63. Will #2
During filming, the lead actress, Olivia Osmond, broke her ankle, halting production for six months. When the cameras rolled again, Dad’s Russian accent was slightly different.
This moment, though, had nothing to do with either movie. I was pretty sure the Devil hadn’t done it, and since we weren’t on the rim of a volcano and no one was about to go into labor, I failed to see how this situation was anything like the final scene of The Day You Die. Unless . . .
Fuck, was that why he was suddenly stumbling and slurring his speech?
At the climax of The Day You Die, Dad’s character, a Russian mob boss named Nikolai, meets his end when a very pregnant Olivia pisses herself and pretends her water broke. Nikolai approaches to check on her, and she trips him, sending him plummeting into the magma chamber.
Dad better not piss himself and get us all killed. Just let Tony have his way.
I hated everything about Tony: his silver hair, his gold hoop earring, his I’m-the-only-reasonable-one-in-the-room attitude.
What he did to Derek and me was unforgivable.
But as much as I hated him, I loved living more.
I was done looking backward, done letting that night define my life.
All I wanted now was to start again, and to do it with James, if he’d have me.
I didn’t think Tony would shoot anyone, not unless provoked. We just needed to cooperate and let him win, let him get away with it. I didn’t need revenge, or even justice. I just needed everyone to be okay.
The chair Tony wanted me bound to sat by the bookcase, which held—among a bunch of leather-bound volumes—Derek’s Oscar.
I sat in the simple leather armchair with its matching ottoman and placed my arms on the rests so it would be easy to bind them.
Dad grabbed the duct tape from the nightstand and hobbled toward me. I knew what he was about to do, and my pulse hammered in disbelief. Please don’t!
We’d rehearsed the scene countless times, Dad standing over me with a prop gun, a pillow shoved inside my T-shirt so I looked pregnant. He’s going to get himself killed. I had to stop this.
Dad slowed and started to stumble . . . then collapsed.
Goosebumps covered my body as I struggled to get enough air. There was nothing I could do but watch. Actually . . . I could use the distraction and—
And what?
My eyes darted to the bookcase and Derek’s Oscar, the golden man with the crusader’s sword. No, I couldn’t do that. That would be ridiculous. Besides, I had another role to play now, that of the concerned son.
I jumped from the chair and started toward my father, but stopped when Tony swung the gun on me.
“Please, Tony,” I pleaded.
“Nice try, Robert. But you’re not going to win an Oscar for this performance either.”
“Just let me help him. I won’t try to stop you from going, I promise.”
“Don’t move.”
A wet spot bloomed on the front of my father’s slacks. Then the stench of . . . shit. Literal shit. What the fuck?
Tony took a few steps closer to Dad. “Come on, Robert, scene’s over.” He kicked my father in the leg. When there was no reaction, he kicked harder.
As he did, I inched closer to the bookcase. What was I doing? This was fucked. The Oscar was still several feet away, and there was at least another ten feet between the bookcase and Tony. I’d never close the distance in time.
I almost stopped, but then I heard James’s voice in my head. “No one’s coming.” He’d been referring to my self-made prison when he’d said those words, but they were just as true now. I couldn’t just wait around and hope for the best. I had to act before someone got killed.
I stared at my father, expecting him to scream, but instead his eyes rolled back. Damn, he really was good. He almost had me fooled.
Tony pulled his leg back for another kick, and that’s when Dad struck.
He swept his leg under Tony’s, knocking him off balance. Tony reeled backward, arms flailing, and the gun went off with a deafening bang, sending up a plume of white feathers.
I didn’t waste time checking to see if the bullet found its mark—just lunged for the Oscar, my fingers closing around the cold metal.
Unlike in The Day You Die, Tony didn’t trip into a volcano. He didn’t even fall over. After two tumbling steps, he regained his balance and leveled the pistol at my father’s face, his eyes narrowed in rage.
There was no way I’d get there in time, so I hurled the statue across the room. I’d never been much of an athlete, but Miles had made me throw sandbags at a wall so many times that the motion was second nature.
The statue careened through the air, flipping as it went, and struck Tony in the face with a wet crunch of bone. Then the gun went off a second time. I was too late.
The pistol fell from Tony’s hand as he went down, and I ran for it, convinced he would shoot the rest of us if he got there first. But Dad beat me to it. How was that possible? Did Tony miss?
Piss-soaked and shit-stained, Dad got to his feet. “It worked. Holy shit, it worked. That was amazing.”
I wasn’t listening, though. I was already at James’s side, checking for bullet holes. Tony might have missed once, but twice?
“Did it hit you?” I furiously brushed the downy mess off him, certain I’d find the bloody wound any second. I’d need to put pressure on it.
James tried to answer, but his mouth was taped shut. After checking his entire body and finding nothing, I gripped the tape and ripped it from James’s mouth. “Where are you hit?”
“I’m fine,” James gasped. “It didn’t hit me.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, you fucking maniac. What the hell was that? You could’ve been killed.”
I started on the duct tape binding his wrist to the headboard, and Dad moved to do the same to Derek. “What are you doing?” I shouted. “Keep the gun on Tony. I’ll untie them.”
“It’s okay, William,” Dad said in a soothing voice. “Tony’s not a threat anymore.”
I glanced over my shoulder, not believing him. Tony was probably . . .
I took a shuddering breath. The man slumped on the floor looked nothing like Tony. His face was all wrong, his nose bent at a strange angle, his silver hair stained red.
“Did you guys plan that?” James asked.
I took another breath as the room came back into focus. Turning, I found James’s eyes on me.
“I knew you’d get my reference,” my father said, working to free Derek. “That was hands down my greatest performance. I’m seeing the movie in a whole new light now.”
“You’re fucking ridiculous, Will, you know that? Both of you are,” James said.
“I thought he was going to . . . that he was going to . . .”
“He was. You did the right thing. You just saved all of our asses. Now, forget about the fucking duct tape for a second and kiss me.”
I wanted to listen, but I couldn’t stop now. I still had one more strip to unwind. I yanked the tape through the bars, barely noticing the metal scrape against my knuckles. There, done.
James took his newly freed hand, wrapped it around the back of my head, and yanked me down into a frenzied kiss that tasted of iron.
“You’re bleeding,” I said, drawing back.
“I don’t care.” He pulled me down again, but this time, instead of kissing me, he held me against his chest.