Standard Disclaimer

A/N: What's this? Updating early? WEll, the life that I don't have is suddenly about to get really full, so I'm racing the clock. That doesn't excuse everyone from reviewing EVERY CHAPTER, though. And you know who you are. ;)

Hostage

"What are we going to do with...him?" Victoria asked as Vincent picked up his satchel. She held the puppy in her arms.

Vincent looked at it, at her, and then toward the bathroom. "We could always put it in there. Put the 'Do Not Disturb' sign on the door."

Victoria frowned. She did not like that idea.

"You want to take him with us?" Vincent asked.

"No," she said quickly.

"Then it's the bathroom. Go on, he'll survive. It won't be that long."

Victoria went and put Max in the bathtub. Vincent had the hotel room door open and was halfway out into the hallway, waiting for her. She picked up her pace at the impatient flick of his fingers in her direction, stepped out into the hallway.

"We going to get another cab?" she asked.

He gave her a little smirk. "There's an MTA station just a little ways away. We're going to take it."

She frowned. "The metro rail? Why not just get a cab?"

"I'm a little sentimental about the metro rail," he said, putting his arm lightly across her back, his hand on her opposite shoulder.

They stepped into an open elevator. "Why?" she asked.

His smile didn't fade. She could have sworn he was enjoying himself. "Because it brought me to you." The elevator doors slid shut.

"What do you mean?"

Vincent patted the place on his chest where she had pulled out that bullet. "That's where this happened. The blue line, into Long Beach. It came all the way back to the other end, that's where I got off. I remembered it wasn't too far of a walk to your office from there. If it had been any other line, I wouldn't have reached you in time."

Victoria stared at him. It had never occurred to her that he'd ever thought of her, during that ordeal he'd told her about. But, her rational voice intoned, it was strictly in a professional way. Although if Vincent truly thought of her in a professional way, her impulsive voice argued, he would never have done...what he'd done. It just didn't make sense. And it certainly couldn't be any good for business.

"Come on, Victoria," he said, taking her arm. She blinked and realized that the elevator had stopped and opened into the lobby and he was waiting for her to move. They exited the hotel and it was a short, few-block walk to the MTA station. He bought two round trip tickets from the booth at three dollars each, and they boarded the train.

It wasn't the blue line, but the gold one that went back to Union Station. They got on the Red line, which took them up to North Hollywood. From there, Vincent grabbed a cab, and it was a solid fifteen minute drive through some very thick, windy neighborhoods before they came to the thick iron gates of an exclusive neighborhood.

"That's good enough," Vincent told the driver. The man pulled up along the curb and they got out. Victoria took in the huge black iron gates, beautiful guilded, decorated with heavy ivy that intertwined with pale purple flowers.

"This way," Vincent said as the cab pulled away. He indicated another direction, one she didn't expect.

"Where are we going?" she whispered.

"I already told you." He took her hand again, just like he had before, in Union Station. "Now let's go."

How they managed to creep through that neighborhood was beyond her. It was guarded, with security patrolling the streets, up and down, occasionally flicking their heavy flashlights into the foliage. But Vincent seemed to know exactly where he was going. Victoria guessed that all of this had been laid out for him in his work-ups. Other people did all the work, and he just did the killing. Maybe she was being too harsh on him - he was just the last step in a long process.

She shoved those thoughts out of her mind. A house came into view. She wished she could see it in its entirety, but it was too dark, and the place was covered by various kinds of bushes and plants - a protection from the street. What she could see, though, was deep gray stone and black trim, and various wings of the house.

They approached a back door, with no light. Vincent reached into his pocket, pulled something out. He had to let go of her hand, but instead of freeing her, he linked his arm through hers, freeing up both of his hands. He silently picked the lock, and as the door creeped open, he reached into holster for his gun. He seized her hand as she gave a startled little noise, and glared at her bloody murder. She closed her mouth, let him pull her inside.

She shut her eyes when he stopped, listening. She wished she could stop breathing...it occurred to her that he could have left her behind, in the hotel room. He could have tied her up to the toilet with an electrical cord. It would certainly have been easier for him, rather than dragging her behind him like dead weight. But no, she thought as she opened her eyes. There was a reason she was here. She was important somehow, although she had no idea why. So as she felt Vincent's grip slack, just a little, as he leaned into a room which appeared to be a dining room of sorts, and there was a series of noises coming from the ceiling, revealing where the people of the house were, she seized her chance.

