Winning ticket

Chapter 5

You awake to the sound of muffled talking, a female and male voice you think.  The pain from your head makes it hard to concentrate. 

Forcing your head upright you try to open your eyes but instead just let out a groan of pain.  You try again and feel more pain coming from the left side of your face, just above your eye.  The splitting headache you have is making you dizzy, even moving slightly has you clenching your eyes shut from pain.

Reaching out you go to touch your forehead but wince in pain from the contact.  Quickly withdrawing your hand you take a second to inspect the wet substance you touched.  On the tips of your fingers you see blood. 

What? 

When did that happen, just like that the memories come flooding back.  The last thing you remember is getting tossed in a van, the pain your feeling must be from getting hit on the head with the gun.

Shit this isn't good.

Now you have no choice but to work through the pain and take in your surroundings.

Overcoming the dizziness you start to look around.  You can't tell where you are, it's dark and damp, maybe underground.  Moving your head to the left you see a tall, built man dressed in all black, he has a bruise on his forehead. 

Seeing the bruise brings forward a memory but you can't afford to get lost in your head right now.  You slide your eyes down to see what he's standing over when you spot Vee who's bound to a chair beside you, the right side of her face is red. 

Double shit.

"Nice of you to join us."  He mocks, moving to stand in front of you.

"What's going on?"  You ask, still trying to get your bearings.

"I think it's pretty obvious what's happening, don't you think?"  Two men from behind you laugh in return, you flinch at the noise.  "I'm here to collect on the bounty."  He explains.

"The bounty?  There's no bounty on me, at least not anymore."  You explain, the pain is becoming somewhat mangable now.

The man lets out a loud laugh before gripping your shoulder with punishing force. 

"Actually it's now two million dollars.  So well done!"

That can't be true, you made a deal with the company.  Why would they do this? 

"Not that I need a reason to kill you.  We have history after all."

History?  What is he talking about, you've never met this man before--your eyes widen in recognition. 

He grins back down at you, and flicks your head wound, "There it is."  He draws out, bringing his hand back to his matching head wound.

You now know why the bruise looked so familiar, he is the assassin you had the unfortunate luck of meeting in the alley a couple days ago.  You knocked him out with his own gun, after kicking him in the groin. 

You need to get out of here, and quickly.

He must see the panic on your face and guesses what you're about to do.  The next moment his hand lashes out and strikes you hard against the face.  You let out a sound of surprise and pain, he struck you on the left side of your face.

"Ah ah.  Where do you think you're going?  We're just getting started." 

He motions to the men behind you, one comes over and holds down your shoulders forcing you to stay seated. 

The pain from getting hit is still fresh but the surge of anger and panic has you struggling to escape the hold you're in.  Seeing you struggle makes his grin even bigger.  He steps back from you and moves around to Vee.  This makes you more nervous as you look between the two of them.  Richard see's this and his eyes light up in delight.