When Logan woke, she felt refreshed and well-rested. Outside it was dark and without the alarm clock, still left unplugged, the hour was unknown. The bedroom fan spun quietly, sans the soft ticking with every gentle sweep. If she could guess, she'd say it was eleven, maybe even close to midnight. What time did she fall asleep? Did she really sleep over twelve hours?
The overcast that hung over the rolling hill country had passed, opening up into a starry night sky and a thin crescent moon. Southcentral, Texas always had erratic weather. Pressure differences brewing over the Gulf held interesting changes for those that resided there.
Sitting up, Logan fought a grimace. She was still sore from the sparring if that's what you'd call it. Thinking of John brought her eyes towards the bedroom door. She'd been avoiding this moment, but that brought waves of anxiety she was tired of dealing with.
Tossing the covers aside, she slid out and tiptoed to her door. Silence followed as she floated quietly down the hall. A part of her hoped he was sleeping, that he had made himself at home without being told to do so. Logan never had and will never have gracious social cues. Another part of her, a more selfish quality, hoped that he was gone. But the reality was, it was because of John that brought her father back. Should John leave, she feared there would be no reason for Caldron ever to return. This ugly incentive fell heavily on her heart, pushing her steps to move faster with worry. What if he had left?
When she reached his end of the hall, just past the landing, the door was shut. Was he on the other side, sleeping and still here, as she hoped? Trust but verify. Her father's phrase lifted her hand as she grasped the knob. The latch clicked, causing Logan to flinch as she eased it open by a sliver. Now that the clouds had dispersed, a small slice of moonlight came through his window, filling the room with a dreamy blue. Even in the shadows, his dark hair could be spotted along with a pillow. He was sleeping.
Satisfied, she shut the door and stepped away. The breath she held released slowly, and she turned from the door. She headed downstairs to clean up the kitchen.
Logan passed the spot along the floor where she'd pinned John. A shattered mug echoed in her head like the ringing he elicited when he cuffed her ear. The fight replayed itself, reminding her of the ache she felt, not from the blows, but her treacherous body. In the end, she had to get away from him.
Reflecting, Logan pursed her lips shamefully as she entered the kitchen only to discover nothing left for her to clean. It had been done already. More shame and foolishness warmed her cheeks. Shame because of her inappropriate actions and foolishness that John was forced to clean her mess. In fact, not only had he cleaned the dishes, but he found their assigned locations. All without banging around, slamming cabinet doors, or clanking steel. Her stomach flip-flopped nervously. She remembered how it felt to touch herself with him in mind and the swells of conflicting emotions that followed when she came.
Standing still in the dark, staring like an idiot into the cleaned kitchen, she jumped when a scratching issuance came from the back patio door. The majority of the patio was covered in shadows, but by the backdrop of moonlight, she made out the clear silhouette of an animal. A skunk?
No, it was too tall.
A coyote?
The build was thicker than any coyote she'd ever seen, and its wagging tail was slender, not bushy like a vermin's.
Logan pulled a nearby drawer open and quietly removed the Sig Sauer P226 from its dwelling. All her life, she rocked hammer back, round chambered. Without looking, she knew all she had to do was pull the trigger. This model didn't come with a safety. She approached the back patio, flipping the light switch on. Light washed the patio, shining on a thick muscular build and two beady black eyes that didn't appear threatening. Pitiful, actually. Initially, she had expected the light to scare whatever it was off, but it appeared this pit bull wasn't going anywhere.
It, no, he wagged his tail and sat back onto his haunches. His ears slid back and forth, showing submission and curiosity. He couldn't decide.
Frowning, Logan stared down at the blue nose pit. Her father loved animals. Dogs, mostly. But Logan did not. She was not a fan of pets or anything that eventually died. The last thing she desired was a fondness for something that would leave her in the end. Logan loved her father, loved him deeply. But the idea that inevitably he too would perish and she would be left alone, grief-stricken with reckless abandon, convinced her not to obtain a pet.
Lowering her pistol, she unlocked the back door and cracked it open.
