The Dimple Strikes Back (30 page)

All in all, I came to consider my brief flirtation with
People
magazine’s third sexiest man alive a solid win. We’d agreed to be terribly flirty during the eventual press junket when the movie opened. JenX approved of this plan, saying “So, speculation. Sexy, right?”

Filming finished, and I think it’ll be a damn funny movie that also makes a statement about the current state of financial hardship for the ninety-nine per cent the world over. I’d come from the ranks of the plebes, and hoped I represented us well.

Sam’s hands now began to wander around the lip of my bikini bottoms, and I don’t know if it was the freedom, the heat or the complete inappropriateness of his actions in semi-public, but I lowered my sunglasses and said, “Wanna go back to the bungalow?”

He grabbed my hand and yanked me up to standing faster than you can say, “beach boner.”

We’d rented a bungalow of such beauty, we now fantasised constantly of moving to Hawaii. Everyone probably does that while under the influence of a warm ocean, spectacular views and Mai Tais. Funny thing was—we could. We could do anything. I was a lady of some means now, and Sam…

When Sam finally laid his cards on the table and was honest about his financial portfolio, my eyes goggled at all the zeroes. Yes, it was ill-got. Yes, I felt guilty. But at least we’d helped put Shelley behind bars. And we were going to set up a charitable foundation to give away bunches of it.

Sam might even consult for different governments from time to time when a big art theft went down. They reserved the right to use him in exchange for him not being locked in solitary.

Whoops—not Sam. My darling was officially in witness protection, which meant he would not be able to appear in public with me until all the baddies after him were caught. His full name, forevermore? Zachary Samuel Ballitch. Pronounced Bale-itch. Uh-huh. Sure.

The Feds definitely got the last laugh. I had only to call Sam “Mr Ball Itch” when pissed at him to receive the Hulk in response.

Today, I harboured no ill feelings for my sexy, sun-kissed man. The glow he gave me melted my bones, and also my underwear. What can I say? He’s got a good butt for brief swimming trunks. We ran, hand in hand, up the private beach and straight to our bedroom’s sliding glass door, like a couple in a movie, except only doing one take. He unlocked the door, and I grabbed his arm to yank him to the bed. We tumbled, laughing, onto the palm-frond pattered comforter.

My cell phone rang.

“Urgh,” said Sam.

Since I was still a witness in an investigation, I was forced to at least check the caller ID. I leaned over the bed and fished it out of my bag to glance at the face. “My mother,” I muttered. I dropped it back from whence it came.

He hitched his fingers into my bikini bottoms and started to yank. “Don’t say that word when I’m about to—”

“Please don’t. I just ate lunch,” said a saccharine voice.

I screamed and fell off the bed. In response, Valerie giggled. Like a politician who can’t seem to stop texting dick pics, she was back.
Again!

She held up a gun, which stopped Sam mid-lunge. Her pistol contrasted sharply with her 50s housewife dress drenched in shades of pink and yellow. She looked like a very special episode of
I Love Loony
.

Valerie stood in the doorway between the bedroom and the rest of the cottage—she’d been lurking in our bungalow for who knows how long. Her eyes sent daggers in Sam’s direction. “You said you weren’t dropping a dime of any of your co-criminals. Only on the buyers.”

He hurried to his feet and moved in front of me. “That was before you came after her. All bets were off after that, and you knew it. This innocent act is wearing really fucking thin, Val.”

“What do you expect? Parading around with that?” She pointed. I was “that.” “You think nobody’s going to notice? In the old days, you’d have leapt at the chance to pull off something like the Mold gold cape. You took pride in your work.”

Sam made an exasperated noise. “I can’t do this forever, Val. You get older. You get slow. You get caught.” He put his hands on his hips. “I don’t want to rot in a jail for the rest of my life.”

“Neither do I!”

“And I never was okay with hurting people. That’s why I left you in the first place.”

She seethed, her hand flexing on the gun. The initial shock had worn off, and anger stiffened my muscles. Valerie and Sam continued debating, but I could hardly hear over the roar of blood in my ears. I didn’t give a shit what she said, anyhow.

