Come With Me

A cool breeze blew in through a cracked window in the dead of night, jolting Amelia Florence awake. She had never been a heavy sleeper, and due to her line of work, probably never would be. She’d been living off one to two hours of sleep with black coffee for good measure, for years, and it really didn’t seem like she was going to stop anytime soon. Whatever. With her left hand Amelia blindly grabbed for her cold, metal alarm clock, bringing it close to her face. 1:42 AM, it read.

Damn, she thought to herself. I’ll just get up now.

Despite getting hardly two hours of sleep, the woman rolled herself out of bed and turned on her lamp by forcefully yanking the chain. It always stuck, and it was probably time for her to get a new one. Whatever. After trying multiple times, the lamp finally came on, completely lighting up her one-room apartment like it was a christmas tree. Amelia traveled around a lot, and was never in her permanent home for more than a week at a time. Her apartment was decorated with the bare essentials, with the obvious choices of furniture scattered around her apartment in a seemingly random way. A dark wood dining table with one matching chair sat in the leftmost corner by the kitchenette, with her red plaid mattress laying bare on the ground parallel to the kitchenette. The only thing that really stood out in her barren home was her black firearms cabinet, filled to the teeth with guns and ammunition of all sorts. Amelia Florence was one tough cookie.

After a quick stretch that soothed her aching body, Amelia made her way to the dull powder blue tiled washroom, quickly combing her hair and getting a good look at herself. The 6’2” lady wore her hair in a shaved-on-the-side style, with her hair color being a surprisingly eye-catching ash brown. Ms. Florence’s eyes were a bright emerald green with little gold flakes caught in them that really showed when she was out in the sun. Her face (and the rest of her body, for that matter) were decorated with light brown freckles, adorning her build like diamonds on a lavish watch or an ornate wedding band. She may not sound attractive to you, but she certainly was to many women in foreign countries- our leading lady was a bit of a player.

Those bright green eyes of hers trailed off after brushing her pearly whites, intently focusing on an itty-bitty little red spot located on the right side of her neck. Directly after spitting gritty white toothpaste into the sink Amelia examined the spot, rubbing at it with her pointer finger. Probably lipstick, the brunette thought as a smug look crossed her young freckled face. Or blood.

Once Amelia was finally finished with her morning routine, our green-eyed ‘heroine’ headed out and left for work at exactly 2:30 AM, packing heat like an oven door. On just about every other day, the twenty-four-year-old would have already been out and about, cutting lives short in the sacred name of cold, hard cash. However, Amelia couldn’t help but have this lingering feeling that today was different. Maybe today’s client will put up a fight for once. It’s too easy silently slaughtering someone. I need something different.

The sun wasn’t close to showing itself through the early morning clouds, and that was just the way the short-haired girl liked it. Too many people were out when the sun was up, so naturally a hitwoman wouldn’t be that fond of working in the daylight. With a bored look, Amelia opened up her email on her throwaway work phone, double-checking the location for today’s mission. Hey, she didn’t want to show up at the wrong spot guns-blazing again. That was a complete nightmare to clean up.

Boom, Amelia confirmed the location with her client, asking him to quietly leave the premises until it was 6 o’clock. That gave her plenty enough time to kill, dispose, and clean. That mantra repeated itself inside of Ms. Florence’s head each and every mission.

Kill. Dispose. Clean.

Her client replied, sending along a photo of Amelia’s target, a woman. A woman? I’ve never killed a woman before, she thought, studying the young lady’s features. A bitter taste grew in her mouth as she continued to survey the photo. The girl sure was pretty, looking around 19-20 with long, wavy mocha colored tresses that went down to her mid-back. The image portrayed the woman smiling without a care in the world, the golden sun shining in her amber-colored eyes and on her lightly tanned skin. The portrait struck a chord in Amelia’s guitar of a heart. Sure, Amelia had no problem slaying men, but women? Women were her bread and butter. She lived for companionship of women. Amelia Florence did not kill women.

