Cattie Get Your Gun

Chapter 7

Click.

Click. Click.

I panicked when everything was dark, only to realize I had closed my eyes when the psychopath had pulled on the trigger. The clicking sound was from his repeated attempts and apparent lack of bullets. In the corner, I could hear Lucy had stopped repeating her mantra, and I no longer heard the quiet tapping of her back against the wall as she rocked. When I heard a quiet clattering sound behind me I spun, my heart skipping a beat, only to find Sam leaning casually in the doorway with bullets rolling around his palm. How had that happened? When had he even come in contact with this guy before getting into the room? I glanced back at the man, who was looking toward Sam with a deathly stare.

"You," the man said coldly. "It was you I bumped into in the hallway."

"Really, I'm sorry about that, I should have watched where I was going," Sam said apologetically, tucking the bullets into his pockets. "So, where were we? Oh, yes, you were about to try to kill us. Care to share why?" Sam glanced at his watch as he moved more into the room. "I have time. I know how you psychopaths enjoy your good ramble."

"Sam, I'm going to kill you," I said under my breath, to which he replied with a small shrug.

From the hallway came a sound of slapping feet and everyone froze until Melany appeared in the doorway, her hair still a mess and the blood under her nose now dried. She looked nearly straight past everyone in the room until she saw Lucy in the corner, dashing over to her and helping the shaking little girl to her feet. She crouched down, keeping the girl's back turned to the psychopath as she tried to whisper soothingly to the girl. The psycho glanced at us all with disgust, as if we were no more than vermin in his eyes. The closest thing to vermin around there was the rat's nest on his head. He pulled back his hand holding the useless gun as if he was about to throw it, but soon thought better of it. He spun and smashed through the window of the room, quickly scrambling over the ledge as Sam and I ran to the other side of the bed. When we looked out the window, we could already see he had landed on the ground just a floor below and had taken off running.

"Mel, get her out of here," I instructed and Melany quickly led Lucy out of the room by the hand as she began to talk about going on a search for vending machines. "Sam, make sure someone knows about the mess in here. A young nurse, one who won't ask questions." I looked at Jack lying in the hospital bed, so peacefully oblivious to all the insane things that had just occurred around him. "I'll find Nolan. We need to look at the stuff he found. Tonight we should all meet up at the basement to go over it."

"So you're on board with this?" Sam asked, raising his eyebrows.

"Our parents knew something and there's someone out there who thinks we're a threat. Authorities would never take us seriously."

"That guy, you know he's going to come back, right?"

I sighed, looking out the window with the jagged pieces of glass around the edges. "I know." I turned back to Sam with a smirk. "But no pressure."

Sam just rolled his eyes before walking out of the room, playing with one of the bullets as he walked. I looked at Jack one more time before leaving the room, remaining halfway down the hallway until I saw a young nurse walk into the room with a dust pan and broom, a wad of cash sticking out of her back pocket. From what I could tell, Sam gave away money more easily than C-listers gave out autographed headshots. I shook my head with a small smirk as I turned, nearly ramming right into an older woman in a wheelchair that bore a striking resemblance to Jack.

"Mrs. Murray," I said, nearly kicking myself for sounding so surprised about seeing her. "I think they're just cleaning up a-"

"Oh, Cattie," she interrupted, reaching out to grab hold of one of my hands with a bright smile on her face. "I haven't seen you since you were a toddler."

"Uhhh..."

"I'm so glad you kids are all seeing each other again." She shrugged, pursing her lips. "The circumstances could have been better, but still nice all the same. I always knew that Sam Poppy would be a terrible driver. No focus."

"I, um..."

"Spit something out, girl, you look like a dying cow."

"That's where Jack gets his charm." My hand flew over my mouth instantly. "I'm sorry, now isn't really the time for-"

Mrs. Murray waved her hand dismissively. "If you didn't have some sass in you, I wouldn't believe you were your mother's daughter."

My hand slowly fell back down to my side as I stared at Mrs. Murray. "You knew my mother?"

"Yes, I did." Mrs. Murray looked down at her lap for a moment so I could not read the expression on her face before she looked up at me again with a smile. "When Jack gets better, you should come over for dinner. I have some old pictures of your family you may enjoy."

"That's really-"

"Don't even try to deny the invitation. I will roll my way to where you live and force your ass into a seat at my house for dinner."

I let out an unexpected laugh that caused a passing nurse to shush me as if she was some kind of librarian. "Sure, I'd love to."

Mrs. Murray patted my knee with a smile as she rolled by, heading toward Jack's room just as the nurse was leaving with a dustpan full of glass. I could see Mrs. Murray beginning to look over her shoulder at me and quickly made my way down the hallway to avoid answering any questions. The less anyone else knew about what had happened, the better. Keeping things secret had never been a problem for me, but something of this magnitude would be difficult to keep under wraps. It was like saying I had carried a kitten once so now I could carry a lion all the way up a mountain just as easily.

Later on that night I managed to get over to the Fosco Gun Shop, but I could not stay for long since Nora was under the impression I was abiding by house arrest rules while she was at work. Oh, the grand ol' honor system, and its ability to be manipulated by smarter-than-you-realize adolescents since the very dawn of time. Down in the basement I found Sam lying on the couch, holding an older looking piece of paper above him as he studied it carefully. Melany was sitting on the floor, looking over the lock on the safe with a set of tools lying on the ground next to her. Nolan was over in the corner on a laptop, doing who knows what but clicking a lot with his mouse as his eyes scanned pages quickly. Damn genius speed-reader.

"So," I said, settling down on the floor next to Melany. "All we have to do is figure out what our parents discovered that got them killed, why we're considered threats, who that guy was that tried to kill Jack, who the other guys were that invaded the CIA headquarters, who is running this whole attack on us, and how we're going to go about sorting all this out?"

"Well," Melany sighed, "let's get to work."