Process of Elimination
**RUBY**
One.
Two.
Just pull it bitch. It’s that fucking simple. No more thinking, No more counting. Shoot now, regret later.
My finger twitches. I go to squeeze the trigger like the good little soldier I am and-
“That is the second time you have hesitated,” Antonio says softly and without looking at me, which is good. He knows that turning to face me will piss me the fuck off and make me harder to deal with.
“How do you know?” I quip. “There might have been a number of times that I have had you in my sights already.”
He smirks and I let his face blur into the background so that I don’t actually notice how handsome it makes him look.
Ruiz shifts a little closer to the couch and my left arm flies up. “Back over by the bar, billy, now. Pour yourself another drink.”
Ruiz sneers, his sharp hooklike nostrils flaring as he meanders back over to the Scotch.
The sound of laughter tinkles through the air as the loud Puerto Rican Pop song that had been shaking the foundation suddenly dies and I curse myself when I hear the padded footsteps of bare feet heading this way.
Romany steps inside arm in arm with some nameless female and oblivious to the world around her as usual. My heart jolts at the sight of her, a silent sob bursting in my chest when I see that she is not only unharmed but happier than I’ve seen her in the better part of two years. A tall Latin Gumby follows behind them and it’s almost comical that the three of them have yet to notice the significant change in the atmosphere.
Gumby heads straight past the bar toward the large white sofa saying, “What should I make for dinner, chicas? I was thinking we could throw Ruiz in the lagoon and he could catch us some shellfish with those crooked cuchillos he has posing as teeth.”
“Oh! Lobster! I love lobster!” Blondie says sliding onto the couch next to Jaime who has gone as quiet as the dead in his seat. She glares at him. “Jaime?”
Romany was also headed for the sofa, but suddenly stops midstride, her eyes glued to Jaime as he twirls a finger and points in my direction. She turns around and I grin. It’s all I can do not to look at her while keeping my sights on the demons in the room.
But, even so… the world seems to stop spinning for a moment and my heartbeat slows so dramatically that I can practically count its beats as they punch haphazardly within my chest.
“Ruby!” My name is a broken sob that erupts from her chest as she races toward me and I can’t help it - I try not to, I really, really do - but my eyes fill with hot crocodile tears that spill down my cheeks like rain in the desert after a long dry season of grief. And when she hugs me, I try not to get irritated that she has just shifted my gun arm away from the psychopath in the corner currently bathing in his whiskey glass.
“Ruby! Thank God! Oh God!” She cries, sobbing into my shoulder and dragging my arm down so low I’m forced to refocus my aim on Ruiz’s ugly flat feet. “Oh my God!”
“Ro,” I whisper, blinking away the tears that she so charmingly wrung out of me. “I love you, I do. And I can’t wait to play your human tissue box but this whole stick up thing works best when I have full use of my limbs.”
“Wh-what?” She asks, lifting her swollen eyes from my now sopping black top. “Oh! Oh no! Ruby, wait a minute.” She shakes her head backing away from me and standing in the line of fire between my gun and Ruiz.
*What in the average taco truck?*
“Ro? What the fuck are you doing?” I snap and even Antonio is staring at her as if she’s just pulled the ultimate party foul and peed on the fur rug.
“We’re all good here, Ruby. No one is shooting anyone while I’m here,” she says sternly and I finally direct my eyes away from Antonio to face her in all her ignorance.
I cock my head, studying her attire for the first time. *Who’s fucking shirt is she wearing?* My eyes drift behind her toward the object of extreme hostility.
Ruiz is missing his shirt.
I glimpse Jaime. He doesn’t have one on either, but he *also* isn’t wearing pants.
My gaze goes back to Ruiz.
*That* bastard is wearing pants. And *his* pants match Romany’s shirt.
My gaze narrows on my cousin. “How long did you spend out in the sun?”
She frowns. “Not long.”
I blink. “Did you swallow an excessive amount of saltwater or something?”
One perfectly manicured eyebrow shoots up in irritation and she crosses her arms over her chest indignantly. “No. I did not.”
“Crack?” I can’t help it. Process of elimination.
“No!” she snaps, twirling like a diva and reaching for Ruiz’s glass of Scotch. Without missing a beat, he hands it to her.
*I think I might actually explode.*
Fury consumes me and I drop my left gun arm, raising the right one so high that I can practically tap the barrel on Antonio’s skull. “What in *ttthhheee* fuck have you done to my cousin?”
He sighs. “This is how I got her. She’s a royal pain in the ass.”
“Ha! Look who’s talking, dickhead!” she retorts. “Romeo himself.”
Jaime and ‘el blondo’ both burst into fits of laughter and I’m almost at a loss because I don’t know where in the fuck I am.
I think of Damien and Tiny waiting outside for my signal. Both of them with hearts in their eyes just barely balancing on the tips of their dicks as they wait for their princess to come running out of the house to safety. Then I spy Romany at the bar giggling at something that borderline serial killer Ruiz has just slithered into her ear and I begin to realize something…
My baby cousin is a slut.
“Ruby,” Antonio’s deep, rumbling tenor vibrates through my stupor.
“What?” I bark through clenched teeth.
He’s looking at me, I can feel it. This is what happens when you hesitate and you don’t pull the fucking trigger. All hell breaks loose and before you know it you are standing in the middle of a *very* fucked up reality.
I should have pulled the trigger.
“Can we please talk?” Antonio pleads.
Finally, I look him in the eyes… and I lower my gun.
I can still see him. The way he looked when he had me locked away in his mansion. Those eyes of his, they haven’t changed at all. I don’t know what it is they think they’re looking at when they focus on me. I don’t know what it is they see. But there is more in them when they look at me than I’ve ever seen in any other pair and I *hate* it.
I hate it because… it makes me feel.
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