CH. 8
One by one, minutes later, the She Spies awake in the back office of the warehouse, their heads still sore from being hit just moments before. They groan a little bit, voicing their pain, but are soon coherent enough to think once again.
"I don't know about you guys, but I wasn't expecting the blow to the head," says Shane, finding her voice first.
"Neither did I, but you'd figure we'd be used to it by now," replies Cassie.
"I don't think anyone ever gets used to getting hit in the head," says DD.
The girls nod in agreement. They look around the room and test the ropes that are around their wrists. To their dismay and expecting, they're tied quite tightly. After a moment of silence, Shane speaks.
"So, do you think this is going to work?" she asks.
"I hope so. Otherwise we're toast," answers Cassie.
"I like toast, but only with butter. And cinnamon and sugar. They make it taste better," says DD.
Shane rolls her eyes at DD's comment as Cassie allows a small smile. One of them was always good to say something funny to lighten up the situation. Of course, sometimes things couldn't be lightened very much, but most of the time, it helped to keep their minds open and ready for things to come. After another moment of silence, DD speaks up with one of the concerns that was on all their minds.
"I wonder how Duncan's doing," she wonders.
"Yeah, I hope he's okay. He doesn't normally go into the field like this," says Shane.
"I'm sure he's fine. If everything goes according to plan anyway," says Cassie.
"Way to sound confident," mutters Shane.
Before anyone can say anything else, the doorknob turns. Their bodies tense up at the sound. The surprise is on them though, because it's Amy that walks through the door. The She Spies don't say anything, but watch to see if there's anybody behind her. Luckily, there isn't. Amy shuts the door behind her and walks over to the girls.
A moment of silence follows, everyone unsure of what to say. Finally, Amy rubs her hands together and speaks.
"They think I'm in the bathroom, so we have to make this quick," she says to them.
The girls sigh in relief, suspecting that they were safe for the moment. They get serious quick though, knowing that they don't have long before things will get dangerous again.
Without saying anything, Amy takes two instruments out of her pocket - a steak knife and a pair of scissors. She puts one in each hand and walks behind them. The girls are a little nervous, because they're tied with someone close by holding sharp instruments. They weren't as nervous as they'd usually be though, because of what Duncan had told them earlier. And as they suspected, she puts them by the handle into the hands of Cassie and Shane.
"So why are you doing this? I thought you hated Cross," asks Cassie as Amy takes a second pair of scissors out of her pocket and goes to work on cutting DD's ropes.
"Yeah, when Duncan mentioned what you had planned, we were a little surprised," adds Shane.
"Especially since you could literally cut the tension with a knife every time you guys were in the same room," says DD.
Amy is silent for a second, thinking of how to phrase what she'd decided earlier that day. In the end, she says what's in her heart.
"I've been doing a lot of thinking lately. He may treat me like a kid and not believe me, but he's my uncle and there's no way I'm going to let anyone take the life of someone I care about. No matter how he treats me, he doesn't deserve to die. If I have to put my life on the line to protect him and prove that I'm not what he thinks I am, then so be it," she says.
"Aww, that's so sweet," says DD.
"If only he could see that," mutters Amy, standing up and putting the scissors back in her pocket.
Suddenly the door opens. All of their heads fly up. Standing there is Nikolai, along with a couple of his lackies. Confusion is on his face.
"Amy, dear, I thought you were in the bathroom," says Nikolai, confusion in his voice.
Amy straightens up and does her best to put her previous persona on. She knows that the slightest slip is going to mean all of their heads. All of her experience in the past with the cartel taught her that Nikolai is a very intelligent person, so she was going to have to step carefully if she wanted to get out of this alive.
"I came in here because I wanted to make sure that they weren't trying to escape. Plus I figured it would be fun to rub my success in their faces," lies Amy.
"May I ask why you're standing behind them then?"
"I wanted to make sure the ropes were tight enough. I wanted my uncle to suffer at the thought of his favorite agents getting caused unnecessary pain," she replies, thinking quickly for an excuse.