She yanked her hand away and ran for the nearest set of stairs. Vincent jerked around, watching her go, raised his gun, silencer in place.

But he didn't fire.

She made it up the stairs and down the hall. She was too loud, she knew she was too loud, but it was too late. A door flew open and there was someone there, a woman with long hair that she had originally thought was golden blonde.

It was actually white.

"Well, hello there," Claudia said.

Claudia ducked her head out into the hallway, then pulled the door shut. "I take it Vincent is with you?" she asked, turning on Victoria, who was trapped in the small, miniaturized bedroom, no immediate way out.

"Ye...yes.." Victoria breathed.

Claudia pressed against the door. "Fuck," she muttered. She pulled out a radio in her pocket and then the house around her came alive.

Various guards could be heard running through hallways. Claudia shouted various orders, obviously the one in charge. Victoria slowly sat down on the bed.

"So you are working for Marcus Shakespeare," she breathed.

Claudia looked at her. Her cold eyes twinkled with merriment. "What, you thought I was one of the bad guys?"

"Vincent did, yeah."

"Well, talk about pots and kettles," the other woman snorted. She gave Victoria what was almost a compassionate smile. "Poor kid, you've probably been through a lot," she sighed. "Mr. Shakespeare is pretty worried about you. I'm sure he'd love to see that you're alive and well. Come with me."

Victoria didn't get up. Claudia raised a delicately drawn eyebrow-line at her.

"Is there a problem?"

"Who killed Allen?" Victoria asked.

"Your ex-husband?"

"Vincent and I found him shot dead, in our house." She swallowed hard, suddenly realizing what Claudia had just said. "How did you know he was my ex-husband?"

"You think Mr. Shakespeare doesn't know everything about his employers?" Claudia returned. "Even you?"

Victoria stiffened. She'd been around Vincent too long. She was starting to pick up some of his uncanny abilities. She opened her mouth, and heard herself ask, again, more loudly, "How did you know he was my ex-husband, Claudia?"

Claudia looked at her, then opened the door behind her. "Let's go see Mr. Shakespeare, Victoria."

Victoria stood up, waited until she was in the hallway in front of Claudia, and then, in a desperate measure, brought her elbow up and smashed the other woman right in the nose. She heard the woman slump against the wall, cussing and swearing in languages she knew weren't English as she ran away.

There were things that Victoria did not see.

She did not see that Vincent couldn't shoot at her. She didn't see that he didn't follow. She didn't see that he was following a particular path through the house, and knew exactly where Marcus Shakespeare's bedroom was located, where the man was sitting up, watching the evening news.

She did not know that Vincent had known this all along, that he'd been given very specific instructions that few people other than him could have followed so quickly, so accurately. He was exactly on his time clock, and he was going to finish the job, Victoria or no. He'd find her eventually, it wouldn't be hard, the stupid girl made too much damn noise anyway.

Marcus sat on his bed, his leg propped up. He was not as healthy as he appeared, and the wounds had gotten infected, and his people were doing their best to clean him up, in lieu of a real doctor. Bringing Victoria into his service had been a risk well worth taking, as she was quite good and had probably kept him alive where others would have failed. But without her, he was stuck to old fashioned methods - lots of hydrogen peroxide and antibiotic ointments. It seemed to be working so far, but it hurt to move around too much.

He was not alone. There was a guard in his room, a very good marksman by the name of Blue Tony, called so because he had only one eye, and the other was covered by a thick lens of blue. It also allowed Marcus some degree of privacy, as Blue Tony's blind eye was to him, the other one watching the room. Marcus even felt comfortable enough to pick his nose on occasion.

There was no sound before Vincent came into the room. Blue Tony managed to get off one single shot, which grazed over Vincent's shoulder and exploded an expensive crystal lamp behind him. Vincent unloaded his signature three shots into Blue Tony - two in the sternum, one in the head. Blue Tony fell back into his chair, in nearly the exact same position he'd started in.

Marcus Shakespeare let out a small yelp as Vincent turned to him. But suddenly there was something in the way. A streak of blue and gray, topped with long brown-black hair.

