Chapter 3
June
I didn’t expect Mack to point a gun at me. The Mack I knew had always been fun and cool. How much of that had to do with the drugs though? Perhaps his coolness wasn’t a projection of his real personality; I clearly didn’t know him that well.
He wasn’t a nice guy. That much I knew.
Mack ran a lot of “errands” for my ex, Dannie Wu.
Dannie never told me what exactly Mack did for him, but those errands definitely weren’t legal.
One time, he rushed into Dannie’s apartment panicking and covered in blood that wasn’t his.
Dannie wasn’t a nice guy either, but I didn’t know that until much later.
“Calm down.” I lowered my voice, hoping that it would somehow help soothe Mack’s nerves. My pulse was racing but I tried my best not to show it.
“I’m here,” I whispered to my phone and wondered when the help would arrive. Wendy seemed to have gone completely quiet on the other end.
Bang. Mack kicked my brand-new Tesla. “Who are you talking to? Get the fuck out of the car now.”
“Okay, okay.” I sounded reluctant and he could probably hear it in my voice. I couldn’t help it though. I got out of the car and held both my hands up.
“Who are you talking to?” Shit. He heard that – I wasn’t as subtle as I thought I was.
“No one. Just a friend…” I stared at the dated abandoned building and was really skeptical about the help Wendy spoke of now.
“I thought we were friends.” My voice came out a little shaky, but I wanted to know what he had in mind.
The only way I knew how was to keep him talking – much like when I treated my patients.
You don’t want them keeping everything to themselves, because there was no way you could help patients like that.
“Friends don’t run away from each other like that,” he snapped.
“It’s nothing personal, Mack. I have a problem being with people. You know, staying at home for too long will do that to you.” I kind of lied. I knew that this was something that many people suffered from after the pandemic, including my mother.
“Is that so?”
“Of course.” I could feel my teeth knocking together. “Lots of doctors died, you know? It could easily have been me.”
I had to keep the conversation going in hope of keeping Mack relaxed.
“I guess you’re right. I did think of you during the lockdown you know.” I let out a small sigh as Mack showed signs of relaxing as he lowered his gun.
“Who else is here? Is it just you? We should go grab a coffee. I know a place not too far–”
Suddenly, a black car that drove past earlier turned around and sped towards us.
“What the fuck?” Mack’s anger was back. “Get on your knees, now.”
“Please, Mack.”
“Get down or I’ll shoot you.”
I did as I was told.
Two people got out of the car and neither of them were Wendy. I didn’t know the woman, but I recognized the large Asian man. A bodyguard. Did he work for Wendy now? What was he even doing in the country?
“Put down your gun.” I heard Wendy’s voice, from somewhere up high. Glancing up, I saw Wendy standing on the top floor balcony holding a megaphone.
What the actual fuck!
I felt confused. I was scared about being held at gunpoint, but at the same time I was excited about Wendy. She looked like a superhero about to save my ass – overlooking me and my whole situation from above.
How was it possible to be feeling such despair and hope at the same time?
A few seconds ago, I was convinced that I nearly had Mack.
Not in a way where I could swing around and disarm him of his gun.
But I was certain that he was about to let me go.
We could have easily resolved this issue without any violence.
Besides, Mack was almost certainly under the influence of something and not thinking clearly. My money was on some kind of drug.
If Mack acted alone, then all I needed to do was give him whatever he wanted. Probably some money. I shook off the thought of Dannie coming for me.
“You’re surrounded, asshole. Surrender now or else…”
Surrender now or else what?
I really wanted to know. Or else what? That line was only ever said on TV. Actually, the whole situation kind of tickled me a little. I had a gun pointed at my head and I felt like laughing – the stress of it all must have gotten to me. I had officially gone mad.
“Mack, listen to me. We can still go get that coffee if you want.” I tried, but he wasn’t listening.
“Surrounded by who exactly?” Two people pointing their guns at him didn’t seem like a big enough threat to Mack.
Those errands that Mack used to run, I knew for sure that it involved physically harming human beings – not animals like Dannie had claimed. Not that it was okay to harm any animal. But Dannie told me back then that Mack was attacked by a stray dog and had to kill it to save his life.
I was sure that those clean-cut bodyguards in their suits just seemed like some jokers to him.