Nikolai is getting suspicious of her actions, despite how she had proved her loyalty to the cartel in the past. He's noted Amy's difference in demeanor from before and now suspects that something's going on that he's not aware of. He motions for one of his men to walk around and check to see if the ropes were tied or not. After a moment of looking, he notices that the ropes are all cut. One look from him, and Nikolai knows that he has been betrayed.
"Perhaps we were too hasty in welcoming you into our family," says Nikolai, catching on to the fact that Amy wasn't acting on their side anymore.
"Perhaps your son was too hasty is deciding to try and kill my uncle, fed or not," says Amy, putting on a brave face.
As if on cue, the She Spies drop the instruments that had cut their ropes and jump up. Nikolai automatically motions for his men to fight the women. As the fight begins, the man that had been standing by lifts up a chair, intending to hit one of the girls.
"Hey!" she says to him.
This causes him to turn around to face her, chair in mid-air. Without wasting any time, Amy lifts her knee to kick him in the groin. When he doubles over, she picks up another chair and brings it down hard on his back, knocking him to the ground. She quickly tosses the chair aside and makes her way around the others and out of the room, leaving the fight to the professionals.
Amy knew she had been pushing buttons and treading in dangerous territory, but she felt it had to be done. Her life had been so complicated lately, but she knew she was making the right choice. She could only hope that things would work out the way they were supposed to and that Cross would believe what she had told the others to tell him. If he didn't, then, well, things may not end up as rosy as she had hoped.
Amy swiftly makes her way to the room that Duncan had been being held in. She wanted to free him as soon as possible so they could get out of there if things went sour. She hoped that the She Spies would be okay. She figured that they would be, since they had seemed to be held high in her uncle's mind.
Amy gets to the room and opens the door. Luckily, it had been left unlocked. She didn't care that that seemed suspicious, she just wanted to get in and out as fast as she could. Duncan is still sitting in the chair with a nervous look on his face.
"We have to get out of here," she says, walking into the room.
She stops in her tracks when she sees the look on Duncan's face. He keeps looking behind her. Slowly she turns around to see what he's staring at. Unfortunately for her, it's Gavin. He's very angry at her for betraying his trust and now there was a different Cross he was focused on getting revenge on.
"I'm afraid that's not going to happen," says Gavin, shutting the door and standing in front of it so there was no way out.
Amy is temporarily frozen in place, having not expected this turn of events. Gavin stands there, glaring at Amy, angry that she betrayed him and the rest of the cartel. He wasn't happy and that was becoming increasingly obvious to both Duncan and Amy.
"How could you do this to us?" asks Gavin angrily.
"How could I do this to you? How could you think that I'd be okay with you wanting to kill my uncle?"
"He betrayed you. You should've agreed with me. You acted like you hated him," he argues.
"Maybe for a while I did, but he's still my uncle," she says.
Gavin is really angry at this point and backhands Amy across the face. She wasn't braced for the hit, so she falls into the nearby desk, knocking some of the wind out of her lungs. Duncan just watches in horror, unable to move and do anything to help.
Gavin approaches his girlfriend. He flips her around so she's on her back, leaning on the desk. He glares at her and goes to his her again, but this time she's prepared. She lifts up her leg and kicks him right in the stomach. This causes him to fall back a little, holding his stomach. She quickly runs over behind Duncan and takes the scissors out of her pocket and hands them to him so he can cut his ropes.
"Quick, get yourself out of here," she says.
Duncan nods, but doesn't say anything. Since he's not used to being in the field, he was getting nervous and scared and was anxious to get out of there. He immediately goes to work on his ropes, carefully watching what's going on with the other two.
Amy turns just in time to see Gavin stand up again. She knows a little about fighting from the times she had fought with him or seen him fight before. Plus, it always helped that she had seen some movies with the subject in them.
"No one double-crosses a Marcel," growls Gavin, putting his hand behind him.
Amy knows that he had a habit of carrying a gun, so she takes no chances and dives at him, tackling him to the floor. A struggle ensues. Gavin ends up punching up at Amy, hitting her in the cheek. When she lifts up her hand to nurse her face, he flips her off of him. Then he straddles her and puts his hands around her throat, trying to choke her.
"No one double crosses a Marcel and lives," he says, tightening his grip.