Vincent blinked. Victoria was standing directly in his line of fire, her arms flung wide.

"STOP!" she screamed. "Don't!"

"Victoria," Vincent breathed, after thoroughly taking in the situation, "get out of my way."

"I won't," Victoria said, "I won't let you kill him."

"Don't you care that he's the reason Allen is dead?" Vincent barked.

Victoria hesitated, turned and looked at her patient over her shoulder. He looked a bit different than she'd last seen him, less pale but older somehow, the stress of his present situation aging him years before their eyes.

He was a big man, probably very strong in his youth, and possibly still considerably so for his age. Dark hair, graying, wide build. A squarish face that had always greeted Victoria with warmth. He'd always been so kind to her, so respectful, bestowing personal courtesies on her like free meals in his elegant dining room, rides back and forth to his home, even with a comfortable form of concealment from its location.

He still looked that way to her now, which was why she hesitated to get out of Vincent's way. But she looked away for too long, and he attempted to swipe her out of the way, reaching forward with one arm while keeping his gun trained on Shakespeare. She danced out of his grasp, almost climbing up onto the bed.

There was a terrible ruckus in the hallway. Vincent reached behind with his foot and shoved the door shut, but a black gloved hand blocked his way. Claudia stood there, her nose bleeding a steady trail down her chin and neck, her gun out and aimed right at Vincent's head.

"Hello again," she said, her voice sounding nasally. "Isn't this pretty?"

Vincent sighed, lowered his gun. Claudia was sloppy for only a moment as she reached to take it from him. It was all that Vincent needed.

Victoria had seen a lot of martial arts movies, action movies, movies where men did incredible things with their bodies that didn't seem possible. Watching it in real life, however, was a completely different experience. Vincent moved like liquid, the only sounds being the crack of Claudia's arm as he broke it and the snap of her knee as he shoved it the wrong way. She hit the floor, but to her credit, she hardly made a sound. Her gun was also now in his possession.

"Clumsy," Vincent admonished her. "Very clumsy. Surprised you're still around, making mistakes like that."

Claudia just smiled up at him, and straightened out her knee. It wasn't a pretty sound. She held her arm close and looked up at him, as if she knew something he didn't.

More pounding coming from behind them. Vincent pushed a chest of drawers over the door to keep whoever else was coming in, out.

"So she is working for you," Vincent said, directing his words to Marcus Shakespeare. "I think you might have been ripped off."

Marcus dragged himself to his feet, unwilling, apparently, to face this situation half lying down. "What do you want, assassin?" he growled.

"What do you think I want?" Vincent asked. "To complete the contract. It's my job." His blue-green eyes narrowed on Victoria, who was still blocking him. "Get out of the way, Vic."

"No," she said calmly, the adrenaline having a very strange affect on her. Even seeing what Vincent was capable of, she didn't believe he'd kill her. "You want to shoot him, you'll have to shoot me first."

His eyes narrowed, and he aimed. For a second, for only a second, Victoria saw, in his eyes, that he was going to do it. He was going to kill her. A job was a job. A life was nothing, not even hers. And then, in the same flicker, it was gone.

He couldn't. For probably the first time in his entire career, he couldn't.

Then Claudia started to laugh.

"That is so PATHETIC!" she howled. "Vincent, you pussy, you-"

Victoria reached out and slapped the woman across the face, hitting her nose, causing the words to be drowned out in a gargle of blood. Claudia shot bloody murder at her with her eyes.

"I don't believe you, Victoria," Vincent whispered.

Victoria looked up at him. "What, she doesn't annoy the piss out of you, too?"

Vincent shook his head. "That man," he said, gesturing with his gun, "that man is the reason your husband is dead."

"He didn't kill Allen," she said.

"Yes, but Claudia did. Didn't you, Claudia?"

Victoria looked back down at the woman. Claudia took her hand away from her blood-filled mouth. "I don't know---"

"Claudia," came Shakespeare's booming voice. "Did you?"

Claudia looked up at her boss, unrepentant. "He was uncooperative," she said. "And then he tried to call the police. What the hell else was I supposed to do?"

Victoria kicked her, in the gut, hard. "You bitch!"

Marcus stepped even closer, close enough so that Vincent couldn't get a clear shot at him without clipping Victoria. In fact, he moved himself a little bit behind her. "That wasn't part of my instructions, Claudia."