“Five. Four. Three. Two. One,” Wendy counted, then three police cars rushed in. “Well, do you need a formal introduction?” she added.
“Tell them we’re friends,” Mack instructed me, knocking his gun on my skull which sent an electric buzz down my spine.
“Friends don’t do that,” a familiar voice answered but it wasn’t Wendy on her megaphone.
Kai stepped out of the car, looking like a knight coming to my rescue. I didn’t know how to react at the sight of him.
“Who the fuck are you?”
Exactly . I wanted to know that myself. Who the fuck gave him the right to rescue me? I wasn’t some kind of princess in distress.
“Her friend.” The corner of this mouth lifted, and I recognized that sarcastic smile on his. “If you drop the gun, we could be friends, too. I’ll do whatever I can to help you.”
Friend huh . Maybe that was what Kai thought of me as well. Just friends.
“If I don’t?” Mack’s hand jerked and the gun knocked on my skull one more time. Gah, I hated that. I could feel another piece of my soul being knocked out of my body every time he did that.
“Dead people can’t be friends,” Kai said, with another sarcastic smile.
“What about them?” Mack’s face turned towards the police.
Kai laughed.
“They can be bought.” Then he stopped his laughter. “Oh, I’m sorry officers, that’s not what I mean, you know, bloody foreigner.”
Fuck Kai. He thought he was being clever.
I was freaking out right now. My forehead and my palms were covered in cold sweat, and I was in no mood to laugh at his stupid jokes.
Was it so hard to understand that the only thing I wanted right now was to not have a gun pressed into the back of my skull.
The next thing I knew, Mack was tackled by a large man, and he almost took me with them.
A crowd of police dashed in, surrounding me, the man, and Mack. Two police officers helped me up, and two others held Mack on the ground as they cuffed him. That was when I realized that it was Dave who jumped Mack.
“Are you okay?” Kai asked.
I nodded even though I didn’t really know how I felt.
“Please don’t tell my brothers,” I muttered, “or Chloe.”
Kai said okay, and I made a mental note to repeat the same thing to Wendy.
My brothers could be overly protective, and I didn’t want them on my case right now.
Kai held me close, rubbing my back with his large hands.
It felt nice and may or may not have had the effect of soothing my nerves. But I enjoyed it.
Tears started pouring out of my eyes, which surprised the hell out of me. Hiding my emotions had been my practice for the last few years, and I had managed really well until now.
Perhaps Kai’s touch did that to me.
But I was still kind of angry at him. Why? I didn’t actually remember anymore. Whatever he did that pissed me off was a long time ago. He might not even have been aware of it. But never mind that. I wanted to be mad at him and I should be allowed.
“Wait, I need to talk to Mack.” I struggled out of Kai’s arms and called out as one of the police cars started to drive Mack away.
“You should stay away from him,” Wendy said.
“Where are they taking him?” I demanded an answer, but my voice could never do stern very well.
“It’s obvious, isn’t it?” Wendy ushered me towards the entrance of the warehouse. “Come, I’ll make you a cup of tea.”
I followed Wendy inside the building and up some flights of stairs.
There were rows of tall industrial shelves on the bottom floor with a few forklifts lying around.
The second floor was in the process of some renovations and was mostly covered in dust sheets.
The top floor was guarded with a heavy-duty metal door, and Wendy scanned her thumb print on the code reader to unlock the door. Inside it was an apartment.
“What’s going to happen to him?” I couldn’t care less about the gorgeous apartment in front of me. The light that came through the floor to ceiling windows was so bright it hurt my eyes a little. It bothered me that Wendy hadn’t told me what I wanted to know.
“Hell. Of course.” Wendy let out a laugh that made me think of the wicked witch of the west.
I sat down in the living room while Wendy made tea and coffee.
Looking around the rather empty apartment, I noticed the furniture was clean and simple but expensive.
Oh, empty might have been the wrong word – it was spacious, very much so.
There was so much empty space and not enough furniture or personal belongings to fill it.
It was entirely possible that the interior designer was going for a minimalist concept, I suppose.
I had redecorated my apartment not long ago and had spent far too much time looking through pricey furniture catalogs – so I could tell the furnishings here were far from cheap.
My interior designer tried to convince me that price was often correlated with the time it would last. How could I know for sure? I guess only time will tell.