Single Lady Spy 01 - The End of Me

and skidded across the silk nightgown on the still-wet tiles. I landed with my face in the toilet, thank God. Everything left in a series of heaves. My body was still the professional purger it had been all those years before.
    The sickness left as quickly as it had come. I flushed and waited for the feelings to completely pass.
    "You are disgusting. That was a horrif…are you alright?"
    I cursed myself silently when he started out annoyed and turned to sympathetic, upon seeing me kneeling over the toilet.
    I flushed again and waved him away, but he didn’t leave like James would have. He crawled up behind me, kneeling in the water and silk. He held my hair and rubbed my back and speaking in a soft tone, "When I was seventeen, my father took me for a ride in the car. He told me that he was going to make me a man."
    I cringed, imagining where the story could go. I knew a lot of bad things about his father.
    He continued softly, "I imagined he was taking me to one of the premier brothels in the area. Of course, I was already a man, but I was willing to humor him. Instead, he drove us to his factory. He owned a company that packaged goods. He parked and we walked into the factory. I was disappointed, I could have gone for a whore. I'd only been with teenage girls at that point."
    I started to become afraid but his voice was rhythmic and soft. It flowed with the motion of his massaging. His accent seemed thicker.
    "We got inside and I saw all his workers were lined up. There were other men there. I rarely went to the factory but I knew who they were. Father clapped his hands and shouted for a man named Roberto to come forward. The poor man shook when he walked but tried to look proud. I was so naïve. I had no idea what my father wanted."
    I knew exactly what he wanted. I was biting my lip and waiting for it.
    "He handed me a gun and told me that I was to shoot Roberto. I asked him why? He backhanded me in front of the men. His ring cut my cheek slightly. I was scared and confused, I guess. I stood up and took the gun from my father and pulled the trigger. The gun never fired. It was empty. My father laughed and took the gun from me. He backhanded me again and told me that a real man chose for himself, what he did and didn’t do. He told me to take what I wanted in the world and let no man be the ruler of my choices. He said even if I got slapped around by the world, I still needed to make my own choices."
    The story was sad but I was grateful what I assumed was going to happen, never did.
    "Then he raised the gun and shot Roberto. He knew the chamber I fired was empty and the next was not. Roberto died in front of me, bleeding to death and gasping for air. My face stung and I hated my father. He laughed and patted me on the back, then took me to see the real family packaging business. Business was what made me a man. It was never firing the gun. He knew I had that in me, all along."
    I was lost. His story contradicted the back massage, and the fact he was sharing it with me, made me want to run away. I didn’t want to get close to him, not emotionally.
    He sighed, "It was the first time I saw someone die. Very sad day indeed."
    I closed the lid and grabbed some toilet paper to wipe my face. I focused on the silver handle of the toilet and the sensation of the paper wiping my face. I didn’t want inside of his world. I didn’t want to know what he had been through.
    He pressed his face against the back of the robe and kissed me once before standing, "So you see, I understand the feelings you have over killing him. It gets easier I'm afraid." He left the bathroom. I felt considerably worse. Not about killing the fat man, but about the fact I would have to kill him. Servario would have to die, if I was going to get away. He was fucking insane, like his father. And his stories were creepy.
    I washed my face and brushed my teeth with the one toothbrush on the counter, I assumed was for me. I rinsed with mouthwash and left feeling the hopelessness of the situation. I slipped the belladonna in my robe pocket.
    He was waiting on the couch. I walked past him, towards the bed in the smaller bedroom of the two I had noticed. I curled into the sheets and closed my eyes. Every inch of me hurt. The weird bathroom-plane sex had more than likely left marks on my back. The second time made me uncomfortably sore between my legs, and the death of the fat man, and the loss of my children's safety made my heart heavy.
    "Is there a