I was done being screwed with by June Cleaver.

I stayed crouched behind Sam and tried to put a scared look on my face, but I was moving beyond fear, into a dark and angry place that made my heart pound and my vision tinge red. Against the wall, just beyond my reach, leaned a fishing pole. I’d asked Sam to move the wet thing out of the bedroom to no avail, and I’d been too lazy to do it myself.

But now… I thought I’d go fishing for some evil ex-girlfriend.

I darted out from behind Sam and launched myself towards the pole. Movement began above me. I concentrated on grabbing the handle while I slammed into the wall with my back. With a mighty, screaming heave, I flicked the tip towards Valerie. The hook launched into the air. She screamed and reared back. The gun went off.

Sam yelled and hit the floor.

“No!” I ignored Valerie and crawled furiously to Sam, rolling and clutching his side.

I pried his hand off the wound, and he began hollering a string of curses the likes of which are still floating in the atmosphere, sullying everything they hit. A huge chunk of his flesh had been torn and burned away, but there was no actual hole. More of a giant trench. A bleeding, blackened trench. I hugged him in joy, and he sagged against the carpet. “Don’t fucking squeeze it!”

Oops, right.

My brain stepped away from the edge of panic, and I remembered that Valerie was still at large, and about five feet away from us. She’d sat up, blood pouring from her forehead. With a short scream, she fished out the spangly green hook. I’d hooked her in the face!

In.

The.

Face!

I pointed and said, “Awesome!”

She didn’t appreciate that at all.

She dropped to her hands and knees and started for the gun, which she got to just ahead of me. I punched her in the throat, and she doubled over, still clutching the weapon. We grappled for it. She made choking noises, still disoriented, but had about ten inches and quite a few pounds on me. I was quickly losing the fight when Sam jumped into the fray. The gun dropped to the floor.

A couple of guys pulled the drapes aside and ran into the room through the open sliding glass doors. I heard, “Is everyone okay?”

Valerie kicked Sam in his wounded side, and he crumpled like a demolished building. She bolted past our would-be helpers, taking the gun with her.

The two surfer dudes gaped open-mouthed at what they saw. Sam croaked, “Call nine-one-one.”

I stumbled to the corner where my running shoes were. Sam followed me with his eyes and gasped, “Don’t you dare!”

“I will dare. That woman needs to learn that you
do not fuck
with Samantha Lytton!”

The other guy asked, “Is that Michelle Williams?”

“That hair does nothing for her,” said the first.

I bolted through the open door and down the concrete path. I revelled in every bit of blood splatter I found—first on the path, then in the grass. I spotted her ahead of me, and I burst into more speed. Folks were jumping out of her way, probably because her face was covered in blood like freaking Carrie, and because she waved a gun. She possessed longer legs than mine, but I had on the proper shoes. She couldn’t run in five-inch heels. See? That’s why no adventure heroine in the world should ever wear high heels!

She tripped on a kerb leading into the street and splatted, her crinoline flying like a be-ribboned tumbleweed. I jumped atop her and grabbed her wrist to keep the gun pointed away from me. She spat at me—it landed on my chest.

Now I was double extra pissed.

I stepped on her gun hand, pulled back one fist and yelled, “Don’t you know who I
am
?” That punch to her stupid face was even better than the one I’d delivered to Shelley. My hand hurt like blazes, my fingers feeling like they would pop off, but I just did not care.

My satisfaction was brief. She came up, fast, and head-butted me. A burning agony flashed from my forehead to my face and I fell backward off her. I scrambled to my feet, my brains reeling, but she delivered a kick to my stomach, and I spiralled and slid into the asphalt street.

Pain seared across my side, my arm, my leg. A car screeched to a halt close to my head. The toxic exhaust seared my nose and eyes. Everything went topsy-turvy and I scrambled to move past the screaming spasms in my body so that I could stand. I crawled to my knees. She was on her knees, too, still holding the gun in one limp hand, her head in the other.

