The Guilty Innocent (17 page)

“That makes perfect sense to me. I hope our meals will not take much longer, I'm absolutely famished!” Elise stated as she peered in the direction of the kitchen, as if she could will the food from the kitchen to the table.

I suppose they would be hungry, the last time they had eaten was on the plane. I wondered if the cat people ate as fast as the wolf breed? After a twenty-five minute wait, our waiter returned with our food. He placed plate after plate on the table in front of us. Sergio and Devin began to tear into their food even before the waiter had finished placing all of the dishes. Elise cut into her honey glazed pork chops, slowly carving the meat into bite size portions.
I
began to eat my breakfast, it was delicious. The funny thing was,
I
had no idea how hungry I truly was until I started eating. I was grateful that this was a restaurant that served American cuisine. I was able to order something I was used to, not that I'm at all opposed to trying new and exciting things. Sergio and Devin were finishing up their meal even before Elise and I were halfway through with our own. Elise came in third place, but something told me, she could eat just as fast as the other two, but I suppose that wasn't her style. I couldn't finish my breakfast and had put down my fork. I settled into my scat and looked at the others, noticing that Devin and Sergio were looking at my plate. Sergio caught me looking at him and quickly averted his gaze. Devin, however, continued to stare.

“If you're not going to finish that, can I have it?” Devin asked. He gave me a boyish grin. “I hate to see food go to waste,” he added.

Sure you do,
I thought, then I nodded and without another second wasted, his hand darted out several times to scooped up the remaining portions of my breakfast. We sat in the restaurant talking. We discussed our favorite television shows, music and movies, anything to kill time while we waited. It turned out that Elise and I enjoyed a lot of the same things, go figure.

About 12:28 in the afternoon, I looked up to see Nikolai entering the restaurant. The hostess greeted him at the door and escorted him to his seat. He sat down and opened the menu, I was grateful that he did not notice us. His eyes scanned over the menu then darted towards the entrance. Five minutes later, Dmitri walked through the door, he walked over to Nikolai's table. Dmitri was about six-foot-four, with long blonde hair pulled into a ponytail and a pair of dark sunglasses covered what I knew to be his aqua blue eyes. He was dressed in a light grey button shirt and slacks, his long dark grey trench coat came down to his calves. Dmitri carried with him a black leather briefcase which he placed on the floor beside the booth. He removed his sunglasses as he sat down in the chair across from Nikolai. He pushed the briefcase over to Nikolai with his foot and gestured for the waiter to come to their table.

“That's the man I saw in my vision, the one that knew about our visit!” I whispered to the others as they glanced unnoticeably at Nikolai and Dmitri. “What are they talking about?” I asked.

Sergio turned to look at me, he shrugged. “My Russian is shitty, I'm only getting incoherent babble.” He confessed, then he looked at Devin and chuckled. He pointed at Devin. “He's probably hearing, 'whaa whaa whaa, babble babble'.” Devin tossed him a sarcastic expression then rolled his eyes in a playful manner.

“Yeah, so we're both useless, Elise knows,” Devin said.

We all looked towards Elise. She sat in her seat silently, her eyes focusing on the table cloth as if in deep thought. She must have known we were looking at her because she looked up questioningly.

“Translate.” Sergio said as he smiled charmingly at her. She looked at him, her lips slightly parted as if she were going to say something, but thought against it. She took a deep breath and began to translate.

“He just ordered a cup of coffee and he is telling Nikolai that he knows about his affair with the boss's girlfriend.” Elise said as she continued to listen to their conversation. We sat at the table silently waiting for Elise to continue.

“Nikolai has a gun under the table, now the other is asking him about us,” she said softly. “They believe we are associates of Nikolai's. He's telling Nikolai that their boss wants him to stop sleeping with Lidiya.” Elise shook her head. “What an idiot to sleep with a Russian mafia boss's girlfriend.” She said, her French accent lacing all of her words, making them sound elegant.