By now, Duncan is free. He notices what Gavin is doing and looks around the room to see if there's something that will aid him in helping Amy. He finally decides on the chair he had been tied to. He picks it up and walks over to Gavin. He hesitates for a moment, really not wanting to hurt anyone, but he knows that it'll help save someone's life. He lifts up the chair and uses all the strength he can muster to smack Gavin on the back. He also hits Gavin's head enough to knock him off of Amy, unconscious.
Once Duncan realizes that Gavin's detained for the moment, the drops the chair and rushes over to help Amy up. With his aide, she is able to sit up, still gasping for breath. She sits there for a moment, leaning on Duncan. Once she is able to breathe normally again, she speaks.
"Thanks Duncan. I owe you one," she says, wiping the blood from the fight off of the corner of her mouth.
"It was the least I could do. You're one of the only people who actually listens to me. Besides, I couldn't let him kill you," he explains.
"You sure it's not because Uncle Quentin would be mad?" she asks jokingly, looking up at Duncan.
"No. You're a good person," he says.
Amy smiles at him. After another moment, she sighs and stands up.
"Well, I might as well take this so he can't use it," she says, leaning over and pulling Gavin's handgun out of the back of his pants, "Maybe we can find a useful way to dispose of it."
At that moment, the She Spies walk in the door. The first scene they scene is Amy standing over Gavin with a gun. They automatically fear the worst.
"Oh my god. She shot him," says DD, as Duncan stands up and dusts himself off.
"And we thought Cross was bad," says Shane.
Cassie nods in agreement.
"Relax. I didn't shoot him," assures Amy, putting the gun in the back of her belt for the time being.
The girls sigh in relief. If she would've shot him, especially with malicious intent, they'd have a lot of explaining to do to Cross. And none of them were sure they were ready to deal with that quite yet.
"Then why were you holding a gun?" asks Cassie.
"I took it out of his pants after Duncan played hero and hit him over the head with a chair because he was choking me. I figured that it was the safest thing to do in case he woke up," Amy explains, smiling.
"Aww, that was so sweet," says DD, looking at Duncan.
Duncan looks down and blushes. He's not used to getting any attention from anyone, let alone the good kind. Of course, any attention from DD was usually a good thing in his book.
"I just did what anybody would do," he says.
"Anybody with a heart," says Cassie.
Duncan smiles in reply, still a little embarrassed at having attention focused on him.
"So, what did you do with the others?" asks Amy.
"Ah, we just gave them a taste of their own medicine," says Shane.
"Yeah, they're tied up in the other room, unconscious and waiting for the police to come," adds DD.
"Are you sure you got them all?" asks Amy.
"All the ones in the room and any that got in our way, why?" says Cassie.
"Did you get Niko?" asks Amy, more urgent now.
"He slipped out while we were fighting the other guys," says DD.
"Oh no. The passage," says Amy, her eyes going wide.
Without explaining, Amy runs past the She Spies and out the door. What they don't know is that Amy knows of a secret passage out of the warehouse. Nikolai doesn't know that she knows about it, so there was still a chance of her being able to catch him. As she ran, she couldn't figure out why she was trying so hard. She had achieved what she wanted, stopping Gavin from getting to her uncle. Now she was going after something bigger.
The She Spies look after her, knowing that they should follow her, for more reasons than one. They glance at each other, contemplating the next best thing to do.
"You stay here with Gavin," Cassie says to Duncan, figuring that that would be the best thing (and it would be easier for him, since Gavin was unconscious).
Duncan looks horrified. He doesn't want to stay with someone who was as violent as Gavin seemed to be, unconscious or not. He wasn't used to being in the field and was as such, not used to having to deal with the bad guys directly. Because of all of this, even thinking of it made him nervous.
"But-" protests Duncan.
"You'll do fine," insists DD.
"Yeah, he's unconscious," adds Shane.
"Just pull the cord off the phone and tie up his hands with it," says Cassie.
"Yeah, that way if he wakes up, he won't be able to get away," adds Shane
"Okay," he says slowly, a nervous look appearing on his face once again.
"Shane! Stop freaking him out," says DD.
"What? I was just telling him the truth," defends Shane.
"I know, but still," says DD.