Finally, I regained my balance and got into a defensive crouch. She peered at me through terrifying, dripping red eyes. Her mouth split into a smile and she giggled. That’s the last thing I heard before the explosion of the gun.

I felt punched in the gut by a demon the size of Iowa. I flew sideways and smacked into the roadway, my head bouncing on unforgiving spikes of pavement. The sunlight blinded me, and people were screaming. I couldn’t move my left arm. But I knew it was still there. A terrible pain unlike anything I’ve ever known exploded across my chest.

I’m dying,
I thought.
I’m dying, and people are taking cell phone pictures of it.

A woman dropped beside me and started talking. I caught bits and pieces. “Gun.” “Ambulance.” “Sherlock Holmes lady.” The woman yanked the cardigan from around her waist and pressed it to my body. “You’re hit in the shoulder,” she yelled. “I’m a nurse. Stay awake, you’ll be all right.”

The sun made spots of my vision. Her face floated above me, shining and kind.

“Samantha!” I heard Sam before I saw him. He came down on the other side of me.

My nurse said, “Shit, this one’s bleeding, too. What the hell is going on with you people?”

“I don’t know,” I whispered. “His dimple got me in trouble.”

Someone said, “We tied up the woman with the gun.” Applause broke out. Camera phones clacked and snapped. The ambulance came screeching up.

And that is how you use a motherfucking fishing pole to foil the villain. FYI—I recommend a more straightforward method. My way hurts like a son of a bitch.

* * * *

Make a sex tape. That’s how you should rise to fame the easy way. I was being accused of being a publicity whore by some in the press, and it stung, but not more than my recovery from surgery did. No matter what you do, never hump an art thief to get ahead.

Only hump an art thief out of love.

I enjoyed my time recovering from my gunshot wound—so metal!—to the shoulder. Well, as much as one can. They gave me good pills and great doctors, and I was holed up in a different Maui bungalow having Sam wait on me hand and boob. I’d donated a huge chunk of money to the cancer charity of choice on behalf the wonderful local nurse who’d leapt into action to save me. Damn, it was the least I could do.

Local youths had wrestled Valerie to the ground after she shot me, and
ha ha fucking ha
she was finally in jail! Every time I thought about her in prison, sipping toilet wine with flat hair, I grinned and sang “Xanadu.” Every time I did that, Sam begged me to stop.

Poor Sam. He currently limped around the bungalow trying to make me a sandwich. He kept running into doorways and tripping on nothing because of his eye, and it’s my fault. See, I’m a witch whose dreams come true, because when I woke up after surgery, Sam greeted me with an eye patch on. Some of the helpful local youths had thought
he’d
attacked me, too, and enthusiastically put a beatdown on him, including throwing a heap of gravel in his eyeball. I’d turned him into an actual pirate, albeit temporarily. He didn’t help himself by carrying Captain Taco around on his shoulder a lot, but at least the fiendish feline couldn’t talk.

Sam set a laptop on the table in front of my couch. “A new video of your fight with Valerie has sold to the press. The best one yet.” He quirked one eyebrow, which really made him appear piratical. Super hot. “The post is called ‘Actual Charlie’s Angel Samantha Lytton Captures Criminal Wearing Itsy Bitsy Bikini’. Wanna see?”

I hid my face in my hands. “Do I want to?”

He sat down next to me gingerly. “It’s amazing.” He sighed. “I love you. You’re crazy, but I love you.”

“She shot you! The woman needed to get told.”

“Okay, okay, calm yourself. You’ll bust a staple. Watch.”

He clicked play, and I materialised into view. The camera person had caught the last moment of me chasing Valerie, and her tripping into the street. I launched myself at her like a pro-wrestler woman. “Whoa!”

“Body slam!” Sam pumped both fists in glee.

We wrestled. I punched her. It looked totally badass. Although thank goodness my embarrassing ‘catch phrase’ wasn’t picked up by the audio. It had felt good at the time, however. She kicked me, and I splatted into the street. My torn-up skin hurt even now to watch it—half my body was raw and scabby from asphalt burn. “Oh, shit, no,” I moaned.