"Git!" she spat, stomping her heel painfully against the wooden floor. She hoped the sound would startle him so she wouldn't have to fire a warning round or, worse, shoot him. Not that she really cared. Strays had found their way to her house many times, and there was a special spot on the property she buried them. But she always gave them an option: run or die.
The dog flinched but didn't budge, his wagging tail only faltering slightly. He decided to stay. Frowning further, Logan tightened her grip on the pistol. Lifting her arm, she backed up just as suddenly, and unseen force shoved the door open. A figure came charging inside. Their bodies collided, spearing Logan about her midsection, and her back met the floor. The wind fled from her lungs, and amidst the scrabbling limbs, weapons, and cursing, Logan finally sucked in a painful gasp of air. A fragrance met her senses. Perfume?
"Where is John Wick?" the assailant hissed angrily as if driven mad with determination. Her intruder was female? The first thing that came to Logan's mind was: who the fuck is John Wick? Oh! John! The clarity struck her as hard as the blow delivered across her temple. The woman, now straddling Logan, leaned down to snarl directly into her face, "Where the fuck is he?"
The thought of him abandoned her just as fast as it arrived. Her Sig. Where was her Sig? Logan kept one fending arm up while the other flailed wildly at her sides, palming the floor for her pistol. The fighting continued, but Logan was quicker and stronger than her attacker. Capturing both wrists, she lifted her hips upward and rocked her intruder off balance. The woman rolled to Logan's left and, unable to catch her fall, was successfully overthrown.
Following her like she followed John into a full mount, she backhanded the woman. The strike was solid and hard, hard enough to crack the woman's nose. A yelp sliced through their grunts and shouts. Something hard brushing her toes. Without taking her eyes from her victim, she snagged the weapon, stuffed the barrel straight into the woman's opened mouth as far as it could go. And fired.
A flash of light escaped the barrel. Warm mist splashed her face, and the body fell slack beneath her—heavy breathing. A ringing sound filled her ears. The gunshot snuffed by weighted silence. The living room lights flicked on, revealing the dead body beneath her and all the blood amidst their strife. On her. The floor. Pooling fast under the assailant's head. She was young, so young. It'd happened so fast; Logan hadn't timed to think. The longer she looked at the woman, the more severe her reality turned.
Logan looked up to find John at the foot of the stairs.
John had just climbed into bed when the woman woke up. He heard the bedroom door open and a heavy silence after that. She had been asleep all day. Not to mention behaving oddly. However, he was still trying to understand her modus operandum. He didn't know her, not yet. But John knew women, especially of the same professional vein. He knew how they operated and what influenced their behavior. Money, power controlled by sex or drugs. It took less than five minutes of being in her living room to realize she was driven by one thing:
Her father.
With her somewhat uncommon accomplishments and a single motive, Logan was not the typical femme fatale he had experienced when working. She wasn't a scorned woman hellbent on revenge. Just a daughter trying to make her dad proud.
Across the room, his door eased open. He hadn't heard her approach. But as quickly as she arrived, she left, shutting the door and where she went after that, he presumed her bedroom. A recent transgression in New York drove him out of the state. He wouldn't consider it was fleeing, but it was starting to look that way. Without a car, a home, and allies dwindling with every passing second, he made a brass decision and called an old friend.
Absentmindedly, he thumbed the wedding band along with his ring finger. He did have a Marker, provided by Winston just an hour before he elected John excommunicado. At one point, he had a dog, but a run in on the outskirts of New Jersey had separated them somehow, and he was alone again. Now, a heavy international bounty hung over his head. People were looking for him. Thousands, maybe millions.
"I'll kill them... I'll kill them all.."
John dragged a hand down his face. This was only the beginning, and it was going to get worse. Still, he did not regret his decision to kill on Continental ground. Using the Marker provided by Winston to his advantage, he reached out and far back into his history. Caldron Ryder was a man he met just before John met Helen, before everything. Where John was on his first and only engagement, Caldron was on his third. They met eye to eye on many things, but Caldron was not nearly as deep into the underground as John. Before, he was in the private military sector, conducting mostly in the Middle East and a few times off the coast of Africa, fighting Yemen pirates. So when-
Shouts. From the bottom floor.