With that, the She Spies run out of the room, leaving Duncan staring down at Gavin, nervously. For a moment, he looks back and forth between him and the phone, knowing he has to act quick so should Gavin wake up, he could be detained properly. All the while, Duncan didn't want to be near him, so it would prove to be a very interesting task, indeed.
As the She Spies leave the room, they notice that Amy is nowhere in sight. They stop in their tracks, trying to figure out which way to go. Their thoughts are cut short when the police burst through the door, with Cross right behind them. When they see the She Spies, they stop. As they stop, Cross comes to the front of the group. The girls see this and quickly walk over.
"Where are the others?" asks Cross.
"Duncan's in the room over there with Gavin," says Cassie, pointing to the office.
"You left him with a criminal?"
"It's not like that. Gavin's unconscious," explains Shane.
"Yeah, he even knocked him out and saved Amy's life," adds DD.
"I see," says Cross.
He doesn't let the emotions he's feeling show on his face, but he's getting more worried by the minute, both because of Amy missing and the mission's possibility of being achieved. He motions for some of the policemen to go get Gavin and Duncan out of the room. As they oblige, the girls explain that there's more men in the back office, pointing them in the right direction. Cross immediately tells more of his men to go and get them. Finally, Cross turns skims the area. When he doesn't see his niece, he turns to the She Spies, a serious look on his face.
"Where's Amy?" he asks.
The girls' faces get serious. This makes Cross nervous, but he doesn't show it.
"She took off after Nikolai. Said something about a passage," explains DD.
"You let her go off after a cartel kingpin by herself?" asks Cross, crossing his arms, annoyed.
"She didn't give us a chance to try and stop her. She ran out of the room," defends Cassie.
"Do you know where she went?" asks Cross.
"I'm in the passage," comes Amy's voice.
Cross and the She Spies look around, trying to find where her voice is coming from. After a moment, they realize that her voice is coming through their hidden microphones. They waste no time in trying to get details.
"And where's this passage?" asks Cassie, speaking into the microphone.
"Go to the storage room in the back. I left the rug folded up and the door in the floor unlocked and open," she explains.
"Right, we'll be there ASAP," answers Cassie.
"Good. I gotta go. I think I hear something," finishes Amy.
After a second, Cross speaks into his microphone, noting how they were strangely all connected.
"Be careful. These guys are dangerous," he says to her.
Amy is silent for a moment.
"Thanks," she says finally.
Amy goes silent so she can follow Nikolai, leaving Cross to smile to himself. The She Spies notice, but don't say anything. Instead, they turn their focus to getting Amy back safely, as well as retrieving and detaining Nikolai.
As Cross directs the girls to go help Amy, he looks over and sees Duncan, a now conscious Gavin, and the policemen exiting the front office. He walks over to them.
"Ah, Mr. Marcel," he says to Gavin.
Gavin remains silent, glaring at him and refusing to speak. He had never liked Cross and his arrest only made things worse. Cross shakes his head and smiles at him, despite this.
"I'm glad you decided to finally cooperate with us. It would be in your best interest to continue to do so," he says to him.
"It would be in my best interest if I had killed you both when I had the chance," says Gavin.
Cross walks closer to Gavin, so he is only inches away. He looks him in the eye without saying anything for a moment, exchanging unspoken words. Finally, he speaks.
"Listen, I know how you treated her before. And I know you've contributed highly to this cartel. I'm going to do whatever I can to make sure you go to jail for a very long time," he says dead seriously, "Take him away."
Gavin glares at him as the policemen drag him outside. Now that he's gone, Cross looks at Duncan. Of course, Duncan thinks that he's going to get yelled at for going into the field, so he jumps to his own defense.
"I'm sorry for going into the field, sir. It's just that Amy said-" he starts.
"We'll talk about that later," says Cross, revealing nothing.
"Okay," says Duncan, automatically thinking that he was just planning a harsh punishment for later.
"The girls told me how you saved Amy. I wanted to thank you," he continues.
"It was my pleasure sir," says Duncan, unsure of how to take Cross's kindness.
Down in the passage, Amy slows down. Only a few of the lights are on, so there are shadows being cast throughout the tunnel, making it difficult to go as fast as she wanted to. It also didn't help that she was getting the suspicion that someone was in the tunnel with her.
