Ronda wished that her saliva had been able to travel far enough to hit Dwayne Johnson in the face. At least there was the small satisfaction of it landing on his shoe. She was going to go down defiantly, not begging for her life, that was for damn sure. The worst part was actually thinking about how hard it would be for Shane and her uncle Hunter to deal with her death. No, her murder. That's what this was going to be. An execution, in fact, and all thanks to the woman she had called an aunt for the past 19 years.

"Filthy fucking animal," Johnson said, looking down at her spit on his shoe. "I think I've heard enough," He looked back up, flicked the pistol's safety off and, aiming right between her eyes, pulled the trigger.

Ronda had closed her eyes, waiting for the end and wondering what would come next. She heard the shot. There was no impact, no pain. Then she heard the unmistakable sound of a body hitting the floor. Snapping her eyes open, everything seemed to be moving in slow motion. She saw Johnson's bodyguard lying on the ground, on his side, with half of his head missing. Johnson was standing there, looking at the gun that he'd fired at Ronda, or rather tried to fire, with a puzzled expression on his face. The blood of his man had splashed up the side of his face. With a growl of frustration, he checked that he gun was loaded and the safety was off, then raised it again, pointed it at Ronda and pulled the trigger. The only response was a clicking sound. For some reason the gun didn't work.

Only then did Ronda start to switch back on. Whatever was happening, she was alive. She needed to run before Johnson picked up a gun from his fallen subordinate and used that to finish the job. Then it occurred to her to wonder why the man was on the ground with half of his head missing. Who had fired the shot? At that exact second, another shot rang out and Johnson pitched forward, falling to the ground face first. Blood was already staining the back of his suit jacket. Someone had shot him.

"Ronda, it's okay sweetheart. I'm so sorry I had to say all of that to you. I'm sorry. I had to make it convincing for him."

The words came from Stephanie, who had appeared at Ronda's side and wrapped her arms around her. The slow motion effect seemed to wearing off now for Ronda. She wondered if it was some kind of effect from thinking that her life had just been ended. Maybe she was close to going into shock? There was no time for that. Shaking her head to try and clear it, she mumbled, "What the fuck? Aunt Steph?"

"Yes, it's me. You're okay. No one's going to hurt you."

Ronda hugged her aunt for a moment, and it finally brought her fully back to her senses. "Jesus Christ, a bit less realism next time, okay?"

"He's still alive, Mrs Helmsley. Do you want to finish it?"

Ronda's head snapped around in the direction of the new voice, thinking that it was familiar somehow. It was. "Camila?" she gasped. "What the fucking hell are you doing here?" The question was born purely of shock as the answer was obvious. Camila had an assault rifle in her hands, from which the two shots had been fired. She had already kicked the guns away from the fallen men, although one of them was very obviously dead.

"My job, Ms Helmsley. Sorry I couldn't be completely honest with you before."

"I thought you were a fucking maid?"

"I would have been, unless someone tried to make a move on the mansion again. Your aunt and uncle wanted someone close by, just in case."

"But your story checked out," Ronda blurted out. "My guys followed you. You live with your kids, with no money, just like you said."

"Army vets often don't come home to much, Ms Helmsley. Can we talk about this later?"

Stephanie had pulled away from Ronda when Camila first spoke, and walked over to the Hispanic woman. "Do you have it?" she asked.

"Right here," Camila said, pulling a pistol out of a holster at her hip. She handed it to Stephanie, who walked over to Dwayne Johnson, who had managed to roll to his front. He was spluttering and coughing up blood, a sure sign that Camila's shot would be fatal. It was going to be academic.

"That wasn't the gun that my husband used to kill your piece of shit cousin," Stephanie hissed at her fallen adversary. "And if you're wondering why it didn't fire? Camila ground down the firing pins. Now, this right here? This is the gun that Hunter used that night. Like I said, poetic justice."

Having killed more than her fair share of people, Ronda knew better than to expect some smart ass last words from Johnson. That was the kind of thing that happened in movies, not real life. Real life was a lot simpler: Stephanie pointed the gun at his head and pulled the trigger, putting a large hole in his forehead. Her aunt seemed to take no particular satisfaction in the killing, merely looking at Ronda and saying, "I think we should get out of here."

"I'll drive," Camila said, jogging over to Stephanie's rental car.

Ronda and Stephanie walked over to the car, side by side. Ronda had never admired her aunt more than she did at that moment. She had back fought against everything that Nicole Reigns and Scott Steiner had done to her so that she could return to Warren City and settle the Helmsley score personally. "I love you, Aunt Steph."

"I love you too, Ron. Don't ever doubt that. You and Hunter are the two most important people to me."

Reaching the car, the climbed into the back and Camila took off, heading towards the city. Ronda took out her phone and said, "I'd better call Uncle Hunter. We voted to shut down the meth lab. There are guys working on it now. He's going to have to make sure our security is right on point in case of reprisals, and he's going to need to call Perez and tell her about those two bodies. If the feds weren't coming before, they will be now. Everyone better have their asses covered."

Stephanie was staring out of the window at the vast expanse of the city. Coming back had been a very difficult thing for her to do, but she had needed to make things right with Hunter after their furious argument and convince him that she really did love both him and Ronda. Using the argument as a basis for the story that she'd told Dwayne Johnson had seemed like a plan that was bound to work, and so it had. Putting Ronda in that situation had been hard, but it had been worth it. Johnson was dead, and with that so was the threat from the Reigns family; this time for good.

"Don't worry about Perez," she mumbled, to herself as much as to Ronda. "She's a smart woman. Feds or not, meth lab or not, this is our city. And it always will be."

"Fucking right," Ronda agreed as she waited for her uncle to answer her call. "By the time the feds show up, Uncle Hunter was have us looking as pure as the driven snow."

By the time the car was making its way through the heavy traffic in the centre of the city, plans were already being put in place. When, rather than if the FBI showed up and started digging into Melina Perez and into Helmsley there would be nothing for them to find.

END

Author's note:

The first chapter of the series' third story has now been published. It is called Covert Ops, and it can be found on my profile. Enjoy!