chapter one hundred and four

The black sedan had not moved from the driveway. I retrieved my cappuccino and hunched behind my car for a minute, observing the house. It became obvious that though the engine was running, there was no one in the car, at least not in the driver’s seat. Perhaps Viola was alone and unattended in the rear of the car! If that were the case, it would be a simple feat to rescue her with minimal risk to all involved.

I crept across the street as stealthily as I could, hid behind a thin tree, and then ambled nonchalantly along the sidewalk with my coffee, as if passing a pleasant walk in the neighbourhood. I managed to steal right up to the black car without being sighted by anyone that looked like they had a criminal record. I mustered up my courage and yanked the back door open, but the car was vacant. I was feeling rather exposed on the driveway, in view of all the front windows, so I trotted over to the front door and put my ear against it. I heard nothing, so I grabbed the handle and slowly opened it. The spacious foyer was empty, but there were muffled voices coming from somewhere on the left, deep inside the house. I tiptoed a few paces and scurried into the white sitting room. I could hear the voices more clearly now. I poked my head around the corner and saw a hallway leading to what I presumed were several bedrooms. There were no doors in my line of sight, so it seemed safe to venture down the hallway, at least for a bit.

I pressed myself against the wall and sidled slowly down the carpeted corridor, becoming more and more certain as I moved that there were at least two people in the room at the end of the hall. One was a yappy, bossy male. A second man interjected agreement or emphasis on occasion. As I paused near the end of the hall, I clearly heard a female voice protesting that she was trying hard but needed more time. My head prickled at the sound of Viola’s fearful words. I stopped in my tracks and pondered my next move. Perhaps I should retreat and wait for Cameron and his team. Maybe I should stay hidden and gather what information I could. Or was it possible that I was the person that God had sent to find and rescue Viola? The inequality of one woman armed only with a lukewarm, half-empty cappuccino going up against two thugs never crossed my mind.

Wanting to use the element of surprise, I hurried my last few steps and inserted myself confidently into the room where the voices were coming from. At first glance, the room appeared empty, and I exhaled with relief. Then I heard a commotion which came through an open door behind the large canopy bed. A walk-in closet, I deducted. I heard a man barking an impatient order and then a loud slap followed by a woman’s whimpering. I grabbed a small stone sculpture from a side table and marched over to the closet.

“That’s enough!” I yelled as I crossed the closet threshold, the immobilised Inuit woman carved in grey held high above my right shoulder. Two men whirled around to face me, both of them with handguns hanging at their sides. I decided my time would be better spent trying to disarm them than to think about all the flaws in my impulsive plan of action. I brought Mrs. Inuit down with all my might on the man nearest me, while tossing what was left of my caffeine fix into the face of the second criminal a few feet to his left.

Viola, who had been stuffing clothes into a suitcase, leaped into action and began to scratch with those marvelous red nails at the coffee-stained man’s face and hands. He waved his gun crazily as he tried to get away from her sharp claws and fired a shot into the ceiling. Meanwhile, the man whom I had introduced to Mrs. Inuit staggered briefly against the back wall, then raised his gun in my direction as he gave his head a few slow shakes. Hoping that his reflexes were sufficiently compromised, I delivered my best roundhouse kick to his forearm and watched his hand move to the left and down before his finger pulled the trigger. A sudden puff of torn carpet near his foot showed how close I had come to being successful at incapacitating him with a leg wound.

I lunged toward the smoking gun and tried to wrestle it out of his grasp. Viola and her thug were grunting and screaming in their own corner. Combat in such small quarters is never recommended and can be extremely dangerous, but I thought we had the upper hand. I was wrong. Within minutes, both of us had been flung to the floor and firearms shoved into our faces. A small red lump on the side of thug number one’s head and a few nasty scratches stained with coffee on thug number two’s face had not been enough to secure Viola’s release. In fact, now they had two females to bargain with.

“Don’t try anything stupid,” the man glaring down at me murmured.

Thanks, buddy, but I could have used that advice about ten minutes earlier. I shot a glance over at Viola and saw that her brief bravery had disappeared. She had drawn up her legs and was hugging herself, sobbing quietly. I felt sick to my stomach. What had I just done?