Well, I had one more piece of information, at least. Bikers wore "cuts." That was, you know, helpful. Yet not at all.
Feeling a rush of queasiness again, I ran around the lower level looking for an unoccupied bathroom before breaking the cardinal rule of parties: Don't Go Upstairs.
I figured it was either go upstairs or vomit in the trash.
It was the lesser of two evils, in my opinion.
I bounded up the stairs, throwing myself into someone's bedroom, then through to their bathroom where I collapsed down on the ground, dry heaving into the toilet.
Of course I wasn't going to actually throw up.
I had nothing in my system but one of those caffeine shot things you can buy at a convenience store. It had tasted like battery acid, but I figured it was well through my system by that point.
Dropping down on the floor with my back pressed to the wall, I took a sort of comfort in the cool tile brushing against my bare legs. It had a stabilizing effect. It helped me be able to focus.
And I needed to focus.
I needed to push all the anxiety and fear away.
I needed to remind myself that I had to do this.
I had no choice.
Or, if I did, it wasn't one I was willing to make.
It was just one night, one action.
One horrible, unforgivable action.
My hand reached into my purse, finding the cavernous thing all but empty save for my wallet, a packet of the anti-nausea medicine, my keys, and the thing that was going to change my whole life.
I'd only touched it once. When I'd taken it from someone who insisted I had to possess it, and put it in my purse.
My hand curled around the metal, finding it cold to the touch and heavier than it looked.
I'd held a gun only once in my life. The night it was given to me along with a set of instructions. Those same instructions that had me hiding out in the bathroom at the Golden Glades Henchmen clubhouse, feeling too sick to move.
Because when I did eventually move, I had to find one of those bikers. And I had to put a bullet in their brain.
I had no idea how I was going to do that.
I'd explained that I had the aim of a toddler, not even able to hit the backboard on a basketball hoop the last time I'd tried.
Excuses, I found out, would get me nowhere.
It was to do this, or to suffer the other consequences. Which were just slightly more unconscionable than picking up the gun and shooting a complete stranger.
It's simple, they'd told me. Just point and shoot.
Simple.
Maybe to someone who didn't value human life.
I did value it.
I mean, sure, did I think my cat was superior to most people? Kind of. But I didn't want to be a part of someone else dying.
I was just testing the placement of my hand on the gun when there were footsteps coming down the hallway, making my stomach tighten as I scrambled back up onto my feet as the footsteps moved into the bedroom I'd walked through.
I was aware of him for a full couple of seconds before he realized I was there, giving me a chance to take him in.
He was tall. Taller than me, and I'd always been tall and a bit lanky. But he was solidly built as well, wide of shoulder, narrow of waist, with what looked like some impressive biceps under the sleeves of his tee.
Whoever he was, he had rich, dark skin and long, black dreads, with a carefully styled, but short, beard, full lips, brown eyes, and a nasty-looking scar on his throat.
Good looking.
Stupidly good looking, actually.
But when my gaze slid from his face toward his body again, there was a gut-punch sensation as I realized what else he was wearing aside from his jeans and tee.
A black leather vest.
Only, they didn't call it a vest.
It was a cut.
It was a symbol of his membership of the bike club.
I managed to hide the gun behind my back before his gaze finally moved in the direction of the bathroom. And therefore me.
There was a silent moment while he looked at me, taking me in.
"There's always one," he mumbled to himself, moving into the doorway, resting his forearm on the doorjamb, leaning his upper body inward slightly. "The upstairs is off-limits," he informed me, in a tone of resigned annoyance. Like, perhaps, the party hadn't been as enjoyable for him as it had been for the other partygoers.
He had a nice voice though, full of bass, and smooth at the same time.
Not that I should have been focusing on his voice. Or his face. Or his body.
The more I did that, the more "real" he would feel to me. Which would make what I had to do all the harder.