Page 50 of Brian and Mina's Holiday Hits
Well, okay then. I follow her in her rampage down the house’s long hallway. We finally find Dinmore cowering under his own desk in his study. I see his shadow under the desk and tilt my head at Mina. She nods and jumps up on the desk like a cat.
“I-I’ve got a gun,” he says.
Stupid fucking thing to say. If you’ve got it, shoot it. I aim my 9mm at the flat wooden panel of the desk and unload the magazine. The bullets go straight through and hit their target. I watch as a pool of blood spreads out under the desk.
“I was going to do it!” Mina shouts.
“Too risky. He had a weapon. I wasn’t going to risk him pulling that same trick on you.”
She leans over the desk to peer underneath at the man.
“He doesn’t even have a gun, Brian. He was bluffing. Dammit!”
“You got to shoot the Butler.”
“It’s not the same.”
“Let’s bury them in the garden with the girl,” I suggest.
She sighs. “Okay.”
The cafeteria is full when we arrive back at the house. They still aren’t used to seeing Mina like this, and it pisses me off the way some of the other girls act around her now. Jealous.Theychose to come here to be trained for the highest bidder. None of us ripped them out of their beds in the middle of the night.
It’s not Mina’s fault if some of them decided a bit too late that maybe they should have stayed in college and stayed in control of their own lives instead of turning a sexual fantasy into their entire personality.
In the hush that falls over the room, the voice of one of the newer girls drifts to my ears. “Look at her. Mina thinks she’s the shit. I’d love to see Brian truly punish her to wipe that smirk off her face.”
There are a few gasps, and I can just make out Annette’s voice to my right. “Oh shit, she didn’t just say that.” Always the concerned house mother.
I can feel my entire face going cold and dark as I slowly turn toward the offending new girl. But before I can move, Mina breezes past me, the click-clack of her high-heeled bootsdeafening in the now silent room. I watch as she grabs the girl by the front of her shirt and hauls her to stand.
“Fiona, you’re still pretty new.” Her words come out crisp and sharp, the way she was with Matsumoto at Easter. “I’m going to give you a chance to apologize before I have to make an example of you in front of everyone.”
Fiona rolls her eyes. “Whatever, Bitch.”
I start in the direction of Fiona when Mina hauls back and smacks the girl hard across the face, leaving a bright red handprint, and then I realize what’s happening. She’s protecting this girl from me. She’s handling it, so I won’t.
I hang back and observe, curious. Everyone in the cafeteria has been stunned into silence by this display.
“I can do whatever I want to you right now and nobody here will stop me,” Mina says, staring her down.
I glance over to find Gabe watching me for my response to this show.
Fiona remains defiant for only a few more seconds before she shrinks back and mumbles, “I-I’m Sorry.”
“I’m sorry, what?” Mina, hisses.
“I-I’m sorry, Ma’am.”
“Good. That was your only warning. You’re on my radar, dear. And that’s a bad place to be.”
Fiona seems to melt back into her chair as Mina takes a good long look around the room. Her eyes finally meet mine, and I raise a brow at her. I see the smallest shrug of her shoulder before she turns to join Annette and another new girl at their table.
Was Mina protecting that girl, or was she protecting my reputation? I don’t even know anymore. Gabe moves closer to me and speaks low so that only I can hear him.
“Do you remember Dmitri Barinov?”
“That slimy bastard Anton wanted us to partner up with?” I ask. I thought we were doing just fine on our own and didn’t need to be bringing any new blood into things. Barinov is too similar to Stryker for my tastes.
