Page 4 of Playing With Danger

No Valentine.

Movement to my right caught my attention. I turned from the checkout area and my breath caught in my lungs. The rest happened fast. Too fast. I caught a man tugging down a black mask and he caught me staring. For a long moment our eyes stayed connected. A moment that would prove to be a mistake. I scurried back, the now-masked-man lunged. He reached down, grabbed a handful of hair, and yanked me to my feet.

Pain, sharp and swift, radiated from my scalp down to my neck, making me cry out. And with that the strangest thing happened—it was like I woke up.

Not in the sense I suddenly realized I was about to become a hostage in a robbery.

It woke me up—full stop.

With bright blinding clarity my narrow life came into focus. My whole life I played it safe. I made lists. I went about my day checking off the things I’d accomplished but none of them were worth much. I didn’t venture outside of my comfort zone. I didn’t take chances. I set goals that were easily attainable instead of dreaming of the impossible. For God sakes, I bought the same brand of spaghetti noodles because why bother trying something new. I was stuck and had been for years, maybe all my life. I hated my job but stayed. I told myself that was what adults did. Further, I lied to myself and gave myself a gold star for toughing out a shit situation because that made me someone with a good work ethic. I had one real friend; the others were leftovers from a time in my life when I put up with mean girl gossip and catty behavior because having someone meant I didn’t have anyone.

My life was going nowhere, but that didn’t mean I didn’t want to continue to live it.

That was what likely made me snap.

I didn’t want to die.

With a rebel yell and my nails bared, I attacked. I scratched and kicked and thrashed until me and the masked man were on the floor with the endcap full of buckets of margarita mix on top of us. The black knit cap was askew so I clawed the side of his face. My knee was close to his groin so I jacked it upward as hard as I could. Unfortunately some of the buckets broke open. I slipped around in sticky, sugary syrup. I ignored the sharp stabbing pain digging into my side and enjoyed the would-be hostage-taker’s howl of pain.

That was as far as I got before a pair of hands went under my armpits and hauled me off the hair-pulling asshole who wanted to use me as a real-life shield. I hadn’t lifted my eyes from the man now cupping his gonads when a pair of black boots blocked the view of my handiwork.

The rest happened as fast as it had started. Valentine rolled the robber to his stomach, yanked his arms behind his back, and pinned him face down on the sticky lime-coated linoleum—or was it lime-coated laminate? Either way the man wasn’t moving. Neither did Valentine, except to turn his head and give me a full-body scan, which made me want to shiver under his heated gaze.

“You’re bleeding,” he gruffly noted.

Against my better judgement I glanced down at my shirt. Sure enough the peach blouse was stained red.

The roaring in my ears started first. The whooshing in my belly that always accompanied the unfortunate soundtrack in my head that told me I was going down started next.

Christ on a cracker.

Not now.

“Told you red wasn’t my color.”

Then it was lights out.

2

Who knew an attempted robbery and a kid throwing firecrackers at a liquor store clerk would be such a time suck?

Okay, so, maybe the long slice that nicked the side of my boob and traveled down my side six inches also took some time to be looked at, cleaned, and bandaged by paramedics. Or I should say, one paramedic called Delilah. She was sweet, but I figured that was an act since she turned into the devil when she figured out that contrary to her best efforts to get me to go to the hospital, I wasn’t going to waste the rest of my afternoon that would bleed into my evening sitting in the waiting room of the ER. I think she purposefully used more alcohol swabs than necessary to clean my cut—that thankfully wasn’t deep, just long and bleeding like a son of a bitch. She had grimaced and apologized when the germ-killing solution burned its way down to my soul, causing the sting to bring tears to my eyes. So maybe she wasn’t the devil, just thorough even though she was unhappy I’d refused her advice.

Whoever said getting cut by a shard of plastic didn’t hurt just as bad as being sliced by glass had obviously never been stabbed by a party bucket before. Stabbed might’ve been a little dramatic, but it was the story I was sticking with. God knows my life being as boring as it was I needed a good story to spice it up.

Coupled with my near-death experience, the stabbing would be my claim to fame. Not that I had anyone to tell but my roommate who would call me out for my theatrics like he always did when my impressive skills of overexaggerating a story took a turn into the unbelievable.

Now I was the proud wearer of a sticky, bloodstained blouse with an over-the-top bandage under my shirt. I’d given my statement to the police—that would be three of them who let me tell my story then asked follow-up questions to their follow-up questions. I was exhausted and ready to go home, drink a bottle of wine, where at such time I’d finally allow myself to stop using humor as the crutch I always relied on and freak out that I’d almost been taken hostage in a robbery attempt.

I was almost to my car when I heard my name, then I was stuck in a mental conundrum—pretend I didn’t hear Valentine calling after me or stop and face the man. I wish I could say my problem was due to exhaustion, but I was running high on adrenaline that was quickly wearing off and I wanted to be alone when the crash hit. Alone where no one could witness my unravelling.

Unfortunately in my hesitation the choice was made for me.

“Sophie, wait up.”

Damn.

Okay, I could do this. Surely the man had more important things to do than hang out in the parking lot of a crime scene talking to a stranger. It hadn’t taken long for my first impression of him to be confirmed—he was a cop. With his brethren still crawling all over the store he wouldn’t have much time to waste on me.

---