Snapping free of his dark, and rather ironic, past, John lifted his head to listen. It grew louder in volume and tenacity, splitting into two voices.
Logan.
Throwing the covers back, John bolted for the door. Flying around the corner, he might have touch two stairs before he was ground level, pushing through the pain flaring around his stitches and abrasions.
A gun went off, and a muzzle flashed.
Unarmed, John halted and took cover. In the heavy silence that followed, he heard Logan panting. He flipped on the living room light, spotted the top of her head across the room just before the patio door. It hung open, allowing the cool night air to carry the smell of blood. Logan looked up with wide eyes, but he couldn't see much else, not over the couch that separated them.
He took a step and stopped just as something small and dark wiggled out from beneath the coffee table. A pit bull rushed to his side. His pit bull.
But how?
Upon spotting John, the dog yipped and cried excitedly, bouncing on his stubby legs and wagging with such fervor, it shook his entire body.
John continued around the couch, and the scene unfolded before him: Logan was wearing nothing but a large t-shirt that fell just past her hips. Fine blood spatter had landed on her bared thighs, her large shirt, and her face. Her brown hair was in tangles around her shoulders. In her right hand was a Sig Sauer P226 Legion grey 45 S&W pistol. Double stack. Double action. Where had she hidden that? He studied the dead woman's face, how her mouth was open wide either from a scream or...that Logan had stuffed the barrel into her mouth.
The pooling blood, a thick, crimson halo beneath the woman's head, now caught the living room's lights. His dog brushed his ankle and whined.
"You must be John Wick." Weary from the fight, Logan was breathless, working her lungs to come down from the adrenaline surging through her.
"I am," he said, studying the slack intruder.
She looked down at the dead body, gesturing. "She was looking for you."
"I know." He watched her stand and look around at her arms and legs, assessing where the blood had landed and where it did not.
John waited for her actions to sink in and hysteria to follow. She turned to shut the patio door, locked it, and drew the blinds down. When she looked back at him, she loosed a breath and grimaced. He could see the subtle tremor along her shoulders with every measured breath dragged through her lungs. He assumed it was possibly her first kill. It had been quite some time since he felt that surge. The killing was an extension of him, like the sound of his voice or the color of his eyes. The rapid heartbeat. The tingling limbs and pupil dilation. He lost that feeling years ago.
When it was clear Logan wasn't going to spiral into a panic attack or call the cops, John came to kneel beside the corpse.
"Who is she?" Logan asked, keeping her distance.
"That's what I'm trying to find out," he muttered.
Setting down the weapon, she disappeared into the kitchen. While she rummaged, he pulled up the ski mask, revealing a woman who looked younger than Logan. Dark hair, heavy makeup. Familiar, in a way, but John was certain he had never seen her before. He checked her pockets for a wallet and cell phone; both told him she was related to Ms. Perkins. A sister, maybe a cousin to the assassin he once knew. Like John, Perkins had conducted business on Continental ground, business involving him nonetheless. Her death was inevitable, but not by his hands. Winston, the establishment and fellow businessman's owner, spared John, with a grace period of one hour. Perkins was not offered such convenience.
He flipped through the pictures on her cell phone.
Nightlife. Self-portraits. A livelihood of vodka, sequins, and sex. But nothing revealed to him she was a hitman or even close to such a profession.
Cannon fodder. Someone must have sent her as a test to see how close she could get. More than likely convinced her, John had killed Ms. Perkins, a scorned woman hellbent on revenge. There were too many people hunting him to decide who was responsible.
But, at the very least, they knew he was in Texas.
And this was only the beginning.
HollyHobbit13: I took your advice! As you can see, haha! I went with the translation because, well, I feared the title may divert readers, but you are right; it is a huge part of John Wick and should be recognized. So thank you. Also, I wrote John's POV like you requested (did I bomb it?). You really are a great help for me and never think you are overstepping your bounds.
Iona: You're welcome! Thank you for reading and reviewing!
Guest(s): Oooof! You guys are too kind!
Thank you for reading/reviewing, as always.