mild concussion
had occurred.

Sam was looking infuriated.
“Do you think of me as a fool? Jon trashed the whole place and could not find the
pendant. That stupid girl also refused to talk about it.”

It was like I was suddenly
on a plane and the air pressure become dangerously low.

“You… you were behind all
that. You attacked Nicole.” And she refused to talk about it. She knew I was wearing
the pendant that evening and she still didn’t tell the attacker. She took the entire
blow and tried her best to keep me away from harm. My love and respect for her just
reached
x
to the power infinity. Thinking about her now made my heart ache.

“Oh lord, I forgot, you
are so impertinent. Yes, my dear, I hypnotized your little scientist-in-the-making
so that you would be out of the picture during the ransacking. But unfortunately,
you attract trouble and so you took the pendant with you and we had to hire Neil
to do the honors.”

He cracked his knuckles
and his voice grew more raucous, “So, let’s do this again.” He unsheathed his gun
and pointed it at my head. “Where is the pendant?”

“You won’t shoot me.”

“Why, sweetheart? You can’t
really think I still crave for your attention?”

“You’re despicable. And
yeah, I lost your precious pendant.” I spat in pure hatred.

He pulled the trigger and
if not for my quick reflexes, there’d have been a hole in my cerebrum. I stared
at him, shocked. I knew that he hated my guts, but never in my worst nightmares
had I imagined he’d not even give a second thought to murdering me.

He threw the gun in perfect
projectile motion with an initial velocity approximately equal to fifty km per hour
on the wall beside me that made me flinch instinctively away.

“You lost it!!! You bitch!
How could lose it?” He caught my arms so strongly that his nails dug in. I yelped
but refused to surrender.

“What’s so special about
that pendant? What do you want from it?”

He increased the pressure
on my arms and pain flooded past the tolerable barrier. “You dare question me after
the catastrophe you caused? You have no idea what you have brought on yourself?”

Channeling all my leftover
strength, I pushed his hands away. “If that was so crucial for your big plans, why
didn’t you ask for it from Mom? I’m sure she’d have done whatever you said, gladly.”

“Oh, I infiltrated that
pendant into her house for safe-keeping, but the stupid crazy bitch gifted it to
you
.”

“She’s our mother, watch
your tongue. At least that much humanity must be intact in you. Or are you beyond
any redemption?”

He groaned, “She’s your
mother, not mine, she never had been.”

I was dumbfounded. How could
he say that when all Mom had ever cared about was his well-being? She resented it,
but she had always loved her son, no matter what.

He sighed desperately, and
before I could register what was happening, he slapped me so hard that I half crumbled
to the ground. My cheek burned and tears finally broke the dam of self-restraint
and flowed precipitously.

“You better not be lying,
sister dear, or the punishment will be much, much harsher than this.” He grabbed
my hair and thrust me towards one of his men. “Take her to the distress room. Do
whatever you wanna do, but torture the truth out of her.”

His men looked reluctant.
One of them spoke, “But Storm, she’s your ….”

Sam’s animalistic look slapped
the man’s mouth shut. “She’s what? Family? Huh!
Majestic
is my only family.
Got it?” The man nodded violently. Two of them grasped me from either side and literally
dragged me along. We were almost past a wooden door when Sam’s next instruction
blasted the last bit of sanity I had preserved.

“And yeah, change the venue
to the pool area. I bet you’ll enjoy torturing her there.”