“Now Nikolai tells him he meant no disrespect and Dmitri said 'of course not' not truly believing Nikolai. Dmitri still wants to know who we are.” Elise's eyebrows were creased as she listened intently. “He is telling him that we are friends of his from out of town. Dmitri thinks he's lying and wants to make sure he did not tell us anything, Nikolai said he did not, Dmitri seems satisfied.” Elise said then she took a sip of her juice.

I continued to watch their table the entire time as Elise translated, I could see the fear in Nikolai's eyes as he stared at the coldness of Dmitri's gaze. Nikolai set the briefcase on the table and opened it, a smile spreading across his face as he nodded approvingly. He then closed the briefcase. Dmitri finished his coffee and rising from his seat, said something else to Nikolai as he prepared to leave.
I
didn't want him to get away, I looked towards Sergio, who seemed to know my intentions and he rose from his chair followed by Devin and then myself. Before we could get close to them, Elise called out to us, we turned to look at her. A second later,
I
heard an eruption of screams, people became hysterical, pushing past us and each other as they rushed towards the exit. Sergio leaped high into the air over four tables and landed in front of Dmitri, grabbing hold of his coat. Dmitri swung the leather briefcase, attempting to hit Sergio in the face, but Devin snatched the case from his hands. I looked back towards Nikolai and found him slumped over the table. Blood began to seep from the bullet wound in his head, forming a puddle.
I
never heard a gunshot, Dmitri must have used a silencer and of course someone saw the assassination and started this chaos. Dmitri struggled in Sergio's vice-like grip. He pulled his gun from his inside pocket but Elise caught his hand and began to crush the bones. I could
hear
the crunching sound of his bones breaking! Dmitri cried out from what must have been agonizing pain and dropped his gun, which convinced Elise to ease up on his injured hand.

Elise began to speak to him softly in Russian, he shook his head stubbornly, proving that he was not going to be a team player. Sergio grabbed his chin in a powerful grip, forcing his eyes to meet Elise's. Devin stood beside them, still holding the briefcase. Elise spoke to the man again and this time when he tried to refuse, Sergio's grip tightened as if he were trying to crush the man's jaw. Dmitri cried out and began to speak rapidly in Russian to Elise. I supposed he was telling her he'd cooperate. She spoke again to him, this time, it appeared he was answering whatever questions she was asking. I began to hear police sirens approaching, I looked towards the door and saw another man dressed in all black, wearing a matching face mask. He entered through the door holding an automatic machine gun. I dropped to the floor and yelled for the others to do the same. Instantly they were on the floor as the gunman sprayed the restaurant with bullets. Dmitri was shot through and through, blood splattered the floor around him as his lifeless body danced erratically as the bullets entered him. The sight of Dmitri being slaughtered scared the shit out of me, I was too scared to move! I didn't want to get shot trying to flee. The man aimed the gun towards the floor, trying to kill us as well. Sergio positioned himself in front of the rest of us as we began crawling towards the kitchen. I cut my hand on a shard of glass from a broken bottle on the floor, but I continued to crawl. Once we made it to the kitchen, Devin and Sergio kneeled inside by the door, waiting for the gunman to come through the double doors. Elise took my uninjured hand and led me towards the back. We moved swiftly across the room until we reached a locked stainless steel door. We turned back to check on Sergio and Devin, the gunman had fired random bullets through the walls of the kitchen. Sergio nodded at Devin and Devin opened the double doors, it was then that we found out there were two gunmen. Sergio leaped towards one of the gunmen, who began to fire several shots into Sergio's chest. Sergio landed in front of him and in a movement almost too fast for me to see, he broke the man's neck then tossed the body to the floor. The other gunman ran out of the door. I watched through the large pane glass window of the restaurant as he climbed into his car and drove away as police patrol cars pulled up.

Three patrol cars took off after the fleeing gunman. Sergio's speed was extremely fast as he retreated back towards the kitchen. One minute I was looking at him standing in the shambles of what used to be a beautiful restaurant and the next, he was standing by the hack door. Elise broke the lock, she took my
good
hand as we all ran through the alleyway away from the restaurant.

