EPISODE #6

Thomas stood by a large tree in the Slater yard, blocking him from view. He watched Victoria pick up his flower and picture. Her reaction was just what he wanted. He continued his viewing getting much pleasure from it. The tears streaming down her face. The fear in her eyes. The paleness of her skin. Yes, just the reaction he had wanted.
Victoria looked out onto the lawn. Nothing but darkness. She reached down and picked up the flower and picture she had dropped. She quickly turned around and slammed the door. She scanned the hallway. What should she do with this? She had to put it where no one could see it. She flipped the switch to the kitchen light and walked over to the sink. She placed the picture and flower in the side of the sink with the garbage disposal. Shredded to bits, both the flower and picture no trace of them ever existing. She looked past the bar and through the dining room. Her eyes met with his. He was there in front of the window staring at her. She looked away praying it was her imagination. She glanced back. Nothing was there. Her breathing was uneven. She slid down to the floor, her back up against the cabinet. She would never be free of him. Never…
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"L-Laurie I… um…"
"Laurie what are you doing here? What's it matter to you what Austin is doing?"
"I don't believe this Austin. I thought you were one of the good guys. I thought you were a gentlemen. But boy was I wrong. Just like all the other men, a weasel."
"What are you talking about Laurie?" Mia demanded an answer.
"I see he failed to tell you about how he was all over me at the movie theater this afternoon."
"Do what?" Mia couldn't contain the surprise in her voice. "I don't believe you. Austin wouldn't do that. Would you Austin?"
"Er…"
"It's the truth. We went to see a movie and instead of watching it we were making out for two hours."
"Austin, this isn't true is it?"
"Well… um…"
"Why would I randomly lie about something like this? Think Mia." She spotted her purse sitting on top of Mia's plate of food. She snatched it and wiped it on Austin's shirt. "Serves you right."
Mia gasped, "That was completely uncalled for!"
"Stay out of this. This is between me and Austin."
"Laurie I'm…"
Mia grabbed her coke and poured it on Laurie.
"You little bitch!" Laurie lunged for Mia but was pulled back by Austin.
"Laurie's right. This is between her and I."
"So she is telling the truth?"
Laurie wiggled. "Let me go Austin!"
The manager walked over to the porch. "What is going on here?"
"Shut up!" All three said in unison.
"I can't believe you would do something like that Austin." Mia picked up her shawl and purse. "I'm leaving. I don't care how cute you are I won't put up with stuff like this." She walked away from the scene.
Austin released his grip. "Laurie… I'm really…"
"I don't care to hear it. What you did was wrong." She turned her back and left Austin by himself.
"Dammit…" He shrugged.
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"That looked pretty intense." Simone stated.
"Oh yes. Young love."
"Like we're much older?"
"Eighteen and twenty-five. Not much age difference but a lot of maturing and learning."
"I guess so. There's a lot more drama at the age."
"I don't know our lives now are pretty dramatic."
"If your sister wasn't around… I'm not even going to finish that sentence."
"She does keep our lives entertained though."
"Yeah…" She peered out at the ocean. Sarah's day would come soon enough and when it did she wanted to be there, watching every minute of it. The thought of the woman disgusted her. How could a woman do so much harm and never pay a single price for it?
"Something wrong Simone?"
"Uh. No. Nothing at all…" She smiled hiding her inner anger.
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Thomas pulled a picture of a woman out of his pants pocket. She was beautiful in every way possible. He liked to keep things organized and neat. Though Victoria and the district attorney's secretary were purely spontaneous. He walked away from the Slater mansion and down the street heading downtown to claim his next victim.
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Laurie entered her dorm room and headed straight towards the fridge. She took out a gallon carton of cookie dough ice cream, grabbed a spoon and plopped down on the couch. Damn Austin. Why couldn't she ever find a good guy? Her relationship history was a serious of mishaps and misses, all ending with her heart broken and a carton of ice cream in her lap. She turned on the television and put it on the Oxygen channel. She had saw previews for a marathon of romantic comedies. Why couldn't life be like in the movies? Everything ending with a happy ending, well most of the time. She let herself get lost in the movie. Unconsciously still eating the ice cream. She was disturbed by a knock at the door. She placed the ice cream carton on the small table beside the couch and got up to answer it. She opened the door and shrugged. "What do you want?"
Mia walked into the dorm room without permission. "We need to talk."
"About what?"
"This Austin thing."
"Mia. I don't want to talk about it. All I want to do is sit on the couch, eat ice cream, watch romantic movies and pretend I'm in them."
"You're eating ice cream too?" She looked at the cookie dough ice cream on the table. "Mmm… cookie dough. I was eating peanut butter chunk."
"Mia…"
"I'm the type of person that if I don't get things resolved I'll never sleep and I need to sleep, I like to sleep. So let's just get this conversation over with."
