My mind immediately locked onto the solution. I had to assume the emotional talk and my sincere apology had bought me a few minutes of compliance.
"Sasha, listen," I said, my voice now low, controlled, and devoid of emotion. "You need to leave. Right now. You cannot be seen near me. If they find me, they will find you. If you want us to have a future, you have to disappear and act like you never found this motel."
I walked over to my laptop and external hard drive. "I am going to transfer this memory card right now. This virgin anal scene is going to be viral gold, but I can't publish it now. Someone might see and recognize this motel. I can't stay in this city anymore."
"But... where are you going?" she asked, tears drying up as fear took over.
"Far away," I said. "You have to leave immediately. I will pack up my stuff, too." I peeled twelve $100 bills from my cash stash. "If you need a sudden plane ticket or a change of scenery. Don't use your cards. Don't use your real name. You saved my life with the information you have given me."
She took the cash. "But this is twelve hundred...?"
I smiled at her. "Today is your lucky day; I'm giving you a bonus. Now go...!!!"
She nodded, quickly got dressed, then slipped out the door and into the pre-dawn quiet.
I immediately focused on the laptop. The data transfer was already at 95%. I secured the footage, wiped the card, and packed the encrypted drive into its pouch.
As I zipped up my camera bag, I realized she had left her hoodie behind. A cold, terrible thought struck me. What if some of the Big Mom Syndicate watched my videos? They would recognize Sasha, and if they did, they could link her with me.
If they couldn't get me, they would definitely get her. And if they were as bad as she had said, they would probably torture her to give me up. I would be gone by then, of course, but I wouldn't want her to get hurt.
"Should I call her back? No, no... no calls," I muttered, knowing any digital trace was a mistake. I decided on a faster course of action. I would have to pack my things, then follow her and convince her to come with me, or at least go into deep hiding.
"What the fuck, Druski, what kind of situation am I in?" I cursed the previous owner of this body.
I grabbed my laptop and cameras and packed them. I had no idea where I would go, but I knew that I had to get the fuck out of here.
It wasn't five minutes later when I heard a sharp, knock on my door.
"Must be Sasha. Did she come back for her hoodie?" I said, walking towards the door. This was perfect; I would have no need to go to her place. We could just elope together into the unknown.
I opened the door and I froze.
It was a girl at the door, but not Sasha.
She was dressed in all black: black boots, black jeans, and a slick leather jacket. I couldn't see her hair because it was hidden beneath a black beanie hat.
She was pointing a pistol with a silencer. I don't know why, but she reminded me of The Black Widow—lean, lethal, and radiating cold intent.
"Don't move or do anything stupid, Druski. I won't hesitate to blow your brains off your head," the woman said, her voice low and steady. "Hands where I can see them..."
I obeyed, raising my hands slowly. My heart wasn't just beating; it was a frantic, trapped hummingbird battering itself against my ribs. My stomach felt hollowed out, convinced I was going to piss and shit myself simultaneously.
Every survival instinct screamed for me to collapse, but my mind, trained by the attribute boost, was desperately calculating angles.
"You're an easy man to find, motherfucker," she sneered, waving me back into the room with the muzzle of the suppressed gun.
I went back into the room slowly, my sight never leaving the lethal silence of the weapon.
She stepped inside, her eyes rapidly scanning the mess of towels and camera gear. She took a deep breath, then wrinkled her nose. "I smell ass in here. Have you been enjoying your life fucking whores?"
I didn't answer. I couldn't. My heart was beating the shit out of my chest, and my brains were running fast, calculating. Was this one of Red Eye's people? How had they found me so fast? What did they want with me? Was I going to die here, in this cheap motel, five minutes after a career-defining fuck?
Maybe she had followed Sasha to the motel. Or maybe Sasha had already sold me out to them. Why else would this Black Widow-looking girl show up as soon as Sasha left? I wondered if she hadn't come alone, if there were more of them waiting outside.
"So, this is where you've been shooting your porn videos, Druski. I never thought that you had it in you," she said, her eyes lingering dismissively on the camera equipment.
I didn't answer back at all. I didn't know who I was talking to, or what information would land me a bullet.
"What, you can't talk now, huh?" she snapped, the gun barrel twitching slightly. "I hate being ignored."
"You are pointing a gun at me," I managed, the words catching in my dry throat. "I find it hard to talk under life-threatening situations."
She smiled—a brief, cold flash of teeth that promised violence. "None of this would have happened if you had simply followed orders and met me at the spot the other day. It's all your fault."
Then realization struck, flooding me with a mixture of terror and dark amusement. She was him. She? This woman was Red Eye. The voice on the phone had been digitally altered, but the precise, personal malice, and the comment about the missed meeting, confirmed it. The Syndicate's top enforcer was a cold-blooded woman in a black beanie.