I couldn't keep up with their speed, so Sergio picked me up and carried me in his arms as he continued to run. The city scenery past me by in a blur as Sergio ran, it was an amazingly smooth journey. I had expected to be drastically bounced around in his grip, but I wasn't. We stopped at an abandoned store, Sergio place me gently on my feet. Devin broke the wood boards off the door opening and we stepped inside. Devin pulled more boards off of the windows to give us some extra light...well it was probably more for my benefit than theirs, I appreciated it. I looked around, the room smelled musty, rank, kind of mildewy and I could hear the distinctive sounds of tiny feet scurrying across the floor and knew I wouldn't remain here for any length of time. If I saw a rat, I was willing to bet I would run faster than my shape-shifting companions.

Sergio removed his shirt, his chest was covered with blood, both Elise and Devin looked at the blood. From my vantage point, they appeared to lust after it, much like a vampire, but not quite. I hoped they could control themselves, I really did not want to see a shape-shifter in bloodlust...again. Sergio wiped as much of the blood off of his chest with his shirt as he could. He was perfectly healed, not a scar visible, must be cool to be able to do that.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

He looked at me and smiled. Then he pointed to my hand, I looked down to see my right hand covered in blood, I almost passed out. I hated the sight of blood, it always gave me goosebumps. I could even feel the goosebumps on my ass and it was twice as bad if the blood was my own. I felt light-headed and weak. Devin walked over to me and attempted to lick my hand, I snatched my hand away, shaking my head.

“I'm just trying to help you,” he said innocently.

“I know, but Warren said that the shape-shifting gene is in the saliva of a shape-shifter. I don't have anything against you, but I don't want to take any chances...you do understand, don't you?” I asked apologetically. The last thing
I
wanted to do was hurt anyone's feelings, but I had to look out for number one.

“It's okay, I didn't think. That is the main way to transfer the gene. Don't worry,
I
understand. I was born a shape-shifter, so to lick my wounds in order to heal them faster is a normal instinct for me.” Devin said, he eyed me up and down and smiled. “You're a human, I'm sure you want a bandage instead,” he chuckled.

I was relieved that he didn't take offense. “That and some peroxide will do,” I said smiling. Then something he said caught my attention. “What do you mean the 'main' way to transfer the gene?”

“Well, it's in our blood too. So if our blood gets into a human's blood stream, then there's a chance you may or may not be turned. It's strange, but the gene seems to be more potent in our saliva. Go figure.” Devin said with a shrug.

“Oh, I see.” I looked at Elise and Sergio, they were watching me as if I were the most interesting thing they have ever seen. I was beginning to feel like some sort of science project. I decided to change the subject, hoping it would take my mind off of my injury as well.

“Look, guys, we need to get back to the hotel,” I said. Sergio nodded and stepped out of the abandoned building. I was more than happy to leave the building, if I heard the sound of feet scurrying across the floor one more time, I was going to leave them whether they were done regrouping or not. We walked a few blocks and Elise held a cab which drove us to our hotel. A few people looked at us as we entered, Devin had loaned me his blue jean jacket to cover my shirt which now had Sergio's blood on it from when he carried me. Sergio had managed to wipe the last few remaining drops of blood from his chest, but the fact that he was bare-chested aroused attention. Some of the attention was induced by lust. It was a good thing that he was wearing black, it sort of camouflaged the blood that stained his jeans. I had shoved my bloody hand into my pocket, hoping that it was not a deep wound.

We made it into our room and I walked towards the bathroom, I began to cleanse my wounded hand. Elise stood in the doorway, her arms crossed over her full-breasted chest. She watched me rinse off the blood as I rubbed soap into the wound. I winced at the stinging pain that I was causing, but it needed to be done. She walked towards me and looked at my wounded hand. Her eyes examined the long, deep, vicious looking, bleeding wound.
I
found it hard to look at the exposed flesh, I began to feel the tingles of goosebumps all over again.