ROYALE INN

This is not how the plan is supposed to go. That is the only coherent thought that Helen can muster as she stares down that gun.

Everything happens in a choppy blur, swaths of light and movement without meaning and certainly without predictability. The man who must be the kidnapper is upon her at once, his gun never wavering from its attention to Helen and Sophie as he grabs Helen by the arm and slides behind her.

“What the fuck is this?” he demands of the room at large. Eric drags himself to his feet, groaning and he holds both hands to his face.

“Drop the gun,” the police officer orders, as another one, a woman, sidles up behind him. Both hold their guns out and at the ready, too, and all Helen can think is that there are now three firearms aimed squarely at her and her granddaughter.

“Couldn’t just play by the rules, could you?” the kidnapper says. All Helen can see is his arm, covered in the sleeve of a gray sweatshirt, and a hint of a tattoo creeping from his wrist onto his hand.

“I said, drop the gun!” the officer repeats, more angrily.

Helen waits for some move, any move, really. She brought this on all of them. If someone has to get hurt in this, it should be her. She never should have trusted Eric.

“Back out of the room,” the man grasping her arm tells the officers. “Back out and close the door, or the lady and the little girl get it.”

Get it? Helen feels like she is in an action movie. This cannot be happening. Then again, her entire life has felt like a movie—a terrible, tragic movie—since Courtney’s wedding day.

“Let them go,” Eric says. “Take the money.”

Helen sees the gun flick in the direction of the officers. “They’re just gonna let me go? Right.”

“You’re only making this worse for yourself,” the male officer says, taking a step closer. “If you drop the gun now—”

He keeps speaking, but Helen does not absorb any of his words. Suddenly she is thrust forward, and all she can think is that she needs to hold onto Sophie. They hit the ground, hard, and as she rolls over, she sees that the kidnapper has gone down, too. Brent has appeared out of nowhere and has his heel dug into the kidnapper’s back while he holds a gun to his neck. The other officers move in and begin to place the kidnapper in handcuffs.

“You should probably check the fire escape next time,” Brent says as the handcuffs snap into place.

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