Zanshin
**RUBY**
“We’re here,” say shortly, signaling the cab driver to take a right and park in what is seemingly the middle of nowhere, but that I know is a ledge just ten feet above the rendezvous point Tiny sent me. “Pay him,” I snap, shooting Damien a look as I leap out of the car. He’s been quoting bullshit at me for the last forty minutes and it’s about as serious to me as a hangnail. If he should fall behind or become collateral held by a New Zealand Cab, I’m not going to be terribly put out.
I gaze down at my clothes, a sleek selection of black attire that I fitted myself with back at Alex’s. It was Stella’s, and not exactly my style, but it would get the job done. Except now that I’m thinking on it… I should have picked something green, because the sun is bright and the ground is as lit as a coked out stockbroker on Wall Street. I literally might have to tear off some tree branches and then tape them to my outfit in order to blend in the way I want to. The way I’m used to.
The sound of the taxi roaring away and the incessant yapping of Damien’s lip, has me turning around to face the road as he walks up. I study the crossroads here and by the main highway. There aren’t a lot of different directions that Ruiz’s men or his father’s men can come from when they decide to show. And today being the grand premiere, I’m willing to bet those bastards aren’t very far off from this spot *right* now. Maybe they rented a place further up the hillside or maybe they didn’t, but it’s only about noon, so those vampires won’t be showing their faces until they can exploit the cover of darkness like a secret weapon. They’re simple like that.
Pussies.
“What now?” Damien asks. “Where is he?”
With an eyeroll meant to silence the devil, I text Tiny, telling him to look up, then I pocket the phone and carefully squeeze between the bushes, careful to jump very lightly once I reach the edge of the cliff. I land with a soft thud in the grass, not two feet from where Tiny sits in the bowels of another bush. Then, I move, making adequate space for Tarzan to come tumbling down the way I planned for him to, but praying that he has sense enough not to scream.
The crash that I hear, followed by the ever so satisfying wheeze of air, is more than enough to brighten my mood when I look down to see Damien on his back and gasping for air.
Kneeling down next to him, I say, “Forgot to tell you about that last step. My bad. Your lungs should be fine in just a minute, yeah? Stop thrashing.”
He flips me off, inhaling sharply as his wind finally returns. “Bitch. You did that on purpose."
“One hundred percent,” I tell him, giving him my back as I crawl down next to Tiny. “Let me see.”
Tiny passes me a pair of goggles and points me straight ahead to about five to six hundred feet across the ravine, where the road slopes downward. There sits a series of army tents and a good amount of firepower. Firepower that we’re going to need to turn this clusterfuck in the right direction once night falls. Or… with any luck… by lunchtime.
One by one the men wandering about the tents scramble toward the edge of the embankment. Each of them clumsily poised on the head of Newton’s hammer. All it’s going to take is one of them to fall, or in this case…
“Hmm,” I murmur. “Do I even want to know what they’re looking at?”
Tiny snickers. “I doubt it’s anything you haven’t seen before.”
“How many?” I ask, excitement bubbling in my veins as I realize I’m going to get to go over there and kill something.
“Five out, five in. I figured I’d get the sleepers first and then take out the others one silent smile at a time. But now that you two are here…”
“I’m betting on you for the win, Tiny. Don’t you dare disappoint me,” I say softly, ignoring the disguised ‘fuck you’ that Damien coughs out the side of his mouth, much like he does the promises he makes to friends.
*I can pretend each and every one of them is Alex. In fact… I might even call them Alex as I slit the bastards’ throats. How perfectly therapeutic. Like… role play.*
“Okay. Let’s do this,” I say, handing Tiny the goggles as I stand and survey Damien’s hopeless ass. “I’ll take the five in the tents and the tone closest to the edge. You guys can handle four together, right?”
“We can handle more than that,” Tiny argues.
I shake my head. “Nope. Uh-uh. You see, because you two are pretty big fucken guys. It’s almost twelve in the afternoon. Your shadows are going to ride on those men like a bad omen blotting out the sun. And… on top of all that. You’re loud. You both are. We do it my way, or I do it alone. Understood?”
“Yes ma’am,” Tiny replies.
Damien stares back at me, all sorrow and bullshit. “I’m s-”
“Don’t say it!” I hiss. “Don’t you dare apologize, you fucking ‘Let Down’. There’s nothing you can say beyond ‘I’m a failure’ that I want to hear.” I step into his face and smile. “Confucius says, the man that cannot control his cock, cannot control his asshole. And an asshole that you cannot control only ever spews bullshit. Therefore, you may not be getting pegged, Damien, but you’re weak. Unreliable. A hemorrhoid that cannot be seated with. But look on the bright side, if I ever need a bodyguard again, I know who *not* to choose.”
“Ruby that’s not-”
“Are we going to do this? Because now’s the time,” Tiny says, presenting us with two knives a piece.
“Yup,” I say, looking away from my old friend. “If we’re quick. We might even be able to stop down at the beach and enjoy a meal with my new friend Antonio. Maybe even grab a bite of Spanish sausage for lunch. Ey Damien?”
“Spanish sausage?” Tiny asks as the four of us make the quick climb back up the ledge.
“Yeah,” I say easily. “It’s just something I’ve been craving.”
“Uh-huh,” he replies, shaking it off as we curl around the foliage and dip past the highway like a couple of ghosts and one lying sack of shit.
The moment we come up on the tents, a sense of rightness washes over me. Peace and tranquility. Something they call Zanshin.
I am at home here, in my element. I am relaxed here. One with my actions and one with the blade.
And it only takes about thirty good seconds to take out every Alex on the hill, before we’re grabbing a few choice pieces of steel and strolling down the road toward the great big house on the water. Hoping that we haven’t missed lunch.
Log in with Google Account
Chapters
Favorite
Settings
