The Story of Blood and Roses

"What? Why do you have doubts?" The words were blaspheming. The reports had shown that it was his body that was found inside the car. I had seen them myself.

"The fucker is too cunning for his own good. I know that he is alive," he smirked as he turned away.

"And that's a problem?"

"For Luke? Yes."And I couldn't for the life of me imagine how Luke would be the one who would get into trouble and not Anthony. Because it was Anthony that Cain had been after, he had killed mom.

"And what is Cain's reason for disliking you lot?" I was sounding highly suspicious to myself, but I always came off as a curious person so I was going to use it to my advantage. I just hoped that he didn't see through it.

"Everyone hates a criminal, Mia. It just happened to me that his wife died in the mansion while they were raiding the place. He uses it as a reason, but I know that it's not." I wish I could feel the anger that would please me, but deep down I didn't even know if I could mistrust what he had said. I was never sure if my father had ever loved my mother. Sure, they had been in love back in the day while they were working and new, but mom had always said that he was in love with the idea of the girl who could kill without blinking her eyes and love him in that moment as well. She said that he'd never love the wife, just the agent. I never believed it, but if she said so herself, maybe it had been true. But it was Anthony speaking. My gut said that I should believe him, but the hatred programmed in my brain told me otherwise. So, I trusted my mom. I trusted neither of the men, I trusted her.

I kept silent after that. I didn't know what to say; first, the letters from the mysterious Jasper, and now the cryptic conversation between Luke and Anthony. I consoled myself by saying that whoever Anthony was, knew what happened to dad. There was no other option. On a better note, I had now got the advantage of gaining Anthony's trust. I was sure that he was attracted to me, and in the process of liking me, as well. Did that make me feel good about myself? Yes, extremely.

"Everyone does hate criminals, don't they?" I suddenly spoke up. There was no thought involved. Did they really hate every criminal? I don't know, I don't think so. A lot of people fall in love with criminals, right? Right. What am I even thinking about?

"Mostly other criminals. It's either a sense of guilt playing out or it's a rivalry at its bud or summit. Normal people, they do hate criminals... but they're cool with it... as long as they don't know about it. They are ignorant, they form opinions faster than you can say the word, but they like to not know things."

"You're an opinionated man, Anthony." He tipped his imaginary hat and then got up.

"We all are, Mia." He shoved his hands inside his pocket.

.

We waited for Darcy to call for another hour. It was a precaution that we intended to take so that he could not blame us for ignoring his calls or ignoring his acceptance of the deal. In the meantime, we watched some animes that I had recorded in my free time. He turned out to love them, much to my pleasure. That particular one was a detective anime about kids who solved mysteries. As it turned out, we figured out the mysteries together, much before the characters could and laughed about how we would have had brilliant careers as detectives. Our conversation from earlier was not visited, I all but forgot about it.

When the hour passed, Anthony decided that it was time he left. He asked me to drive with him and take my car from his place so that I could travel to the mansion again the next morning.

I locked up and secured the apartment as Anthony waited for me outside. We walked down the stairs in silence. When we reached outside, I saw Anthony walking towards the car. I jogged towards him as he opened the car. Suddenly his head snapped upwards and he muttered a curse under his breath.

"Down!" He ducked himself. Bewildered I did the same. As I crouched behind the car, I realized that two bullets had been shot. One had missed Anthony by mere centimetres and the other had made a dent in the car's side (by the sound of it).

He slid the door open as he produced his gun out of the back of his jeans and I did the same. As we slid into the car and Anthony slides into the driver's seat. The car drives off, and I feel the adrenaline rushing through my veins.

"Are you alright?" His voice was loud, loud enough to make me jump. I nodded frantically and turned to look at him.

"Are you?" I asked him. His eyes flickered towards me for a second and then widened.

"Shit!" His eyes zoomed on my arm, I followed his gaze.

That was when I realized that there were three bullets.

Well, damn.

Before we could do anything about it, Anthony's phone started ringing. I pulled his phone out of his pocket and picked it up. I was not given the time to speak.

"I hope you liked your present, Anthony. Enjoy."

And then the phone went dead.

"Who was it?" Anthony asked, seething.

"Luke."

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