Pen Pal(83)

My voice high with stress, I say, “Michael, what are you doing?”

Eyes rolling, he replies in a hushed whisper, “He’s with the government, Kayla. He’s with the CIA. He wants information from me. He wants my equations.”

Terrified, I swallow and look at Aidan. He stands perfectly still, every muscle in his body tensed.

My mind is a rabid animal, scratching sharp claws at the inside of my skull.

Where did he get a gun? Does he know how to shoot it? Is it even loaded? He looks homeless—where has he been living? Oh, God, has he been sleeping on the boat?

Though I’m panicked and desperate, I try to keep my voice as calm and soothing as I can. “No, Michael. He’s not with the CIA.”

Spittle flies from his lips when he screams, “He’s with the CIA! He’s trying to steal my equations!”

He jerks his arm up and points the gun at Aidan’s chest.

I’m so frightened, I think I might faint.

Aidan remains perfectly still, his face impassive and his breathing shallow. I see wheels turning behind his eyes and am terrified of what might happen next.

Swallowing a sob, I lift my hands and start pleading. “No, please, listen to me. He’s not with the government. I promise you, he’s not. He’s in construction, okay? He’s my friend.”

Michael licks his cracked lips. He shifts his weight restlessly from foot to foot. That hand holding the pistol is now shaking hard.

Then he slices his wild gaze in my direction.

“He’s…he’s your friend?”

I grasp my mistake when Michael turns the gun toward me. I jerk back a step, a scream caught in my throat.

Aidan says firmly, “No. We’re not friends.”

“She just said you were!”

“I’ve been lying to her.”

Michael looks back and forth between us, then jerks the gun back in Aidan’s direction.

“Lying?”

“So I could get close to her. So I could get your equations.”

Aidan looks at me. What I see in his eyes makes me want to scream, it’s so stupid. So stupid and reckless and so fucking like him, the self-sacrificing fool.

No, God, no, this isn’t happening, this can’t be happening.

He looks back at Michael and says calmly, “Let her go. You and I can talk better if she’s not here.”

“No, Aidan, I won’t—”

“Be quiet, Kayla.”

“I’m not getting off this boat!”

“You are. Right now. Do it.”

Michael’s wild gaze darts back and forth between us. In his eyes, I see nothing of the man I was married to. The psychosis has swallowed him whole.

My pulse is a roar of thunder in my ears.

How can I distract him? What can I hit him with? The fire extinguisher! It’s right over there!

Seeing me looking around in panic, Michael suddenly screams, “You’re with the CIA, too!”

“She’s just scared,” says Aidan. “You’re pointing a gun at her. Anyone would be scared.”

Panting, Michael hisses, “You’re not scared.”

“That’s because of my CIA training. Kayla, get the fuck off this boat.”

Goddammit, Aidan, no! No! Stop this!

Tears stream down my face. My vision is blurred by them. My breathing is labored. I take a halting step backward, then another, hysteria gripping me in a cold, crushing hand.

I can call 9-1-1. If I can make it to the house and Aidan can keep Michael talking, I can call the police and get them here before anything awful happens.

I stop short when Michael says in the barest of whispers, “No. She’s in the CIA, too. I see it on your face.” He looks at me. His voice rises. “You both have to die!”

When I sob and clap my hands over my mouth, Aidan says in a commanding voice, “Nobody has to die. Just put the gun down and we can talk about it.”

Rocking back and forth from foot to foot, his hand shaking and all the whites of his eyes showing, Michael screams, “One of you has to die you have to choose right now who dies who dies who dies if you don’t choose I have to kill you both!”

He points the gun at me again. He points it right at my face. The only reason I don’t topple over is because terror has turned my muscles to stone.

Aidan says, “If we choose, you’ll only shoot one of us?”

My heart stops beating then. It stops dead in my chest, stalled by horror. “No, Aidan, stop it, don’t say another word—”

“Michael?”

“Aidan, no! Stop it!”

Michael screams, “Yes!” and cocks the hammer of the pistol with his thumb.

Aidan looks at me. His heart shines in his eyes. He says softly, “I love you, bunny. I’ll love you until the end of time.”

Then he looks back at Michael and says words I’ll never be able to unhear. They’ll echo in my head for all eternity.

“Shoot me, then.”

Time changes. Everything takes on the surreal quality of a dream. I see what happens next unfold in front of me like a movie played in slow motion with the sound warped and the colors blurred, dragging by at half speed.

Michael swings his arm toward Aidan.

Aidan lunges.

A fireball explodes from the end of Michael’s gun.