The dame was supposedly her client’s wife, one that he had quickly grown tired of. They called her Cordelia Holiday and she worked as a lounge singer in a local casino. Amelia felt a sudden surge of rage brewing like a lightning storm on a dry summer night, deep in the pit of her stomach. She can’t be above twenty-one, our freckled protagonist thought. And this pig wants her dead because she won’t put out anymore. Screw him.

Was it wrong for Ms. Florence to feel this way about obeying a client’s orders? Yes, it most certainly was. She had been trained to suppress any feelings she had about her targets and/or her clients, and this completely threw everything out the window. Amelia would not- no, scratch that, physically could not murder this innocent, young woman. Cordelia Holiday had her whole life ahead of her, and there was no way in hell that Amelia would be the one to rip that away from her.

Forty minutes had passed since Amelia Florence had her game-breaking revelation, forty long minutes spent driving to the location and plotting her pseudo-heroic plan. Surrounded by the illegally tinted fiberglass windows that formed her bulletproof car, our sapphic ‘heroine’ went over her procedure one last time for good measure. Amelia took a deep breath, then began.

Mr. Holiday is already out of the house. It is currently 4:50, She stopped focusing on her thoughts to check the time on the throwaway cell phone. Okay, 4:51. I have about sixty-nine minutes before I absolutely must exit the building- with Cordelia or without. Entering the home, I’ll quickly and efficiently make my way into her bedroom. Amelia pulled out a long cigarette, lit it, and took a slow drag before continuing on with her thoughts. I’ll retrieve her and bring her back to the car, where we’ll ride off into the morning sun together. Hell yeah. The brunette chuckled- after letting out a dry cough due to her cigarette smoke, of course.

Sounds nice, but scratch that. I’ll convince her that I’m her fairy godmother who's come to whisk her away to lalaland or something. I’ll figure it out then. Amelia shoved her tobacco stick deep into the built-in ashtray, effectively snuffing it out before quietly exiting the vehicle.  Maybe this signified a turning point in the freckled woman’s life. Maybe she’d leave her life of loneliness and murder for some random woman she only knew the name of. Amelia stood in front of the home in the monotone grey that only the early morning knew- taking everything in before silently coming in through a first-floor window, as requested by Mr. Holiday himself.

Everything in the two-story home laid still. Cordelia Holiday laid in her bed, silently sleeping like any person in their right mind would be at this hour. Even while unconscious, the twenty-one year old recognized the cold spot in her bed where her husband was supposed to be. If she had been awake, Cordelia would have called for him to come back to bed- he’d grudgingly return from his study to lay with his bride of six months. She’d fall back asleep, he’d wake and return to his study, she’d wake up once again and call him back...rinse, repeat.

Ms. Holiday rolled over and reached for the soul that would lay next to her- long fingers grabbing nothing but cold air. She lazily opened her eyes and sat up, coughing before raising her voice. Time to call the husband. Would she ever get a full night’s rest without his absence waking her up at ungodly hours? Probably not.

“Samuel, come back to bed,” Cordelia’s voice was like early morning fog- beautiful, but cloudy. Her cold, feminine fingers went to rub at her midnight blue eyes, fluttering open once she was finished. The young woman yawned, slowly noticing the slender figure standing at the edge of her bed. Immediately she called for Samuel, before being hushed by the figure. Oddly enough, it felt comforting and kept her quiet. Samuel never had this effect on her.

“Cordelia Holiday, “ The voice spoke, low yet definitely belonging to a woman. “Your husband isn’t who you think he is. My name is Amelia Florence, and I’m here to save your life.” The figure held out her hand, waiting for Cordelia to grab it in response.

Cordelia didn’t know why she reached out for Amelia’s hand. Cordelia didn’t know why she agreed to run from her husband with the hitwoman. Cordelia didn’t know why she let a stranger whisk her away from vague danger. As she viewed the sun rise through Amelia’s car windows, she knew but one thing:

There’s no turning back now.