"I had the feeling you'd end up down here. You always were smart," comes Nikolai's voice.
Amy stops, looking around to try and see him. Since he's still in the shadows, she can't see him. She wants to proceed, but she knows better than to do that when she doesn't know where an enemy is. It was definitely not an ideal situation.
"What do you want? And why are you still here?" she asks, her hands poised at her sides, ready to pull out Gavin's gun if she had to.
"Silly child. Do you really think I'd leave any unfinished business?" he asks, stepping into the light.
To her horror, he is pointing his gun at her. She is frozen in place, unsure of what to do. She couldn't reach for the gun that she had because he could shoot her before she even got her hand on it. Either way, things didn't look good.
"Oh come on…unfinished business isn't that bad," she says, getting more nervous by the second.
Nikolai just shakes his head and keeps his gun poised. He's intent on doing what he had stayed to do and no one, especially not a teenage girl, was going to sway his opinion.
"Too bad. You were an asset to the cartel," says Nikolai.
With that, he starts pulls the trigger. The bullet only skims her shoulder, but it knocks her back into the shadows. A thud follows, signaling to Nikolai that Amy has fallen. Satisfied and thinking that he had killed her, he puts his gun away and turns to leave.
"Not so fast," comes Cassie's voice from the shadows.
The girls come out of the shadows and stand there, in face off position. Nikolai turns, figuring that he might as well get them too, since they were the enemy. Any damage he could do to the feds was good in his book, and this would make it easier on him in the future if he got away, since there would be less federal agents on his tail.
"Ah, girls. I see you came to try and save your friend. Unfortunately for you, you're too late," he says, smirking.
"What are you talking about?" asks Shane.
He doesn't even need to point. Their eyes fall on Amy's feet, which are just under the edge of one of the lights. They gasp, thinking the worst has happened. They don't know that she was only skimmed on the shoulder. It doesn't help that she's not moving, laying still as if she had actually been fully hit by the bullet.
"How could you do this to her? She's just a kid," says DD.
"Same way I'm going to do it to you," he replies, pulling out his gun.
To their dismay, he is too far away to get to without getting shot. Even if they went into the shadows, he could just as easily shoot wildly and most likely hit them. There's not much they can do at the moment.
"You don't want to shoot us," says Shane.
"Why shouldn't I?" says Nikolai.
"Because…" Shane looks at Cassie and DD.
"Because we'd really like to stay alive," says DD.
The others nod in agreement.
"Too bad that's not going to happen. No one messes with a Marcel and lives," he says.
Just as he goes to pull the trigger, the girls squint their eyes shut, nervous about being shot. They cringe, wondering who was going to be hit and thinking that that may be their last moment together.
After a few moments of silence, the girls open their eyes. They look down at themselves and then at each other to see if any of them had been shot. Seeing no injuries, they look to where Nikolai had been standing. To their amazement, he is laying on the ground in the light, holding his shoulder and cringing in pain, rocking back and forth a little. Confused looks fill their faces.
"Correction. No one messes with a Cross," says Amy, stepping out of the shadows and lowering the gun.
The girls' look of confusion turns to amazement when they see her hear her voice. What adds to the amazement is that they never would've thought that she was the type of person who would shoot somebody. Then again, it was a life or death situation.
"What happened?" asks Shane.
"I shot him," says Amy, stating the obvious.
"We thought he shot you," says Cassie as Amy walks over to Nikolai.
"He did, but it only skimmed my shoulder," she explains, wincing a little at moving, motioning to her bleeding shoulder before leaning over and picking up Nikolai's gun.
She stands there, pointing both guns down at the injured criminal. She glances up at the She Spies.
"You guys may want to detain him before he gets up. Though I highly doubt that's going to happen voluntarily any time soon, it would probably be a good idea to do it now," she says, grinning.
The girls grin in response and walk over to her, happy that they were all alive. The only way things could've been better would be if no one had gotten shot. But, sometimes, sacrifices had to be made to get things done, especially when things were as serious as that day had been. Now they could all look forward to returning to the beach house and relaxing for a while. If Cross allowed it, that is.