"Fine. I give up." She sighed and ran her hand through her hair.
"Obviously we both can't have Austin."
"Obviously."
"And obviously we both really like him."
"I don't think so."
"Huh?"
"I know all about your little school girl crush on Noah Robinson."
"Well that crush was crushed today… He's engaged did you know that?"
"Uh yeah. Don't you read the paper?"
"No… Well you think someone could tell me about it. After all every knew I had the hugest crush on him. Anyway getting off topic. Austin's cute."
"Very."
"And definitely available."
"Right."
"So how should we resolve this?"
"I have no earthly idea."
"Well we need to come up with something."
"Oh jeez Mia why don't we just flip a coin?" She said sarcastically.
"I'm serious Laurie. Though a coin would be a really simple way of solving this…"
"I've got it. Why don't we let him decide? Because no matter what someone's going to end up getting hurt in this situation."
"True. Yeah. So let him decide…"
"Are we done here?"
"I guess so…"
"Okay good then get out of my room so I can finish eating my ice cream and watch this marathon."
"Okay…"
Laurie closed the door and rubbed her temples. What a mess…
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Sarah sat at a table in The Getaway. Someone being attacked in the restroom didn't seem to hurt business at all. The club was hopping and she was enjoying it. She had been there for about twenty minutes nursing a martini. Who said she had a problem with alcohol? So she got a little out of hand every now and then. She could easily control her drinking. She picked up the toothpick with olive on the end, dipped it in the drink and ate the olive. She was dressed in a red halter-top dress, matching red heels and her hair was pulled back with a red rose for decoration. She was bound to have fun tonight and she certainly was looking hot.
She spotted a dark skinned man with short black hair looking at her. "Wow…" she said under her breath. She smiled at the man and returned to sipping her drink. Play hard to get that's the way to do it…
The man stood up and walked towards Sarah. Mmhmm. Works every time. "Hi."
"Hey there. Would you like to sit down?"
"Sure."
She motioned for him to sit by her. "How you doing tonight?"
"I'm doing good. Even though I got stood up."
"Ouch. That's not good."
"Yeah. It was supposed to be one of those blind dates. My friend had set it up."
"Ehh. Blind dates suck. You're learning from the expert here."
He laughed. "I noticed you were sitting here by yourself. No date?"
"Nope."
"That's a shame. A woman as beautiful such as yourself should never be without a date."
"Oh please go on." She joked. "I'm flattered."
"You should be. I mean it."
"You're certainly not from here. Gentlemen around here are few and far between and that's not any type of an American accent. Where are you from?"
"Israel."
"Whoa. Little far from home aren't we?"
"Yeah."
"So you're Jewish then?"
"Yes I am."
"Orthodox?"
He nodded yes.
She looked at the man sitting beside her. There's got to be a flaw somewhere. Handsome, polite, charming. Yeah there was definitely a flaw somewhere.
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April walked out of the hospital's main door. She yawned. Today had been so stressful. She just wanted to go home and go to bed. She dug in her purse and took out her cell phone. She hit Kyle's number on her one touch dialing.
"Hello." A saddened voice answered.
"Kyle?"
"Hey April."
"Something wrong?"
"Uh… no."
"Are you sure?"
"Yeah. Everything's fine. I just had a bad day. I'm actually just going to bed. I won't be up for dinner tonight. I'm sorry."
"It's okay. I'm pretty tired myself. Well, I'll let you go to sleep. I call you tomorrow."
"All right." He hung up his phone.
Something was wrong with Kyle. He never sounded that bad. She shrugged. Everything had been going so well and now this, whatever it was. She put her cell phone back in her purse and took out her car keys. She began walking to her car but before she could reach it she bumped into someone.
"Hello." Thomas grinned.
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Felicia propped her feet on Kyle's desk. "Perfect fit." She smiled in triumph. It had taken a while but she had finally reached her goal, district attorney. Tomorrow she would be Heaven Beach's new district attorney. She deserved to be on top and now she was. It only took killing a man and blackmailing another but you have to fight to survive in this world. She looked at the "to do" list Kyle had made for himself. Hire a law clerk, appoint an assistant district attorney, hire a secretary. Had he accomplished anything being the D.A. she pondered. She scanned her mind. Assistant district attorney was easy. She had offered it to Kyle but he had refused her second choice was an old colleague of hers, Elizabeth Harper. She had a small firm in Tampa Bay and would be perfect for the job.
She picked up the phone, "Elizabeth. It's Felicia. How are you? I've got a proposition for you…"
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"So what's your name?"
"Amir Chazel."
"I wish my name was that original. That's a beautiful name."
"Thank you."
"Sarah Robinson. Pleased to meet you."
"Not nearly as pleased as I am."