Claudia glared up at the man, but kept her mouth shut.

"Shoot her, Vincent!" Victoria screeched.

Vincent looked at her in shock. "You won't let me kill the criminal mastermind, but you want me to kill his flunky? Your sense of right and wrong certainly is subjective."

Marcus placed a large hand on Victoria's shoulder. "Listen, my dear, I am so sorry all this has happened."

She shook him off. "Save it."

Marcus looked from her to Vincent, realized she was moving away. Any minute now, Vincent could put his gun back on him, and he was unarmed. He stared to panic.

"Dr. Potter," he said, his voice pleading, "I was genuinely concerned for your safety. I did not know that Claudia would exceed my orders."

"You're concerned enough for my safety to send a psychopath to my ex-husband's house," Victoria ground out bitterly.

"You want me to shoot him now?" Vincent asked. Marcus jumped.

"I don't want you to shoot anybody, Vincent."

Vincent took a deep breath. "Well, that really is too bad, because I do have to." He aimed his gun at Marcus again, with Victoria out of the way. She tried to dart into his path again but he caught her by the arm and held her fast.

"No, Vincent, don't!"

"Why not?" Vincent demanded, his eyes locked on Shakespeare. "He's just a criminal, just one of a million other criminals...no one will miss him...some people will probably live longer after he's dead."

He cocked the gun. He was ready to fire. There were gunshots in the hallway, the small armed force that was protecting the Shakespeare grounds had all collected at the bedroom door and were pounding to get in, willing to destroy the entire wall if they had to.

Time was almost up.

A/N: Evil cliffhangers! Dont' worry, the next (and last) chapter is on the way. In the meantime...

Par: Heh...yeah, chapter 8 was fun...hopefully you liked ch. 9, too. And this chapter...only one more to go before this phase of the story ends! Thank God, this morning I was hit with inspiration. And I just got back from seeing Collateral (#4!) so hopefully I'll be able to continue it.

Sargonne: Hey! Welcome back...and yes, it is going to get worse. A lot worse. But I'll let you judge. HOpefully the sequel will be even WORSE than that...lots more Claudia, and the inclusion of the other characters from the movie...Max, Annie, and especially Detective Fanning. I just can't believe that a member of the LAPD would go into a situation without wearing his Kevlar! Duh!

Warm Mittens: You were sick? That sucks. Yes, Claudia is a total bitch, and in the next story, she will be even WORSE!!! if you can imagine that. So, school shopping? I'm assuming you're in high school, then, but if I'm wrong you have the right to smack me. And no, you're right, right now, I do have no life...but that will all change this coming Tuesday as the school year beings and i have to go to work and teach all the little second graders again. SIGH it was fun while it lasted. BTW, loved, "Oh, my giddy god." I am so gonna use that sometime. P.S. Damn is spelled with a silent N, not a B. Heh. Sorry, had to be a teacher there for a moment. :)

Oh Sweet Treats...you been taking your meds lately? See, this is what happens when you don't! BTW, like the second line of the story was, "He had no soul." Or maybe it was the first line...anyhoo, no soul, equals soulless. And the name of the next story will be solace, pronounced almsot the same way! Solace means comfort, safety. If you think these two kids are getting off easy, you're on more crack than I thought! That puppy was also a real-life deal. ON Sunday I was walking around downtown and there was a guy just like the guy in the story selling that puppy. The poor little thing...and he wanted that much, too! I felt so sorry for that little puppy, so I gave him to Victoria. See, the secret to good writing is drawing from real life. Although, tell the truth, I never want to get involved with a sociopathic killer, even if he does look like Tom Cruise. orry, not my style. But Victoria can have all the fun she wants! LOL!

firegoddess164: That was funny about your cats! LOL...is one black and the other gray? Because that WOULD be perfect. No, sorry, this entire part is in Victoria's POV, but we'll get into Vincent's head a little next time. And there WILL BE a next time.

Okay, so...I know how much of a heart attack everybody had over the last cliffhanger, so I've posted this chapter early and I'll post the final chapter tomorrow morning. Which means that the next story will get uploaded hopefully on Saturday night. The minutes of my freedom are running out! I have to act fast! Aaaaahh! SO YOU BETTER REVIEW FAST!!!