"Uh oh. More of the charm." She laughed.
"Would you like to dance?"
She looked at the crammed dance floor. "You think they'll be room for us?"
"Sure there will. Come on." He held her hand and led her out to the dance floor.
"I haven't danced in forever so excuse me in advanced in case I step on your feet."
"It's no problem." He smiled widely.
She winked at him. She couldn't remember the last time she had this much fun.
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Kyle walked over the cabinet and grabbed a bottle of vodka. He started to drink his sorrows away. How could he have been so stupid? He had a great thing going with April and a great thing going with his job. Felicia had made him choose between his job and April. The question was had he made the right choice? He took another chug from the bottle.
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"Can I help you?" A chill ran up her spine. This man gave her the creeps.
Thomas grabbed her wrist and sharply turned her around.
"What are you doing?"
He put the blade her back. "Don't say a word."
"W-What…"
He applied more pressure. "Not one word. You see that alley over there? Just nod."
She nodded as a tear rolled down her cheek.
"Walk towards it. If you say anything I will stab you. Understand?"
She nodded again. Please God. Please don't let this happen. Please, she pleaded.
They walked briskly towards the alley.
Please God make someone see me. They'll know something's wrong. They neared the alley. Oh God. Please no. Okay, wait. There's no need to panic yet. Stay strong April. Stay strong. You can stop this. She looked down at the ground and came up with a plan.
"You're so beautiful. I'm sure you know that though." He smelled her hair. "Smell good too."
She got up her courage and executed her plan. She stomped on his foot and elbowed him in the stomach. She grabbed her cell phone and hit Kyle's number. As she called she began to run away from the alley.
"Hello?" A drunken Kyle answered.
"Kyle! Help me I've been--"
Thomas grabbed her and dragged her back into the alley. She dropped the cell phone and began screaming as she was being pulled back into the alley. "Kyle! Call 911!" He slung her up against the alley wall and held the knife to her throat.
"What the hell were you thinking?"
"I--"
"Shut up!" He slapped her across the face. Blood began trickling from her lip. "Don't you ever try something like that do you understand me?" He slammed her up against the wall harder. "Do you understand me?"
"Y-Yes."
"Good. Now just shut up or I will kill you and I would hate to kill something as pretty as you."
Oh God please help me…
He began tearing at her clothes.
Please God…
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Nicholas stood outside of the hospital. He pulled a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket and lit one. Good thing it was dark and no one was outside. He needed to get out of that damned hospital for a minute. He spotted a group of teenage girls pulling up to the hospital. He turned around and walked away. Not wanting to take the chance of being seen. He saw an alley next to the hospital and began walking towards it. Little creepy but who would spot him in an alley?
He walked into the alley and saw two people up against the wall. "Uh… sorry. I didn't see anything." He began to walk away.
Thomas was startled and lost attention of April. She took advantaged of his state and pushed him away from her. "Nicholas!" She bolted towards him, her clothes half torn. "Help me!" She ran behind him and grabbed his wrist. "Help me…"
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Sarah and Amir stepped out of the club. "You're not too bad of a dancer."
She laughed. "Yeah… I guess I still have it in me."
"I'm usually not his blunt… but here's my number." He pulled a napkin out of his pocket. "I've had it written ever since I saw you tonight." He handed her the napkin.
She looked at the napkin. "Whoa. This must be my lucky night."
He laughed.
"Are you busy tomorrow night?"
"Not really."
"Maybe we could see each other?"
"Sure."
"I haven't been to the boardwalk in forever. You want to go there?"
"Yeah. I love the boardwalk."
"All right." She smiled at him for the thousandth time that night.
"Well… I…"
"Yeah. I'll call you. Good night." She kissed him on the cheek and walked towards the parking lot. She glanced around her. No one was around. She jumped up and squealed. She opened her car door and got in. "Oh my God he is so amazing…"
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"Nicholas. Please help me. He was trying to rape me."
"Shut up! No I wasn't she's lying. She wanted it as much as I did."
"Help me Nicholas…"
"Don't believe her man she's lying."
"Please…"
Nicholas touched April with his left hand, reassuring her she was safe. "Look man I don't want to have to call the cops or anything and cause a big scene. Why don't you just leave? It'll make things easier on all of us."
He spat on the ground. "Fine." He approached April. "I'll see you again…" He walked away into the darkness.
April hugged Nicholas and burst out into tears. "Oh God…"
He hugged her back. "Shh… everything's okay now April. Everything's okay…" He hardly knew April but she didn't seem to be the type to have sex in an alley.
"Thank you so much." She was still holding on to him. She didn't want to let go. "I-I don't even want to think about what would have happened if you wouldn't have shown up…"
"Everything's okay April. Nothing happened that's all that matters."
"Thank you…"